Fathers and Sons

Why it’s on the list: Turgenev’s novel of a generational rupture in provincial Russia, in which the young Bazarov announces that he accepts nothing on authority — the book that gave “nihilism” its currency as a label for a real movement. Turgenev refuses to settle the argument: the older generation is ineffectual, the younger one corrosive, and Bazarov is undone by the very feelings his programme denies.

Where I heard about it

• Brendan McCord — on his Philosopher-Entrepreneur Reading List, March 2026, in the section on Literature and Societal Critique, as the novel that named a movement before the movement could describe itself. The full 211-entry list is on The Philosopher-Entrepreneur Reading List.

Connections

• Culture — the generational rupture the novel registers.
• Socialism — the radical Russian current Bazarov prefigures.
• The Philosopher-Entrepreneur Reading List — the curriculum this came from.