Ivan Goncharov

Oblomov

Ivan Goncharov

Ivan Alexandrovich Goncharov (1812-1891) was a Russian novelist who achieved literary fame later in life, after a career in the civil-service which spanned more than thirty years. His first novel, «A Common Story», was a definitive success and his notoriety was cemented with the publication of his second novel, «Oblomov», in 1850. Based on a short story written a year prior, «Oblomov» is about a cultured, intelligent, upper middle class man experiencing a mid-life crisis. Ilya Ilyich Oblomov has sunk into a lethargic stupor, which he calls «Oblomovism,» and spends the majority of his time lying on the sofa or in bed. Goncharov portrays beautifully the process of Oblomov's decline, as well as its consequences, at first through flashbacks and then through the intervention of Andrey Stoltz, a man quite the opposite of Oblomov. The novel was revered for its brutal but honest representation of the slothfulness of the Russian gentry, and has become a timeless classic of Russian and psychological fiction.

Oblomov

Ivan Goncharov

Based on a novel by the Russian writer Ivan Goncharov, this dramatic comedy features his eponymous hero, Oblomov. A young man of considerable decency and kindness (with a «soul as clear as crystal»), Oblomov has fallen into such a state of lethargy that he resists even getting out of bed, finding every excuse possible to do absolutely nothing. All the efforts of his male and female friends to energize him ultimately fail in various hilarious ways. Goncharov's character became so identifiable, so emblematic of a particular subset of the upper classes, that it became a byword (olbomovism) for self-imposed laziness and indolence.