Books: Through Gentle Eyes

A SPORTSMAN'S NOTEBOOK (398 pp.)—Ivan Turgenev, translated by Charles and Natasha Hepburn — Chanticleer ($2).

A century ago these lyrical sketches of Russian country life were considered an incendiary call for the abolition of Russian serfdom. When the book first appeared in 1852, the czar's advisers strongly warned lim against it. But Alexander II read the book and later admitted that it had indeed helped persuade him to free the serfs.

Republished for the first time in 18 years (in a new translation), A Sports man's Notebook now seems far removed from all such flaming issues, and the brutality of the feudal masters...

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