Turgenev’s The Smoke is a portrait of Russian intellectuals living in the chaotic 1860s, shortly after the Emancipation reform of 1981. Turgenev’s stylistic style is characterized by a strong sense of the times and an extraordinary sense of reality. This work also features strong female characters such as Irina and Tatyana, and the love affairs of Litvinov who is hesitant and torn between them. This paper analyzes this debate between Slavophilia, and Westernizer in Turgenev’s The Smoke and the issue of the protagonists’ love affairs. In particular, in Smoke, the railroad appears as a medium connecting Russia and the West, a product of natural science and a means of transportation that connects the protagonists’ encounters. The railroad is more than just a means of transportation, as it directly reveals the artist’s worldview through the protagonist Litvinov. Through writer’s narrative and his protagonist Litvinov, Turgenev presents an objective view of the Slavicist and the uncompromising Westerner, both of whom are unable to completely deny their past and their existence, and both of whom are searching for a way forward for Russia. A new European artefact, a symbol of the natural sciences and the power of civilization, railroads and trains are transformed into a space for Litvinov’s growth and reflection. Turgenev also substitutes the image of a runaway train for Irina, who is oriented toward upward mobility and the West. He then sets up the figure of Tatyana, the idealized counterpart of Irina, to antithesis, and suggests the direction in which Russian intellectuals and Russia should move toward historical progress, social reform, and social justice.