Vera Figner was a member of Narodnaya Volya, the small clandestine organization that after multiple failed attempts killed Tsar Alexander II with bombs on a St. Petersburg street in 1881. A tiny conspiratorial cell, working in total secrecy and willing to die, successfully struck down the autocratic head of a vast empire.
Figner argues that she and her comrades turned to terrorism only after peaceful propaganda, education, and reform efforts among the people were met with arrests, exile, and executions by the state. The claim is that closing every legal channel for change converts idealists into assassins.
Figner describes surviving roughly twenty years of imprisonment, much of it in the Schlusselburg fortress, by imposing rigid internal discipline: fixed routines, intellectual work, and strict emotional control to prevent the mind from collapsing. Survival under isolation is treated as an active practice, not passive waiting.
Figner presents her choices through the lens of fidelity to an ideal, judging actions by whether they honored her commitment rather than by their practical outcomes or personal cost. Viewed this way, imprisonment and sacrifice become fulfillments of duty rather than defeats.