Crime and Punishment (1866) If there is no God, everything is permitted.
Like James Joyce's Ulysses (see review), this is a novel that has been so influential on other writers that ultimately its status as a masterpiece is independent of the actual quality of the text. That said, the novel is so seriously flawed in terms of both tone and message that it calls into question whether this is truly a good book and whether Dostoevsky is a great novelist or merely an influential polemicist. The first fatal flaw is the fevered pitch of the narration. Every single word of the novel is conveyed in a breathless, near hysterical manner. None of the characters ever seems to have to do any work; instead, they sit around picking at psychological scabs and obsessing over the moral implications of their every action. I have seen Dostoevsky referred to as an Existentialist and this characteristic is symptomatic of that philosophy. After all, if there are no moral absolutes to guide your actions and decide moral dilemmas, then such questions do become insoluble and are likely to become obsessive concerns. But for the reader, this constant frantic pitch becomes pretty tiring after 500 pages. Not to mention the fact that if you don't accept the Existential presumption, all of that dithering over cut and dried moral questions seems truly bizarre. Who would adopt a philosophy that forces you to live life this way? The second problem is also a function of Existentialism. The Existential philosophers (Kierkegaard, Camus, etc.) blithely set about disposing of God on the assumption that postGod man will be as concerned as they are with constructing a new basis for morality. They also mistakenly assume that it is possible to create such a foundation for morality in the absence of the idea of God and the premise of the absolute. Thus, Raskolnikov posits the following individualistic morality: Porfiry Petrovitch: ... it was not that
part of your article that interested me so much, but an idea at
Raskolnikov smiled at the exaggerated and intentional distortion of his idea. "What? What do you mean? A right to crime? But not
because of the influence of environment?"
"What do you mean? That can't be right?" Razumihin muttered in bewilderment. Raskolnikov smiled again. He saw the point at once,
and knew where they wanted to drive him. He
"Yet I admit that you have stated it almost correctly;
perhaps, if you like, perfectly so." (It almost
Now this philosophy raises a host of problems, we'll just mention a few. The first is, who is to say that Raskolnikov is wrong? What, absent an absolute moral standard derived from God, makes one person's moral whims right or wrong? Second, one supposes that Dostoevsky does not subscribe to this philosophy, but it is presented in full and is powerfully argued. Even Raskolnikov's guilt and self torment only prove that he is not one of the ubermen, not that the philosophy itself is wrong for such beings. There is, of course, the brief epilogue where Raskolnikov seems to be redeemed by the love of and the Christian example set by Sonia, but it comes as an afterthought and as the author says, "That might be the subject of a new story...". He was clearly more interested in the ramifications of the new philosophy and so it is treated as the serious idea worthy of exploration, despite its obvious malignancy and disastrous results. And this is often, perhaps inevitably, the case with the Existentialists--their arguments against God are more powerful than, and thus overwhelm, their attempts to erect new moral structures in his place. There can be no doubt that this is an important novel, one that every culturally literate person should read. But an honest assessment requires the acknowledgment that it is seriously flawed as to both premise and execution. I recommend it, but can't imagine anyone actually enjoying it very much. (Reviewed:) Grade: (C) Tweet Websites:-Fyodor (Mikhaylovich) Dostoevsky (1821-1881) (kirjasto) -Fyodor Dostoevsky (Wes Marlan, FyodorDostoevsky.com ) -FYODOR DOSTOEVSKY (1821-1881) (Guardian) -Fyodor Dostoevsky (1821 - 1881) (little blue light) -Fyodor Dostoevsky (1821 - 1881) (the Internet Public Library Online Literary Criticism Collection) -Fyodor Dostoevsky (Wikipedia) -CARICATURE: Fyodor Dostoevsky (David Levine, NY Review of Books) -International Dostoevsky Society -ETEXT: Notes from the Underground -ETEXT: Crime and Punishment -ETEXTS: Works by Fyodor Dostoevsky (CCEL) -AUDIO STORY: The Dream Of A Ridiculous Man by Fyodor Dostoyevsky (read by Trey Downey, 30 June 2023, the Greeat Stories) - -VIDEO: The Grand Inquisitor - John Gielgud (A rare version 1975 of The Grand Inquisitor from Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov produced by the Open University.) -PODCAST: How Dostoevsky’s Exile in Siberia Led to Four of the Greatest Novels in Literature: Kevin Birmingham Guests on the Book Dreams Podcast (Book Dreams, April 14, 2022) -ESSAY: “The Crocodile,” Dostoevsky’s Weirdest Short Story: Why being eaten by a crocodile named Little Karl is really a lesson in the dangers of foreign capital. 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Rodden, 11 Feb 2022, American Purpose) -ESSAY: Youthful Cynicism and Dostoevsky’s Case for Hope: Why do we choose to believe in a framework where suffering and violence are the most fundamental reality of the world? How can pain and grief coexist with the small joys that we experience daily? (KATERINA LEVINSON, 2/15/22, Public Discourse) -ESSAY: Dostoevsky’s 200th Birthday and His Living Legacy (Sainowaki Keiko, 1/24/22, Nippon) -ESSAY: Encountering the Spirit of Revolutionary Negation: Fyodor Dostoevsky's Demons continues to illuminate a path forward amidst our debilitating contemporary crisis. (Daniel J. Mahoney, 1/03/22, Law & Liberty) -ESSAY: The Grand Inquisitor: On Dostoyevsky’s immersive polyphony and neologisms (JULIA KRISTEVA, 1/03/22, BookForum) -ESSAY: Dostoevsky at 200: An Idea of Evil: Radical yet reactionary, the Russian literary giant remains a bundle of paradoxes. (CATHY YOUNG, DECEMBER 31, 2021, The Bulwark) -ESSAY: Dostoevsky’s Favorite Murder: The author of “Crime and Punishment” had a love-hate relationship with the true-crime obsessions of his era. (Jennifer Wilson/December 28, 2021, New Republic) -ESSAY: Crime, Punishment, and Columbo (Thomas Hibbs, December 22, 2021, Pundicity) -PODCAST: Kevin Birmingham on How Dostoevsky Came to Write Crime and Punishment: In Conversation with Andrew Keen on Keen On (Keen On, November 18, 2021) -ESSAY: 5 books Dostoevsky considered masterpieces (VALERIA PAIKOVA, 4/09/21, Russia Beyobd) -ESSAY: Fyodor Dostoevsky: philosopher of freedom (Gary Saul Morson, January 2021, New Criterion) -ESSAY: A God-Possessed Man: Fyodor Dostoevsky (1821 – 1881) (Malcolm Muggeridge, A Third Testament) -ESSAY: Ivan Karamazov’s Mistake (Ralph C. Wood, December 2002, First Things) -ESSAY: Kant's Aesthetics in Dostoevsky's Notes from Underground (David A. Goldfarb, Mid-Atlantic Slavic Conference) -ESSAY: Dostoevsky's nihilism (RAVI VYAS, 9/02/01, The Hindu) -ESSAY: Awakening from Nihilism: The Templeton Prize Address (Michael Novak, August/September 1994, First Things) -ESSAY: Tragic and Comic Visions in the Brothers Karamazov (Joyce Carol Oates) -ESSAY: Encountering Dostoevsky (Jessica Hooten Wilson, 2/20/20, Law & Liberty) -INTRODUCTION: Dostoyevsky Stricken: A God-possessed man reacts to suffering. : From the foreword to The Gospel in Dostoyevsky: Selections from His Works (Malcolm Muggeridge, Plough) -Christiaan Stange's DOSTOEVSKY RESEARCH STATION -ESSAY: Fyodor Dostoevsky (Katharena Eiermann, Realm of Existentialism) -STUDY GUIDE: Notes from Underground (Spark Notes) -STUDY GUIDE: Middlebury's Notes from the Underground Study Guide (Jen Marder, Mike Meyer, and Fred Wyshak) -STUDY GUIDE: Study Guide for Notes from the Underground (Paul Brians, Department of English, Washington State University) -STUDY GUIDE: Dostoevsky: Notes from the Underground (Professor George Mitrevski, Department of Foreign Languages at Auburn University) -LECTURE: Lecture on Dostoevsky's Notes from the Underground (Dr. Gary R. Jahn) -Researching The Brothers Karamazov (Dartmouth College) -STUDY GUIDE: Middlebury's Brother Karamzov Study Guide - -ESSAY: Of Course True Crime Fans Are Guilty: For Fyodor Dostoevsky, that was the point (KEVIN BIRMINGHAM, NOV 24, 2021, Slate) -REVIEW ESSAY: The Eyes of Another: Dostoevsky’s masterpiece, ‘Crime and Punishment,’ offers a radical reinterpretation of guilt and redemption. (Marilyn Simon, 31 Jan 2023, Quillette) - -ARCHIVES: dostoevsky (Find Articles) -REVIEW: of Notes from Underground by Fyodor Dostoevsky, translated by Richard Pevear & Larissa Volokhonsky (Allen Barra, Salon) -REVIEW: of Notes from Underground by Fyodor Dostoevsky, translated by Richard Pevear & Larissa Volokhonsky (Peter Heinegg, America) -REVIEW: of The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoevsky, translated by David McDuff (A.S. Byatt, The Guardian) -REVIEW: of Dostoevsky, The Miraculous Years 1865-1871 by Joseph Frank (A S Byatt, The Observer) -REVIEW: of Resurrection from the Underground: Feodor Dostoevsky. 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Földényi (James Wood, The New Yorker) -REVIEW of The Idiot (Clancy Martin, Book Forum) -REVIEW: of Lectures on Dostoesvky | Joseph Frank (Heidi White, Forma) -REVIEW: of Dostoevsky in Love: An Intimate Life By Alex Christofi (Donald Rayfield, Literary Review) -REVIEW: of Dostoevsky in Love (Albert Wald, University Bookman) - -REVIEW: of The Sinner and the Saint: Dostoevsky and the Gentleman Murderer Who Inspired a Masterpiece by Kevin Birmingham (David Stromberg, American Scholar) -REVIEW: of Sinner and the Saint (Ian Thomson, The Observer) -REVIEW: of Sinner and the Saint (Maureen Corrigan, NPR) -REVIEW: of The Sinner and The saint (Jennifer Wilson, New Republic) -REVIEW: of Sinner and the Saint (Jake Bittle, The Nation) -REVIEW: of Sinner and the Saint (Christopher Sandford, Hedgehog Review) - -REVIEW ESSAY: A Spouse Divided: Two new biographies delve into Dostoyevsky’s relationship with his long-suffering wife (REBECCA PANOVKA, 12/17/21, BookForum) FILM: -FILMOGRAPHY: Fyodor Dostoyevsky (IMDB.com) -FILM SITE: Notes from Underground (directed by Gary Walkow) Book-related and General Links: |
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