The post-war years. Yakut hunter Bykadyrov discovers mysterious footprints in the taiga leading to a village where the head of a geological expedition has just been murdered. A group of state security officers arrives from Moscow to investigate the crime.

The plot is based on events that took place in St. Petersburg in May 1901, when workers at the Obukhov military factory rebelled against the tsar.

《父与子》描写的是父辈与子辈冲突的主题。这一冲突在屠格涅夫笔下着上了时代的色彩。巴扎罗夫代表了19世纪60年代的年轻一代——激进的平民知识分子，而巴威尔和尼古拉则代表了保守的自由主义贵族的老一代人，当然，在对待年轻人的态度上，父辈中的人们态度各有不同，尼古拉比较温和，希望理解子辈，想跟上时代，只是不太成功，巴威尔则固执已见，信奉贵族自由主义，对年轻人的反叛耿耿于怀，父与子的冲突在广义上表现为巴威尔和巴扎罗夫之间的对立，由此，在巴扎罗夫身上塑造了时代“新人”的形象。