Set in St. Petersburg Russia, this classic's protagonist is Rodion Raskolnikov, a young man in the prime of his life who premeditate the murder of money-lender Alyona Ivanovna just for the mere fact that he believes he can get rid of a vile person he considers not fit to live. He commits the brutal crime and suffers the consequences of his guilty conscience, constantly vacillating between remorse and self-justification for the horrible act. His acquaintance with investigator Porfiry Petrovich who suspects him of the murder and love interest Sonia further complicates this conflict and compounds this highly thought-stimulating psychological thriller.
'On an exceptionally hot evening early in July a young man came out of the garret in which he lodged in S. Place and walked slowly, as though in hesitation, towards K. Bridge.'(opening lines)
'This evening, however, on coming out into the street, he became acutely aware of his fears.
"I want to attempt at thing like that and am frightened by these trifles," he thought, with an odd smile. "Hm ... yes, all is in a man's hands and he lets it all slip from cowardice, that's an axiom. It would be interesting to know what it is men are most afraid of. Taking a new step, uttering a new word is what they fear most ...'(2)
'Trifles, trifles are what matter! Why, it's just such trifles that always ruin everything...'(3)
'There are chance meetings with strangers that interest us from the first moment, before a word is spoken.'(9)
'In order to understand any man one must be deliberate and careful to avoid forming prejudices and mistaken ideas, which are very difficult to correct and get over afterwards.'(31)
'In a morbid condition of the brain, dreams often have a singular actuality, vividness and extraordinary semblance of reality. At times monstrous images are created, but the setting and the whole picture are so truthlike and filled with details so delicate, so unexpected, but so artistically consistent, that the dreamer, where he an artist like Pushkin or Turgenev even, could never have invented them in the waking state. Such sick dreams always remain long in the memory and make a powerful impression on the overwrought and deranged nervous system.'(48)
'He was in full possession of his faculties, free from confusion or giddiness, but his hands were still trembling. He remembered afterwards that he had been particularly collected and careful, trying all the time not to get smeared with blood...'(69)
'Fear gained more and more mastery over him, especially after this second, quite unexpected murder. He longed to run away from the plaace as fast as possible. And if at that moment he had been capable of seeing and reasoning more correctly, if he had been able to realise all the difficulties of his position, his hopelessness, the hideousness and the absurdity of it, if he could have understood how many obstacles and, perhaps, crimes he had still to overcome or to commit, to get out of that place to make his way home, it is very possible that he would have flung up everything, and would have gone to give himself up, and not from fear, but from simple horror and loathing of what he had done. ... But a sort of blankness, even dreaminess, had begun by degrees to take possession of him; at moments he forgot himself, or rather forgot what was of importance and caught at trifles.'(71-72)
'Where is it I've read that someone condemned to death says or thinks, an hour before his death, that if he had to live on some high rock, on such a narrow ledge that he'd only room to stand, and the oceans, everlasting darkness, everlasting solitude, everlasting tempest around him, if he had to remain standing on a square yard of space all his life, a thousand years, eternity, it were better to live than to die at once! Only to live, to live and live! Life, whatever it may be!'(139)
'Through error you come to the truth! I am a man because I err! You never reach any truth without making fourteen mistakes and very likely a hundred and fourteen. And a fine thing, too, in it's way ... To go wrong in one's own way is better than to go right in someone else's. In the first case you are a man, in the second you're no better that a bird. Truth won't escape you, but life can be cramped.'(176)
'Again that awful sensation he had known of late passed with deadly chill over his soul. Again it became suddenly plain and perceptible to him that he had just told a fearful lie -- that he would never now be able to speak of anything to anyone.'(200)
'If he has a conscience he will suffer for his mistake. That will be his punishment...'(230)
'Pain and suffering are always inevitable for a large intelligence and a deep heart. The really great men must, I think, have great sadness on earth...'(230)
'You see I kept asking myself then: why am I so stupid, that if others are stupid -- and I know they are -- yet I won't be wiser? Then I saw, Sonia, that if one waits for everyone to get wiser it will take too long ... Afterwards I understood that that would never come to pass, that men won't change and that nobody can alter it and that it's not worth wasting effort over it. Yes, that's so. That's the law of nature, Sonia ... that's so ... And I know now, Sonia, that whoever is strong in mind and spirit will have power over them. Anyone who is greatly daring is right in their eyes. He who despises most things will be a law-giver among them and he who dares most in the right! So it has been till now and so it will always be.'(359)
'... do you know to what a point of insanity a woman can sometimes love?'(407)
a Bantam Classic Edition
472 pages
Book owned. Read in St. Petersburg, Russia.
Book qualifies for: 2011 Victorian Challenge
100+ Reading Challenge
