"Rudin" by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev is a novel first published in 1856. It introduces Turgenev's enduring theme of the "superfluous man"—an eloquent, educated nobleman whose intellectual brilliance masks a fatal inability to act. When the charismatic but penniless Rudin arrives at a country estate, he captivates its inhabitants with his words and captures the heart of Natalya, a perceptive seventeen-year-old daughter of the estate owner. Their love story becomes a test of whether Rudin's soaring rhetoric can translate into genuine deed. (This is an automatically generated summary.)
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