Chapter 26: Summary
The chapter opens with Arkady and Katya sitting on a bench at the portico. Anna had previously warned Katya to be more careful in her behavior with Arkady (174). She tells Arkady it is the last time they can
be alone. They hear Anna and Bazarov walking by and listen quietly. Anna is telling Bazarov that she thinks about Arkady more often and that she thinks Arkady has become like a brother to Katya. Bazarov tells Anna she is free (176).
After they have gone, Arkady proceeds to tell Katya that he loves her, and he asks her to marry him. She says yes. Anna and Bazarov the next day meet. Anna receives a letter from Arkady asking for Katya’s hand. She and Bazarov both agree to allow them to marry.
Bazarov is saying good-bye to Arkady, and Bazarov gives some good, fatherly advice to his pupil. He tells Arkady that Arkady is not cut out to be a progressive, and that it fits him to marry. He offers Arkady a hug.
Anna even finds joy in Arkady and Katya’s love. She is excited about their future.
Chapter 26: Analysis
Bazarov is finally doing the right thing. He realizes what he is and what he has done to people. He knows he must leave. He is acting for the first time like a father to Arkady. He tells Arkady to get married and have lots of children. We feel a sense of gratitude to Bazarov for saying the right things to Arkady.
Arkady has grown up and is free from the overpowering influence of Bazarov. He can finally make his own decisions. He cries as he embraces Bazarov for the last time. The reader here is filled with a sense of relief for Arkady and a sadness for Bazarov’s character. He is alone and probably still angry, but he says that is what it’s going to take to revolutionize his country.
Chapter 27: Summary
Bazarov goes home and tells his father that he’ll be staying for six weeks, but he must not be bothered, so he can do his work. Vasily doesn’t mind, he is so happy to have Bazarov home again. He tells mother not to bother Bazarov. But soon Bazarov starts to spend more time with his father. Vasily notices that Bazarov is “distressed” and “wretched” (181). Bazarov was bored. He started to help his father with the doctoring of the muzhiks (Russian peasants) because his father was awkward with his hands. Bazarov soon “found himself an occupation” (183). Vasily is proud of his son.
Bazarov contracts blood poisoning from helping with an autopsy on a man who dies from typhus. Bazarov knows he’s going to die and asks that a message be sent to Anna Odintsova that Bazarov sends his respects and is dying. Vasily asks Bazarov to do his Christian duty before he dies, and Bazarov says he will if it comforts his father.
Anna Odintsova comes, and Bazarov tells her that he loved her and he thinks that she is wonderful (193). She kisses him on his forehead. He becomes unconscious and dies the next day.
Chapter 27: Analysis
Bazarov has a premonition that he is going to die. When he says his final good-bye to Arkady and everyone at the farm, he knows he has lost out on happiness. The reader sees some growth in his character and by this time in the story has grown accustomed to his idiosyncratic, cynical personality that sometimes is maybe just his way of showing others that he likes them.
When he says his last good-bye to Anna after the duel had happened, Bazarov actually says that he is going away for a long time (170). He also says that he doesn’t want her to remember him with disgust. Bazarov knows the kind of person he is, and he is coming to terms with this at this point in the story. We even find that he has always been jealous of Arkady. His last words before he dies express his realization of the kind of people in the world who truly matter: people like his parents, simple, hard-working, honest people. Finally, we are left with Bazarov reconciling himself with himself.
Chapter 28: Summary
In this final chapter, Arkady and Katya get married, and Nikolay and Fenechka get married. Nikolay is giving a farewell party for Pavel, who is leaving for Moscow on business.
Anna is married to a Russian statesman, Anna’s aunt dies, Arkady and Nikolay are living on the farm with their wives, Arkady runs the farm, and Nikolay has become a public official. Katya and Arkady have a son, Kolya.
Pavel lives in Dresden, goes to church and is a perfect gentleman (198).
Vasily and Arina visit their son’s grave often.
Chapter 28: Analysis
The novel becomes unified with Nikolay and his son living together on the family’s farm. Nikolay was worried and anxious at the beginning of the story when Arkady resisted his father’s traditional ways. But in the end, he is with his father, taking care of the farm, married and content. Father and son have been united.
For another, however, the story does not end so happily. Bazarov dies, leaving his parents to grieve for him. Despite the loss of his son, however, Vasily is content to know that Bazarov had fulfilled his father’s wishes for him to meet his God before he died: a sad, but bittersweet ending for one father, and a joyous ending for another. But that is the way of life.
Our Networks