Book Review: Crime and Punishment

[osprey_archer]

I finished Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment! I feel accomplished but not necessarily enlightened: on the whole I’ve had better luck with the French authors than the Russians, partly because I tend to find the French authors’ moral points thought-provoking even if I don’t necessarily agree, whereas with the Russian authors I’m often left feeling - “Is that the moral point you wanted to make? Am I understanding you correctly? Well, I guess that’s a point of view. If I understood you. Which I don’t think I did.”

Actually, this is only true of nineteenth-century Russian literature. I find twentieth-century Russian authors much more accessible.

I also spent a lot of time mentally arguing with the introduction, which argues strenuously that Raskolnikov is not a madman, which - okay, if he’s defining madness strictly as delusionality, I guess he has a point. Raskolnikov doesn’t think he is Napoleon, he just thinks/hopes/wishes he might be like Napoleon.

But. He’s spent the last month lying on his bed in his filthy apartment, neither eating nor sleeping, obsessing over whether or not to kill an old lady because if he can do it without remorse he will prove that he is a great man, like Napoleon, who lost entire armies in the service of his destiny without batting an eyelash. His other hobbies include avoiding everyone he knows because the idea of interacting with anyone fills him with dread.

Even the other characters, who have no access to his internal monologue and don’t know that he’s killed someone in an attempt to work out his theory, are worried that he’s going insane. If Raskolnikov isn’t insane then I’m not sure if there are any literary characters who count. I think the idea that Raskolnikov is totally sane grows from the belief that he can’t be both insane and a commentary on the human condition, and, you know, I think probably he can.

But at the same time I think this is all a side note to whatever Dostoevsky is trying to get it, which is - Christian forgiveness? Redemption through suffering? Raskolnikov’s name, as the endnotes helpfully informed me, is related to the work raskol, which is the word for the splitting of the Russian Orthodox church following a set of reforms in the 1600s. The Old Believers, who refused to accept the reforms, were called raskolniks. So there’s an ongoing conversation here which is just going straight over my head. Clearly I need to read more.

Comments

[kore]

with the Russian authors I’m often left feeling - “Is that the moral point you wanted to make? Am I understanding you correctly? Well, I guess that’s a point of view. If I understood you. Which I don’t think I did.”

LOL, that is pretty much a good reaction to the Russians, I think. Except for Tolstoy. Late Tolstoy is all HERE IS MY POINT DO YOU SEE IT GOOD NOW I AM POUNDING IT INTO YOUR FOREHEAD. There's a great passage in a Thomas Wolfe novel where the bibliophile hero is looking for a nice long book to chew through, hits C&P entirely at random, starts reading it, abandons it, comes back to it later, finishes it in like two days, and goes around arguing with it in his head and seeing the characters while real life is a little less vivid.

Ugh on that introduction -- which translation did you read? Sometimes that can make a difference in how the morals come across, altho honestly I don't think I ever got much into C&P. My favourites of his were The Idiot and Demons (also Devils and The Possessed). I think part of what's going on in C&P is that whole idea of the 'just' crime and who will miss the horrible pawnbroker woman, so it might be D's sort of transmogrification of Les Miserables? But the pawnbroker is not a loaf of bread. But it has been a looong while since I read it and I wasn't that hot on it even then.

[osprey_archer]

I read the Penguin edition, which was translated by David McDuff, who also wrote the introduction. He also quotes (disapprovingly, to be fair) another critic who argues that 'Sonya's faith is not one that has been attained through struggle,' which nearly made me levitate with rage. She's a teenage prostitute! How much more struggle does she need to go through before her faith counts???

Raskolnikov sometimes tries to justify the crime to himself as a just crime (when he's not trying to convince himself that great men do what has to be done regardless of petty concerns like "justice"), but I think Dostoevsky means that to be of a piece with all his other rationalizations: beneath the surface rationale they don't really hold water.

[thisbluespirit]

But at the same time I think this is all a side note to whatever Dostoevsky is trying to get it, which is - Christian forgiveness?

I'm pretty sure it is, yes. (Raskolnikov digs himself further and further in until he finally owns and accepts punishment for what he does, and then forgiveness via Sonya - and Sonya = Sophia = the Holy Spirit). Also re. insanity - it depends how you want to define it, but certainly he clearly is mentally ill (plus eating at starvation levels over a long period affects human beings and makes them more likely to act in abnormal and violent ways in itself). Although I think those things are our terms, not Dostoevsky's so, I'm not sure really. I read C&P when I wasn't in a state to think much, only feel, and it gave me all the FEELS. I'm not sure quite in what way, but I couldn't stop reading it, which, given said state, was not great as I wound up unable to read almost another word for three weeks. I'm still not sure I regret it, though. And I think perhaps reading with the emotions rather than the brain was perhaps the right way, as I found it hugely cathartic in ways I can't explain. (I read it when I was on my initial David Collings kick, as he came out of nowhere to play Raskolnikov for ITV, and so also to start with I was pretty amused, because it did indeed explain EVERYTHING about his subsequent career of angsting, crying, and breaking down on TV while occasionally murdering people, so maybe I should be disqualified from commenting on it anyway.)

My introduction carefully explained that Dostoevsky hated the West and probably wouldn't want me reading it and liking it anyway, so I felt vaguely guilty about enjoying it. (Why do people have to inflict introductions on books? The ones that are "hey I really love this author who has been UNFAIRLY OOP for ages" are usually okay, but all classic intros are a) spoilery and b) annoying and sure of their rightness despite being Clearly Wrong. They should be banned from the front and sent to the back of the book.)

[osprey_archer]

I always skip the introduction and read it after I've finished reading the book so at least the general utter wrongness doesn't affect my first reading of the book, but afterward I read the introduction and then generally argue with the writer about their interpretation of the book. These interpretations could never survive a rigorous fandom dissection! How did they end up actually published with the actual goddamn book??

[evelyn_b]

Your C&P reading experience sounds a lot like the first time I read it. I skipped classes because I felt I physically couldn't put it down, and "hugely cathartic in ways I can't explain," is exactly how I would have put it if I'd been able to say anything about it at all.

I read it when I was on my initial David Collings kick, as he came out of nowhere to play Raskolnikov for ITV, and so also to start with I was pretty amused, because it did indeed explain EVERYTHING about his subsequent career of angsting, crying, and breaking down on TV while occasionally murdering people

. . . not this part, though! I've never seen a C&P adaptation. Is this one good?

[thisbluespirit]

and "hugely cathartic in ways I can't explain," is exactly how I would have put it if I'd been able to say anything about it at all.

<3

. . . not this part, though! I've never seen a C&P adaptation. Is this one good?

I wish I knew! It may still exist, but it may not. Its status is currently unknown. All I can say is that it would be b&w, cardboard, but was a decent length and had a pretty great cast that included Peter Bowles and Patrick Wymark as well, and I have this rather glorious TV Times cover as hard evidence.

[evelyn_b]

I think the idea that Raskolnikov is totally sane grows from the belief that he can’t be both insane and a commentary on the human condition, and, you know, I think probably he can.

Hah.

Poor Razzers. Your description of him is so apt. He spends so much time trying to psych himself up for The Most Rational Murder that will prove he is a Great Man whose actions Matter (when everyone in his life would be happy if he'd just eat some toast, wash, and go to lecture once in a while), and when he actually does it, it's not just horrible but ridiculous, like the world's most gruesome Benny Hill sketch, and he didn't even remember to swap out his giant hideous hat for a less-noticeable hat, like a clod. I don't want to spoon-feed him redemption in Siberia or anything, but I do love him. And Dostoyevsky in general, though I don't understand half the axes he has to grind and don't agree with the rest.

no ax pun intended, of course.

[osprey_archer]

NO AX PUN INTENDED, that's what they all say. Ha! (But it was a v. good ax pun so I suppose it's allowed to stay.)

Razzers would totally be Raskolnikov's nickname if for some reason he found himself at a British boarding school circa 1900. Presumably he's attending Eton alongside Lord Peter Wimsey and Roderick Alleyn... which gives them an edge when he commits a murder a few years later after he stops attending Oxford and instead spends all his time in his closet-like room not eating toast.

[evelyn_b]

I don't think that's an AU of which Dos. would approve! I'd also like to think the earnest friendship of the Eton Detection Society would help set little Razzy on a better path, but tbh he'd probably just retreat further into his own head to avoid all the quotes.

(Alleyn would totally try to bring him toast + some dubious British paste in his rooms at Mansfield, because he's heard rumors and poor Razzers always was a little iffy about keeping himself fed. That's how he finds out he's taken a room in town and hasn't been seen in a month. Can the EDS band together one last time to solve the mystery of what the heck is going on, and possibly prevent a tragedy before it's too late?? Probably not; old Rasko was never one to take an intervention in the spirit in which it was intended).

[osprey_archer]

Dostoevsky would probably be HORRIFIED to see his antihero transmogrified into a British schoolboy, but what can I say? We all have to be horrified sometimes, Dos.

Allers would definitely be the one who tries to do something useful about Razzers' food situation. Flimsy just sits crosslegged on Razzers' bed and quotes things at him while Razzers quietly fumes and wishes he would go away. But does he say anything? He does not. Flimsy is left in the happy delusion that he is being Very Helpful and has ably distracted Razzers from his troubles.

[minutia_r]

Oh nooooooooo

(that was my approving oh nooooooo)