A Reckless Character

In Ivan Turgenev's A Reckless Character, a conversation about whether modern recklessness is truly new leads an older narrator to recall Misha Polteff, a young man whose life becomes a study in danger, excess, and self-ruin. Raised in a strict, devout household of ritual and restraint, Misha begins as a delicate, obedient boy with something unsettling beneath his manners, then transforms after his parents' deaths into a dandy of drink, gambling, and extravagant pleasure. He careens from repentance to debauchery, from monastery vows to military service, borrowing money, charming women, and surviving one absurdly perilous feat after another. Yet behind the bravado lies a deeper emptiness, a restless "spleen" that drives him toward humiliation, poverty, and desperate protest. In a darker parallel, Fabio becomes trapped in the eerie mystery of Muzio, a figure surrounded by silence, ritual, and the uncanny power of a Malay attendant. As Muzio appears alternately dead, alive, and spellbound, Fabio is drawn into a world of obsession, fear, and inexplicable influence. The story closes on unresolved tension, where secrecy, emotional damage, and the possibility of new life linger side by side. This edition has been fully restored with modern typesetting, custom cover design.