Talk:What Is To Be Done? (novel by Chernyshevsky)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
[edit] False interpretations
The statement "Within the framework of a story of a privilegied couple who decide to work for the revolution, and ruthlessly subordinate everything in their lives to the cause, the work furnished a blueprint for the asceticism and dedication unto death which became an ideal of the early socialist underground of the Russian Empire." is at least highly controversial. In no way do the main characters of the book, i.e. Vera Pavlovna and Lopukhov, work for the revolution - in fact, all Vera Pavlovna does is establishing co-operative society for seamstresses. The novel praised the marriage with equal rights for a husband and a wife - although it was considered "nihilist" by some retrograds at the time, in no way can it be named "revolutionary". The character who really "subordinated everything in his life to the cause", Rakhmetov, is not the one who personifies Chernyshevsky's ideals - that's a common view of contemporary critics. However, this character did influence Lenin a lot. Kollfan 20:41, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
