Love in Turgenev's short story, First Love, is treated as a brief whirlwind or summer storm that sweeps away its people and transforms them. Vladimir's love for Zinaida triggers such a transformation, transforming him from a naive and idealistic young boy into a man. The story of his first love haunts Vladimir until his old age and telling his story acts 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 Should Not Be Banned”?Get the original essayTurgenev uses this short story to tell readers his feelings about love in general, but specifically about first love and lovemaking of lightning. He treats the subject of love with a certain condescension. Presented with the evidence of this book alone, it may be accurate to say that Turgenev believes that first love is not only paltry, but that it is not true love. Turgenev's hero, Vladimir, is so young, idealistic and naive that from the very beginning the reader is able to see through him and similarly see through his love. By portraying such a light and flirtatious heroine, Turgenev also suggests the falsity of this love story. Even more than Vladimir, Zinaida is a transparent character of whom only one aspect is discussed in depth: her appearance. It's incredible 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 blatantly testify to 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, very idealistic young boys and full of romantic ideology. Both led sheltered lives and had the freedom to let their ideals run wild and blend into the idyllic, illusory image of humanity and the world they inhabit. Both are dreamers and hopeless romantics whose books are filled with poetry and hearts filled with passion. More importantly, both believe they have experienced true love and, ironically, the objects of their affection are strikingly similar. Both Zinaida and Olga bear a strong resemblance and are in fact almost identical in many ways. Both are described as exquisite, beautiful, graceful and enchanting, but that is where their descriptions end. There isn't much reference to their inner feelings and they both lack the characterization of their male counterparts. Olga in particular is only described physically and then disappears into the background of the story. Zinaida has a dominating and mocking personality, which makes her a little rounder than Olga, but the description remains mainly external. Due to the nature of Zinaida and Vladimir's characters, Vladimir ultimately falls in love with the character. the idealized image he has of Zinaïda. Her extremely beautiful exterior alters Vladimir's judgment of her as a shallow and empty person and, instead, her aesthetically pleasing exterior captivates him. She can also be the picture of perfection in her poetry books, making her all the more attractive. Zinaida is made to be looked at and admired. Vladimir fell into the trap of loving her image and thinking that in fact he was falling in love with Zinaida as a person. For Vladimir, his first love was love at first sight; one of the most exciting and probably the most frivolous types of love there is. It's exciting because love is exciting; Vladimir dances in his room and.