This volume features two of Turgenev's best works of short fiction: the touching First Love (1860), a semi-autobiographical novella, and The Diary of a Superfluous Man (1850), the fascinating tale of a Russian Hamlet. Both provide superb introductions to the author's keen social perception, rich characterization, and narrative command.

In this volume of "First Love and Other Stories" six of Turgenev's shorter works are collected together. Firstly in "The Diary of a Superfluous Man" we find the story of a dying man who recounts the incidents of his life. Secondly this collection contains the short story "Mumu", which relates what follows when Gerasim, a deaf and mute man, rescues a drowning dog. Thirdly, in "Acia", there is the story of an unnamed narrator who recounts, in a remorseful...

The following attempts at literary portraiture originally appeared, with three exceptions, in American periodicals—The Atlantic Monthly, The Century, and Harper’s Weekly. The paper on Emerson was contributed to Macmillan’s Magazine, that on “The Art of Fiction” to Longman’s and that on M. Guy de Maupassant to The Fortnightly Review. The reminiscences of Turgénieff were written immediately after his death, the article on Anthony Trollope...