Love in Turgenev's story First Love is treated as a brief whirlwind or summer storm that overwhelms its people and transforms them. Vladimir's love for Zinaida triggers such a transformation, transforming him from a naive and idealistic boy to a man. The story of his first love is one that haunts Vladimir into old age, and telling his story serves as a reconciliation with his past and the pain he felt when his first love betrayed him. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay Turgenev uses this short story to tell readers about his feelings about love in general, but especially about first love and love at first sight. It treats the topic of love in a rather condescending way. Presented only with the evidence from this book, it might be fair to say that Turgenev believes that first love is not only petty but that it is not true love. Turgenev's hero, Vladimir, is so young, idealistic and naive that from the beginning the reader is able to see through him and equally see through his love. In portraying such a fickle and flirtatious heroine, Turgenev also suggests the falsity of this love story. Even more than Vladimir, Zinaida is a transparent character of which only one aspect is mentioned in depth: her appearance. It's amazing that Vladimir has such passionate feelings for a woman he barely knows. This exaggeration of Vladimir's emotions, as well as the transparency of his characters, openly states Turgenev's contempt for first love. The character of young Vladimir is comparable to that of Lensky in Pushkin's Eugene Onegin. Both are naive boys, very idealistic and full of romantic ideology. Both have led sheltered lives and had the freedom to let their ideals run wild and blend into the idyllic and illusory image of humanity and the world in which they live. Both are dreamers and hopeless romantics whose books are full of poetry and hearts are full of passion. More importantly, they both believe they have experienced true love, and ironically, the objects of their affection are strikingly similar. Both Zinaida and Olga have a strong resemblance to each other and are in fact almost identical in many ways. Both are described as exquisite, beautiful, graceful and enchanting, but that is where their descriptions stop. There isn't much reference to their inner feelings and both lack the characterization that their male counterparts have. Above all, Olga is described only physically and then fades into the background of the story. Zinaida has a domineering and mocking personality, which makes her a slightly more complete character than Olga, but the description is still kept mainly external. Due to the nature of both Zinaida and Vladimir's characters, Vladimir ultimately falls in love with her. idealized image he has of Zinaida. Her extraordinarily beautiful appearance alters Vladimir's judgment of her as a superficial and empty person and instead her aesthetically pleasing appearance fascinates him. She may also be the image of perfection in her poetry books, making her even more attractive. Zinaida is made to be looked at and admired. Vladimir fell into the trap of loving her image and thinking that he was actually falling in love with Zinaida as a person. For Vladimir his first love was love at first sight; one of the most exciting but probably frivolous types of love there is. It's exciting because love is exciting; He has Vladimir, who dances around his room and has a mischievous half-smile on his face causing his father (who barely notices him) to tell him.