# Semyon Novikov — Short Fiction character guide

> Semyon Novikov in Short Fiction by Ivan Bunin.

**Role:** supporting

**Also known as:** Semyon

**First appearance:** 0001-short-fiction

## Snapshot

A Cossack officer of plebeian appearance whose brief, ruinous affair with a schoolgirl ends in a railway platform shooting.

## Who they are

Ungainly and out of place in Olga Meschersky's genteel circle, the officer is drawn into a liaison she treats as a game and he takes as a promise of marriage. When she hands him her diary on the station platform and tells him she never meant to marry him, he reads the pages about another man and shoots her in the crowd. His blunt confession to the coroner, and the diary entry he preserves, expose the gulf between her careless cruelty and his wounded, literal devotion.

## Relationships

### [Elijah](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/short_fiction_30_se/characters/elijah)

_friendship_

Elijah and Semyon Novikov are close companions, likely bound by shared experiences and mutual trust.

### [Elijah](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/short_fiction_30_se/characters/elijah)

_friendship_

Elijah and Semyon Novikov are close companions, likely bound by shared experiences and mutual trust.

### [Elijah](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/short_fiction_30_se/characters/elijah)

_friendship_

Elijah and Semyon Novikov are close companions, likely bound by shared experiences and mutual trust.

## In the story

### [Elijah, the Prophet](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/short_fiction_30_se/chapters/elijah-the-prophet)

The peasant protagonist who bargains with the prophet Elijah and offers his daughter as a sacrifice.

## Links

- HTML: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/short_fiction_30_se/characters/semyon_novikov
- Book: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/short_fiction_30_se
- All characters: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/short_fiction_30_se/characters