In Mikhail Lermontov's novel A Hero of Our Time, the author brings out the irony surrounding various characters, with Pechorin taking center stage. Pechorin's portrait is considered in the book as an exemplary Byronic anti-hero and Lermontov describes him as a typical man of his time. The author creates a hero who is both cynical and intelligent, honest but violent, not alive in the absolute sense of this world, but not yet dead, at least not physically. In other words, Pechorin is a complex character full of contradictions. But it is precisely with these contradictions that he appears as a human being whose life is a struggle for meaning. Pechorin is a very existential character. He understands his life as a senseless event. He wants to love women, but he has spent his life without giving them respect and taking only love from them without giving anything back. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why violent video games should not be banned"? Get an original essay In one stage of the book, Pechorin clearly states that he does not know what he is living for, and this feeling of uselessness is a source of his inner personal melancholy. Pechorin is doomed to die from the start because living a life of sensual pleasure and cynical introspection, without ever experiencing a feeling of true unity with anyone, and not knowing his true purpose, no matter how great he was smart and intelligent, Pechorin's life is aimed at death at the fastest possible pace. In a particularly interesting passage, he speaks of himself as follows: “So what? If I die, I die. It won't be a great loss to the world, and life bores me completely. I am like a man. yawning at the ball; the only reason he doesn't go to bed is because his car hasn't arrived yet” (Lermontov, 36). This phrase of Pechorin shows two critical aspects of his complex character. First, he comes to a point in his life where he views death as his only solution to life's problems, and this despair only further kills his inner light of true humanity, sensitive love and spiritual power of life. 'soul. Secondly, he says that Pechorin misunderstood life as entertainment and an exciting event by comparing it to the ball. This attitude towards life is why he lived poorly most of his life, becoming indifferent to the best that life can give, and never really being able to give anything in return. Pechorin himself spent his life in a senseless search for pleasure and sensual satisfaction. For him, women were entertainment, because he treated his whole life without real respect. Pechorin began to understand all this as his death approached, which he predicted and to which he felt closer at the end of the story. He chooses death as the only thing to cure him of a useless life and a tasteless existence. This mistake brings despair into Pechorin's life because he no longer believes he can win in a battle against himself. Pechorin himself devalued his life, spending it on the right things. When he chases Vera on horseback but then gives up, it is his feeling of existential fatigue that stops him because he no longer has the power to live being only illusorily very intelligent, but incapable of loving with real love. and of a partnership between a man and a woman: “I saw how futile and foolish it was to seek lost happiness. What more did I want? See her again? For what” (Lermontov, 42 years old)? Pechorin understands that he does not deserve Vera and may be the reason for his suffering, although she understands him very well. He doesn't want to use Vera as a beautiful woman without giving her back what she