A Hero of Our Time

Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov (1814–1841) is one of the most significant poets of 19th-century Russian literature. The combination of simplicity and sublimity, naturalness and originality is what distinguishes the master’s hand—and his ability to depict the characters of his heroes objectively, revealing one person through the perception of another—still fascinates both readers and critics. The famous novel “A Hero of Our Time” tells of the astonishing fate of an “extra” secular man: talented, yet doomed to never be happy because of the very circumstances of his birth, upbringing, and belonging to a particular circle.