First Love is a novella by Ivan Turgenev, first published in 1860. It is one of his most popular pieces of short fiction. It tells the story of Vladimir Petrovich, a sixteen year-old,that is staying in the country with his family and there meets his new neighbor, Zinaida Alexandrovna Zasyekina, a beautiful twenty-one year-old woman who is staying with her mother, the Princess Zasyekina. This family, as with many of the Russian minor nobility with royal ties of that time, were only afforded a degree of respectability because of their titles; the Zasyekins, in the case of this story, are a very poor family. The young Vladimir falls in love with Zinaida, who has a set of several other (socially more eligible) suitors whom he joins in their difficult and often fruitless efforts for the young lady's favour. Zinaida, as is revealed throughout the story, is a thoroughly capricious and somewhat playful mistress to these rather love-struck suitors.
- ISBN10 1074495845
- ISBN13 9781074495848
- Publish Date 17 June 2019 (first published 15 January 2014)
- Publish Status Active
- Imprint Independently Published
- Format Paperback (US Trade)
- Pages 138
- Language English