Vera Figner
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Vera Figner was born into a family of aristocrats and seemingly grew up with all of the benefit and privilege afforded to persons of similar means in Russia, at the time. Yet, she describes this upbringing as Spartan (Figner 37). To some extent, the ôSpartanö characteristic of her upbringing could have been due to some level of exploitation of the lower level of the ôaristocraticö class by the Tsar. While there was clear exploitation of the peasant, working class (the serfs), FignerÆs portrayal of her youth demonstrates that some of this exploitation occurred within in the lower levels of landed gentry, such as her father, as well. This may also explain why her father had to work in a bureaucratic job to help make ends meet for his family. Vera appears to have been a very attractive young woman and likely was determined to be successful at whatever she chose to accomplish. The example of the padlock (Figner 22) is the first glimpse the reader gets pertaining to her character and strength of will and determination. This particular example demonstrates what would be a lifelong characteristic of being able to take a high level of accountability for her actions, whether these actions were right or wrong. For Vera, her domestic life appears to have been typical of others of her station until 1861 when the serfs were emancipated and the social order in Russia began to change for the first time. While her father was an overbearing, blustering aristocrat and government bur
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Will, that she came to clearly see (somewhere around the age of twelve) the vast disparity between the two classes in Russia. On the one hand, the aristocrats, best described as living in a state of ôàsated complacency, emptiness and the golden tinsel of lifeà.ö (31), in contrast with the regular people, described as having ôàlofty ideals, conflict and sufferingà.ö (Figner 31). She would come to see this suffering very acutely in the time following her departure from medical school when she worked as an ôAssistant Doctor.ö The suffering that she had to see during this period clearly had a profound effect on her perception of the ôvalueö of the imperialist government of the Tsar and his minions.
It appears that in her early years, Figner had little use for the first groupùthe aristocratic class. What is unclear is whether this was because they offered her little if any intellectual stimulation or whether it was because she had little exposure to others of her ôclass and statureö while growing up and during her formal education process. This writer assumes it is a good mixture of both. In the year or so following her formal education she had limited social interactions outside of a small group of relatives and this shaped m
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Approximate Word count = 1432
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page)
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