I moved in with my uncle this May, and was pleased to discover a number of lending libraries in his neighbourhood. During walks and rides of the area, I would nosey into the local offerings, and upon one such nosey-ing I found a copy of Fydor Dostoevesky's Crime and Punishment.
I had recently connected with a number of friends from Duke, one of whom had graduated in Russian Literature and was keen to read more in the summer. I took the book, and my taking was promptly followed an idea of a Russian Lit Reading Group of some kind, where I involved another two friends. The reading group was not a success in terms of any kind of synchronous discussion; yet, I make such comment to provide the context for picking up Dostoevesky at a time where I am looking to read through the Canon chronologically — that is, Gilgamesh, Vedas, Ancient Greeks onwards.
I had read some of D’s short stories prior, namely White Nights and An Honest Thief, both in English translation, and was struck by the psychological and emotional intensity of both character and scenario; the demands that the characters would place on themselves and others (in these two stories) felt believable — that is, naturally arising from a living, suffering human — and, consequently, unsettling in their strength, revealing the force and insecurity of human desire.
Perhaps surprisingly, as Crime and Punishment takes shape as a novel, and thus a much longer piece of writing, I found D to attempt a very singular kind of project in C&P: that is, to give shape to and follow a central psychological distress in the life of the protagonist. In this case, it is Raskolnikov and his decision to murder an apparently despicable pawnbroker. From what I recall of those aforementioned short stories, there is one major difference in C&P, being that the protagonist is driven on by an idea that appears to spring from within (though, do ideas ever?); whereas in White Nights and An Honest Thief, the distress result from human encounters and the ensuing feelings of guilt, love, attachment etc.
Enough with comparisons! It was a helpful way in. I think I shall proceed with some general thoughts about the writing, plot, and follow with certain moments, conversations that I found personally interesting compelling.
One. I found D’s writing to be blocky-y, i.e. the writing was somewhat dry, undynamic, frigid, description proceeding from one wooden block to another. The writing came alive for me in the dialogue between characters, that is where the words carried some Life of their own. I wonder whether D would have made a more exciting playwright; and yet his description and story-telling does achieve a great deal: you would feel that stage directions would not suffice to capture everything he wanted his audience to see of his characters. And, in spite of the stagnated flow of his writing (though, I did read from an English translation, tr. Constance Garnett, which may be an unfair source-text for such appraisal), it achieves much in its setting of place and feeling. And the construction of the story that can hold what feels like the novel’s central concern, and then deviate, complicate and restructure the terms of the narrative, is expert — at least in the opinion of someone who would not even attempt to embark on such an effort. But there is the feeling that the writing itself, stylistically (?), might be more Beautiful.
I am not giving too much away in saying that the book follows the thinking and living of an impoverished ex-student, Raskolnikov, who plans to kill an elderly pawnbroker with whom he has dealings with. He is an isolated figure, quite caught up in Ideas, or an Idea — that there really ought to be little personal impediment to committing such an act. It appears to him that there really ought not to be anything wrong with the murder of someone he deems worthless, parasitic, and that any hesitation is a sign of weakness on his part — of his inability to live and Act like a Great, viz. Napoleon. And we follow Raskolnikov as he struggles with himself alone and with others on just this issue.
I won’t go much more into the plot, as there is Sparknotes for that — or the actual book. It’s a good-sized book, not exhaustively long (my copy was 500 pages) but requires a good two-three weeks of attention. There were times where I wanted to give up with D; however, I stuck with it and I’m happy I did. The story gathers momentum as it moves on and I became more and more curious about the plot’s conclusion with each part (six in all). D does an excellent job of integrating various characters and side-plots into the orbit of Raskolnikov’s goings-on, which make the book able to paint a larger picture of where and when R is living.
Before touching on some excerpts from the book, I wanted to bring attention to a theme of madness and treatment, medicine in C&P. There is a continual discourse between Raskolnikov’s family and friends/acquaintances, including the doctor, Zossimov, about whether he is in fact Mad. Raskolnikov is terribly ill at points in the book, and the suggestion is owing to his mental state; a few friends mentioned that this was an innovation, and that Dostoevesky was instrumental to Freud in his exploration of neurosis. Sickness and its causes are a theme throughout, especially how it relates to one’s environment, the majority of the novel being set in the destitute quarters of St Petersburg. I am not inclined to make further comment, but thought it worthy of note.
[Razumihin speaking] “…They talk such trash! I almost came to blows! I’ve left my uncle to preside. Would you believe, they insist on the complete absence of individualism and that’s just what they relish! Not to be themselves, to be as unlike themselves as they can. That’s what they regard as the highest point of progress. If only their nonsense were their own, but as it is…”
“Listen!” Pulcheria Alexandrovna interrupted timidly, but it only added fuel to the flames.
“What do you think?” shouted Razumihin, louder than ever, “you think I am attacking them for talking nonsense? Not a bit! I like them to talk nonsense. That’s man’s one privilege over all creation. Through error you come to truth! I am a man because I err! You never reach truth without making fourteen mistakes and very likely a hundred and fourteen. And a fine thing, too, in its way; but we can’t even make mistakes on our own account! Talk nonsense, but talk your own nonsense, and I’ll kiss you for it. To go wrong in one’s own way is better than to go right in someone else’s…”
Razumihin emerges as Raskolnikov’s closest companion in C&P, though the affection afforded by the former is somewhat unrequited. This speech is one of at least two where D’s characters decry the felt inhumanity of scientific socialism, or the ideals of a dialectical-materialist society.
I found Razumihin increasingly endearing, here and elsewhere, as someone who demands some kind of consistency in thought — and also as a proponent of someone who has ideas-his-own (though I am not entirely sure what that means). He is intelligent, somewhat exuberant, especially under the influence, and is markedly different to Raskolnikov in his sympathy for those around him. Above he demands some degree of independent thought, and yet his morality is fairly conventional: he is not caught up in the troubles Raskolnikov finds himself in to justify following moral norms.
“Dounia was simply essential to [Pyotr Petrovich]; to do without her was unthinkable. For many years he had voluptuous dreams of marriage, but he had gone on waiting and amassing money. He brooded with relish, in profound secret, over the image of a girl – virtuous, poor (she must be poor), very young, very pretty, of good birth and education, very timid, one who had suffered much, and was completely humbled before him, one who would all her life look on him as her saviour, worship him, admire him and only him. How many scenes, how many amorous episodes he had imagined on this seductive and playful theme, when his work was over!”
Pyotr Petrovich, fiancee to R’s sister Dounia, is probably the easiest character to despise in C&P. There is ample in the short excerpt to suggest why. What is of interest to me here is Petrovich’s desire to be completely depended upon, by virtue indicating his strength and success as a Man. Later, D notes on how Petrovich regards such a woman with great social utility: “the fascination of a charming, virtuous, highly educated woman might make his way [into higher society] easier, might do wonders attracting people to him…” Dounia would be P’s instrument.
Later in the book, Svidrigailov, a similarly exploitative though more mysterious character, posits that Dounia “is thirsting to face some torture for someone” — which accords with his telling of their interactions, and yet doesn’t sit nicely with the emerging nobility and self-assuredness that D bestows on Dounia, in both description and action. I found a similar tension living in Sonia, who we do see at times painfully devoting herself to those around her – first her mother, and later Raskolnikov – and yet carries with her an authority and honour that a glance or posture would betray.
I would be interested in a feminist critique to D’s C&P, which is really an invitation for myself to read more feminist literature.
[This final excerpt can reasonably be considered a spoiler]
“[Dounia] threw her arms around him.
“Aren’t you half expiating your crime by facing the suffering?” she cried, holding him close and kissing him.
“Crime? What crime?” [Raskolnikov] cried in sudden fury. “That I killed a vile noxious insect, an old pawnbroker woman, of use to no one!…. Killing her was atonement for forty sins. She was sucking the life out of poor people. Was that a crime? I am not thinking of it and I am not expiating it, and why are you rubbing it in on all sides? ‘A crime! a crime!’ Only now I see clearly the imbecility of my cowardice, now that I have decided to face this superfluous disgrace. It’s simply because I am contemptible and have nothing in me that I have decided to, perhaps to my advantage, as that…. Porfiry….suggested?”
“Brother, brother, what are you saying? Why, you have shed blood!” cried Dounia in despair.
“Which all men shed,” he put almost frantically, “which flows and has always flowed in streams, which is spilt like champagned, and for which men are crowned in the Capitol and are called afterwards benefactors of mankind. Look into it more carefully and understand it! I too wanted to do good to men and would have done hundreds, thousands of good deeds to make up for that one piece of stupidity, not stupidity even, simply clumsiness, for the idea was by no means so stupid as it seems now that it has failed….(Everything seems stupid when it fails.) By that stupidity I only wanted to put myself into an independent position, to take the first step, to obtain means, and then everything would have been smoothed over by benefits immeasurable in comparison….But I…I couldn’t even carry out even the first step, because I am contemptible, that’s what’s the matter! And yet I won’t look at it as you do. If I had succeeded I should have been crowned in glory, but now I’m trapped.”
“But that’s not so, not so! Brother, what are you saying?”
“Ah, it’s not picturesque, not aesthetically attractive! I fail to understand why bombarding people by regular siege is more honourable. The fear of appearances is the first symptom of impotence. I’ve never, never recognised this more clearly than now, and I am further than ever from seeing that what I did was a crime. I’ve never, never been stronger and more convinced than now.
The colour had rushed into his pale exhausted face, but as he uttered his last explanation, he happened to meet Dounia’s eyes and he saw much anguish in them that he could not help being checked. He felt that he had, anyway, made these two poor women miserable, that he was, anyway, the cause.”
I find this to be the zenith of Raskolnikov’s journey throughout the whole book, if you discount the Epilogue (which I found confusing, though somewhat comforting). He is able to articulate ‘the matter,’ which has been present to him throughout, but here he has openly acknowledged and articulated it for the first time. And in acknowledging it openly, he finds himself at odds with those both close and far; explicitly and definitively, they no longer see eye to eye, on what is the Crime and what is the Punishment.
R proceeds along persuasive lines, though it strikes me that appreciation of context is lacking in his equation of conquest to his murder. He seems to approach the matter abstractly, but without regard to how his action might affect him, and why he is so concerned with this desire to prove himself in the first place. And is that why he ought to abstain from murder?
Of course, he barely knows this woman and must certainly be an imperfect judge on the quality of her life; and still, there is something despicable about her to him. But, in my mind, in the conversation with Dounia, we see that it is not hatred that inspires the murder, or at least not exclusively. He says, “By that stupidity I only wanted to put myself into an independent position, to take the first step, to obtain means…” There is a purpose to the action, namely, to rid himself of whatever obligations he felt to society, or himself, to not commit murder — and thus become Potent, no longer afraid of appearances. Perhaps, the act represents the defeat of the Super-ego by the Ego for Raskolnikov, a necessary step for his own perception of Realisation.
There is, of course, more to say here (and everywhere!), but for now I rest. I am intrigued by the questions surrounding ethics this last excerpt raises, especially regarding individual responsibility and state violence. I feel that Dostoevesky would recommend a more ontological approach to ethical action, maybe grounded in religious scripture, or some internal-social sense of basic morality.
Another thread to follow is the use of terms Crime and Punishment, what we mean by them, in word and deed. A friend recently invited me to a group associated with Restorative Justice, which attends to these words quite differently…
For now, I rest.
Charlotte, North Carolina // July 2023
nilly deen 
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