Contemplating an old master's paintings: first, a boy and his
bird. An expression of fear and shock forever imprinted on that bird.
Alas, a cat attacked it and though it survived, later a rat bit off its
beak. This is a disturbing composition, with striking images. Still,
there is elegance in the rendering and an intricacy not immediately
perceived.Surviving in a hut, a former healthy and beautiful girl, whose joy was dance and song. Now in her 30s, on her own, paralyzed and atrophied. In spite of tragedies, serenity settled on that fate tested face. Another one: in a clearing a wealthy young man acting cruel towards his conquest, a village girl. The hunter and the hurting pray. Her helplessness is remarkably vivid. One fantasizes a way of helping her, envisions a happier resolution to her story.
These are crumbles of the profoundness that A hunter's album offers. This is Turgenev's collection of short stories, not actual paintings, works of art nonetheless.
Similar to one of the characters mentioned, the narrator is a huntsman. In spite of his position, he is a sympathetic witness. This huntsman glances under the veil of a troubled world. 19th century Russia, when nearly all villagers were childlike and all their lives - dependence. A place in time when simple people were serfs on a lord of the manor's land. What today are ones pears or neighbors, appeared as underdeveloped and under-capable beings. The mind blocks such realities.
This is not a upworthy nor a depressing read. It's an effort of raising consciousness on a reality: it is what it is, actually, it was what it was.
The album numbers 25 sketches. Stories of: serfs, professionals from that time (a miller, a doctor), neighbors, lords of the manor. Day and night, danger and happiness. Turgenev muses over a community of friendly and pleasant people, their children, also over the bad lots - poor and rich alike.
There are circles inside circles in this depictions. There is a circle of personal stories and details inside one exhibiting the community. These also become absorbed into an implicit one of societal and political norms. Including all mentioned before and shading a warmer light on them, the background circle of nature and fauna. Beyond its politics and social injustices, the world is a beautiful one.
There is deep love for nature in these sketches, Turgenev describes it amazingly. The hunter is never a usurper nor a destroyer, he appears as a pursuer of beauty. He does profit from this world, but with respect.
People and societal representations were complex in their detail, emotionality and diversity. They converged towards one vision: realism. However, the complexity of nature depictions resides in their entirety. Imagined as paintings they do not form a thread leading towards a purpose. They are a gallery of longings and belongings. The imagined gallery displays realistic paintings - Courbet comes to mind. Also romanticist ones (Turner) and it even finds space for impressionism luminosity. It is a skillful achievement.
Realism in social and political descriptions, on the other hand an uplifting, expanded vision for nature. The landscape sustains human life. And there human life can escape to recover. It is compelling that with the distance of years passed and the distance of social advances, one still finds restoration power in Turgenev's world.
The starting point in approaching Turgenev's stories ought to be the need for knowledge and historical accuracy. Its importance prevails. One starts a journey into the hunter's world to gain a more valuable understanding of his times and to see what he saw. Yet what digests, is this worlds beauty and the arresting character descriptions.
How does a beakless bird and an abandoned invalid insert into world transformation? How did a hunter innovate reality? In real life Turgenev was "the hunter", born into a land-owners family. As already remarked, he is one sympathetic towards his characters. That is to say not empathetic. The storyteller is never someone else than himself, he employs the distance for detachment. Perhaps, stories immersing completely in such cruelties would have been unbearable to read. As it stands, this book had major impact, being linked with the serfdom abolition. It was also Turgenev's first remarkable work.
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