Glyn Turton sheds new light on the well-documented influence of Turgenev upon Anglo-Saxon culture of the late nineteenth century. First, by exploring the timing and quality of the contemporary English translations of Turgenev's works, he identifies the cultural and ideological factors which determined the reception of those translations. Second he examines the influence of Turgenev on Henry James and George Gissing, among others, and argues that each found in the work of the Russian novelist a vindication of his own distinctive attitude towards art and social reality. In doing so Turton exposes the tensions between the search for an aesthetics of fiction and the processes of historical change at work in late nineteenth century English society. By engaging with both the linguistic and literary aspects of the reception of Turgenev's novels in the West, Turgenev and the Context of English Literature embraces the literature and cultural histories of England, America and Russia in a single perspective. It demonstrates how the influence of a foreign writer is determined by a complex combination of cultural, historical and economic factors in the host country and offers fresh insights into the intellectual climate of the times. The cultural historian is not the only potential beneficiary of this study; for its illuminating comment, its methodological ingenuity and its rich insights it will be welcomed equally by the literary comparativist as well as by specialists in the work of the individual writers discussed.