Guilt, Suffering, Confession and Redemption in Crime and Punishment
"You keep lying!" screamed Raskolnikov, no longer able to restrain himself. "You're lying, you damned clown!" And he flung himself on Porfiry, who retired to the doorway, but without a trace of panic. "I understand everything, everything!" He approached Porfiry. "You're lying and taunting me so Ill give myself away-" "You can't give yourself away any more than you have already, Rodion Romanovich, old man. Why, you've gone into a state. Don't shout, I'll call my men, sir!" (Dostoyevsky, 34)
No humane person with any values is able to commit a heinous crime without some feeling of guilt or remorse afterwards. Slowly, this guilt festers and eats away at one's conscience until the point of escape, reached by confession, thus leading to salvation. Throughout Dostoyevsky's Crime and. Punishment the main character, Raskolnikov is stricken with guilt and suffering that eventually lead to his confession and redemption motivated by many forces.
Crime and Punishment is the story of a young "intellect", Raskolnikov, who develops a superman theory. In his hypothesis, he felt that certain men were extraordinary and could commit unethical acts without punishment or a guilty conscience. In his case, he wanted to rid the earth of a parasite through the vicious slaying of an old pawnbroker, Alyona, and her sister, Lizaveta, in order to gain money so that he could continue his studies and to see if he was truly extraordinary. Was he truly the Napoleon that he thought he was? Could he walk over people with no regard for their feelings or sufferings as Napoleon had? (Literary Criticism, 68) "He is obviously no superman or Napoleon, but didn't get enough fre...
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...ut its overwhelming power and the fact that it made such a painful impression on readers that those with strong nerves fell ill and those with weak nerves had to give up reading it. (Kjetsaa, 183)
Works Cited
Bloom, Harold. Modern Critical Interpretations. New York, New York: Chelsea House Publishers, 1988.
Dostoyevsky, Fyodor. Crime and Punishment. New York, New York: New American Library, Inc., 1968.
Gale Research Co. Nineteenth Century Literature Criticism. Detroit, MI 1984, Vol. 7.
Kjetsaa, Geir. Fyodor Dostoyevsky, A Writer's Life. New York, New York: Viking Penguin Inc., 1987,
Magill, Frank. Masterplots. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Salem Press, 1976.
Terras, Victor. Handbook of Russian Literature. New Haven, CT; Yale University Press, 1985.
Timoney, John. Speech on Crime and Punishment. Mt. Holyoke College, November 10, 1994.
Often times in literature, we are presented with quintessential characters that are all placed into the conventional categories of either good or bad. In these pieces, we are usually able to differentiate the characters and discover their true intentions from reading only a few chapters. However, in some remarkable pieces of work, authors create characters that are so realistic and so complex that we are unable to distinguish them as purely good or evil. In the novel Crime and Punishment, Fyodor Dostoevsky develops the morally ambiguous characters of Raskolnikov and Svidrigailov to provide us with an interesting read and to give us a chance to evaluate each character.
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Dostoyevsky's writing in this book is such that the characters and setting around the main subject, Raskolnikov, are used with powerful consequences. The setting is both symbolic and has a power that affects all whom reside there, most notably Raskolnikov. An effective Structure is also used to show changes to the plot's direction and Raskolnikov's character. To add to this, the author's word choice and imagery are often extremely descriptive, and enhance the impact at every stage of Raskolnikov's changing fortunes and character. All of these features aid in the portrayal of Raskolnikov's downfall and subsequent rise.
The main character in Crime and Punishment, Raskolnikov, has nihilistic ideas, which ultimately lead to his own suffering. Raskolnikov, an impoverished student, conceives of himself as being an extraordinary man who has the right to commit any crime. He believes that as an extraordinary man that he is beyond good and evil. Since he does not believe in God, he cannot accept any moral laws. To prove his theory, he murders an old pawnbroker and her step sister. Besides, he rationalizes that he has done society a favor by getting rid of the evil pawnbroker who would cheat people. Immediately after the murders, he begins to suffer emotionally. Raskolnikiv “[feels] a terrible disorder within himself. He [is] afraid of losing his control…” (Dostoevsky 95). He becomes ill and lies in his room in a semi-conscious state. As soon as he is well and can walk again, he goes out and reads about the crime in all the newspapers of the last few days. The sheer mention of the murder...
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