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'superfluous man' typical of Russia's intelligentsia in the 1840's he is none the less a failure in the vein of Don Quixote or Hamlet. His pettiness, his habit of interfering in other people's lives and borrowing their money, his sterility in the face of love he enflames in Natalya, the novel's heroine, are all redeemed by eloquence. He has a capacity for sudden lightning access to truth that inspires everyone who knows him. ' He has enthusiasm,' remarks one of the characters, 'and that, believe me- for I speak as a phlegmatic man- is a most precious quality in our time. We have all become intolerably rational, indifferent and effete; we have gone to sleep. We have grown cold, and we should be grateful to anyone who rouses us and warms us, if only for a moment!'
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