Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Published: 1866
Languange: Russian
Translation: Pevear/Volokhonsky (1992)
Length: ⁓200k words
Initial thoughts
Until now, my relationship with Russian literature has been confined to a single year of my life. In high school, I was on the academic decathlon team, spending most of my free time preparing for what is essentially a full day of competitive multiple-choice tests. Each year's curriculum is shaped by some central theme, and in my senior year, that theme was Russia. We studied art, economics, literature, music, science, and social science, all through the lens of Russian history. This was just over a decade ago, so the details have become fuzzy, but these are the memories that come to the surface as I prepare to read Crime and Punishment. I remember afternoons sitting on uncomfortable science lab stools discussing the poems of Alexander Pushkin, which everyone on my team enjoyed, and Boris Pasternak's Doctor Zhivago, which everyone on my team reviled. It was a slog. Miserable. Grueling. We spent the whole year complaining about it. On the day of the competition, we were shocked to hear a rival team talk about how much they loved the book. Were they joking? Surely they weren't reading the same garbage we were... And they weren't! The other team read a different translation! I can't for the life of me remember which translation was the "good" one and which was the "bad" one, but I can clearly recall the feeling of betrayal after finding out I had spent so much time beating my head against the "wrong" translation.
As you might imagine, it took me a bit of time to decide which translation of Crime and Punishment to read. (Wikipedia lists no less than 14 English translations! Scary!) This is the first Dostoyevsky novel I've ever read, so I want to get a good sense of what he's about. I settled on the Pevear and Volokhonsky translation (P/V) for three reasons. First, unable to let go of the experiences described above, I ended up reading a blog post comparing Doctor Zhivago translations. I still can't say for sure which one I hated in high school, but based on these excerpts, who I am today prefers P/V. What some people call stilted, I call concise. It works for me. Second, not everyone in bookbug club is specifying which translation they're reading, but of those that are, P/V is the most common. Whether or not it's the best translation matters less to me than being on the same page as fellow club members. This is a joint exercise! The final reason is that I'm joining the club halfway through the month and this is a long book. If I'm going to finish on time, I need to stop fussing over the possibility of reading a better/worse translation and just start!
With that, on to the novel!
Part One
"What a well they've dug for themselves, however! And they use it! They really do use it! And they got accustomed to it. Wept a bit and got accustomed. Man gets accustomed to everything, the scoundrel!”
He fell to thinking.
“But if that's a lie,” he suddenly exclaimed involuntarily, “if man in fact is not a scoundrel—in general, that is, the whole human race—then the rest is all mere prejudice, instilled fear, and there are no barriers, and that's just how it should be! . . .”
Rodion Raskolnikov at the end of Part One, Chapter II
The novel begins in the heat of summer, but it feels more fitting that I should read it now, in December, the month when I find myself most preoccupied with the same questions that torment poor Raskolnikov. The holidays are challenging for me; I think a lot about the wells we dig. Is my yearly stay with my parents more like climbing into the well or am I digging it even deeper? My circumstances are different than Raskolnikov's, of course, but I know the terror of confronting someone so miserable that you'll do anything to not end up the same way. I pity Marmeladov. I pity Raskolnikov, too. Frantic and bloody, he digs a well even more horrible than the one he was desperately trying to avoid.
Why? Was it inevitable, predetermined? A product of human nature or circumstance? Seeing suffering all around us, does it become easy to justify adding to the pain? We dig and dig and dig. Is man a scoundrel?
As I follow along with Raskolnikov's line of thought (though it is often less like a line and more like a circle or a tangle of wires), I try to fight off my own tendency towards cynicism. Yes, we dig wells. But we can climb! I find bittersweet comfort in the following poem:
What Resembles the Grave but Isn't
Always falling into a hole, then saying “ok, this is not your grave, get out of this hole,” getting out of the hole which is not the grave, falling into a hole again, saying “ok, this is also not your grave, get out of this hole,” getting out of that hole, falling into another one; sometimes falling into a hole within a hole, or many holes within holes, getting out of them one after the other, then falling again, saying “this is not your grave, get out of the hole”; sometimes being pushed, saying “you can not push me into this hole, it is not my grave,” and getting out defiantly, then falling into a hole again without any pushing; sometimes falling into a set of holes whose structures are predictable, ideological, and long dug, often falling into this set of structural and impersonal holes; sometimes falling into holes with other people, with other people, saying “this is not our mass grave, get out of this hole,” all together getting out of the hole together, hands and legs and arms and human ladders of each other to get out of the hole that is not the mass grave but that will only be gotten out of together; sometimes the willful-falling into a hole which is not the grave because it is easier than not falling into a hole really, but then once in it, realizing it is not the grave, getting out of the hole eventually; sometimes falling into a hole and languishing there for days, weeks, months, years, because while not the grave very difficult, still, to climb out of and you know after this hole there’s just another and another; sometimes surveying the landscape of holes and wishing for a high quality final hole; sometimes thinking of who has fallen into holes which are not graves but might be better if they were; sometimes too ardently contemplating the final hole while trying to avoid the provisional ones; sometimes dutifully falling and getting out, with perfect fortitude, saying “look at the skill and spirit with which I rise from that which resembles the grave but isn’t!”
Part Two
“The first thing you do in any circumstances is try not to resemble a human being! [...] So, if you weren't a fool, a banal fool, an utter fool, a foreign translation...you see, Rodya, I admit you're a smart fellow, but you're a fool!”
Dmitri Prokofych Razumikhin in Part Two, Chapter VI
I felt some sympathy for Raskolnikov initially, but with each chapter, I find that I care for him less and less. He spits on those who love him, refuses their help, and digs his hole deeper at every opportunity. What else is there to do but to call him a fool?
Part Three
“Well, and those who are the true geniuses—the ones who are granted the right to put a knife into others,” Razumikhin asked, frowning, “they ought not to suffer at all, even for the blood they've shed?”
“Why this word ought? There's neither permission nor prohibition here. Let him suffer, if he pities his victim...Suffering and pain are always obligatory for a broad consciousness and a deep heart. Truly great men, I think, must feel great sorrow in this world,” [Raskolnikov] suddenly added pensively, not even in the tone of the conversation.
From Part Three, Chapter V
- My disgust with Rodion Raskolnikov grows.
- Despite characters constantly pointing out how similar Rodion and Dunya are, I like her a lot. Is this because we (the readers) view her from Rodion and Razumikhin's perspectives, and they both respect and admire her? Were we to get a chapter from her view instead, a full account of what she thinks as she paces around the room, would we find out she is just as twisted as her brother? Probably not, but I do wonder what the point of emphasizing their similarities is. Does Dostoyevsky want us to identify some key difference between them that makes one a murderer? Is being raised by a mother who always sacrificed her daughter's happiness for her son's the reason that Rodion thinks he is so superior to other people?
- The quote above sticks out to me, but I want to hold off on discussing Rodion's worldview until I am done or nearly done with the novel.