"These restless youths found another mirror of their attitudes in Bazarov, the young hero of Turgenev's novel Fathers and Sons (1862). Turgenev (a 'man of the f

"These restless youths found another mirror of their attitudes in Bazarov, the young hero of Turgenev's novel Fathers and Sons (1862). Turgenev (a 'man of the forties') had intended him as a monstrous caricature of the nihilists, whom he regarded as narrowly materialist, morally slippery and artistically philistine, although later he would pretend otherwise. There was a striking resemblance between Bazarov and the student idol Pisarev. Yet such was the gulf of misunderstanding between the fathers and sons of real life that the young radicals took his faults as virtues and acclaimed Bazarov as their ideal man." - A People's Tragedy: The Russian Revolution: 1891-1924 This is probably the reason why it was distrusted by the Left and the Right. The right disliked the message his characters such as Bazarov presented, the left disliked the message his characters like Pavel Petrovich presented.