Twenty Minutes

Ivan Goncharov's novel "Oblomov" was published in 1859 and depicted, in its hero, the greatest couch-potato in literature. So appealing is Oblomov's habit of never really getting up that his name has become synonymous with a sort of fatalistic laziness. So prevalent a character trope did Oblomovism become in Russia that Lenin said that three revolutions had not been able to defeat it. Lesley Chamberlain explores the book and its legacy. Producer Tim Dee (rpt).