Answer:
A brilliant but flawed idealist who is out of step with his time.
Step-by-step explanation:
Stepan Trofimovich is a refined and high-minded intellectual who unintentionally contributes to the development of nihilistic forces, centering on his son Pyotr Stepanovich and former pupil Nikolai Stavrogin, that ultimately bring local society to the brink of collapse.
The character is Dostoevsky's rendering of an archetypal liberal idealist of the 1840s Russian intelligentsia and is based partly on Timofey Granovsky and Alexander Herzen.
Stepan Trofimovich is a complex and contradictory figure. He is a brilliant scholar and a gifted orator, but he is also lazy, self-indulgent, and financially irresponsible. He is a man of great ideas, but he is also naïve and idealistic. He is a man of principle, but he is also easily manipulated.
Stepan Trofimovich is a tragic figure. He is a man who is out of step with his time. He is a man who believes in the power of ideas, but he finds himself in a world where ideas are no longer valued. He is a man who is trying to hold on to the past, but he is ultimately swept away by the tide of history.
