Christmas Reading: "Fathers and Sons" by Turgenev

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Originally Posted by Etienne

Arkady was never really a nihilist and wouldn't have acted like Bazarov. Even though he might have had some nihilist beliefs they were only a surface and wouldn't affect his real character which is calm, polite and gentle. Absolutely not like Bazarov.

Etienne, I agree with this and I thik it totally obsurd to reverse their characteristics or personalities; they are who they are. What is the point of 'what ifs'. We should just go ahead and discuss the other aspects of the story.

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Nihilism is the ideal he tries to live with, and only this makes him a nihilist. There is no perfect nihilist, like there is no perfect Christian, for example. You are not a nihilist only if you are the "perfect" nihilist. But again this is really just semantics and hair-splitting...

I agree with this concept and your comments, but most of all - that all this talk, of whether this character or that character is a 'true nihilist' is definitely 'hair-splitting....not to mention downright boring, at this point. What happened to the book discussion?