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Exquisite.

First, so expressive, the prose makes me swoon. And I am not a swooner (is there such a word as swooner?).

Elena listened to him very attentively, and turning half towards him, did not take her eyes off his face, which had grown a little paler--off his eyes, which were soft and affectionate, though they avoided meeting her eyes. Her soul expanded, and something tender, holy, and good seemed half sinking into her heart, half springing up within it.

Second, how is it a male of the 1860s was able to express a young woman's thoughts and being so accurately? There is a chapter that is presented as this young woman's diary. Turgenev gives us diary entries of some of the action that has already taken place, so that, though he has described from the outside what occurred, he gives us her feelings at the time of these known events. Then, we are given her feelings about events not yet told, and in this way, Turgenev apprises us of them.

In an introduction which accompanied an 1895 edition, we are told:

To the English reader, On the Eve is a charmingly drawn picture of a quiet Russian household, with a delicate analysis of a young girl's soul; but to Russians it is also a deep and penetrating diagnosis of the destinies of the Russia of the fifties.

I did not read all of this introduction because it seemed to me to begin to reveal spoilers, but I was glad to have read this much and to get this alternate perspective. It enhanced the story for me, as part of the conflict involves a Bulgarian who worries about his country.