Grigori Aleksandrovich Pechorin is an enigma: arrogant, cocky, melancholic, brave, cynic, romantic, loner, socialite, soldier, free soul, and yet, victim of the world, he eludes definition and remains a mystery to those who know him. Just who is he? And what does he hope to achieve? Evolving from first person to third person, and then into a diary, A Hero of Our Time takes on a variety of forms to interrogate Pechorin's cryptic character and his unusual philosophy, providing breathtaking descriptions of the Caucasus along the way. The novel has been hailed as an influence on such writers as Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy and Chekhov, and is a striking take on Lord Byron's 'superfluous man'; it harks back to the teaching of Machiavelli, while anticipating the future work of Nietzsche.