Crime And Punishment

Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky

Crime and Punishment is a rather interesting, yet tedious book to read (at least the version I have was tedious to read). The story focuses on an impoverished student by the name of "Raskolnikov", or if you will, "Rodion Romanovich Raskolnikov", or Rodya, or Rodka. (I hope you are beginning to see what I mean about tedious). Though to say that he is a student while the story takes place is clearly false, everyone still considers him to be one, so we'll leave it at that.

But to move on, Rodya believes himself to be of a higher class than other people, not a social class, but a sort of class that concerns the differences between "right" and "wrong". He plans the murder of an old pawnbroker shrew that no one particularly likes. Strangely enough, this idea only occurs to him whenever he overhears two officers joking around about it.

When he does eventually carry out his plan, he also kills her sister, who happens to be the best friend of the woman that he later comes to know, and fall in love with. He doesn't kill the sister out of malice or spite, but only because she caught him in the act. From there, his mental state goes into a downward spiral into insanity and comes back again only through a spiritual and emotional rebirth through the woman he comes to love.

The book can be split into two parts (it's actually split into six, but two main parts are very distinct). Parts 1 - 3 are said to be "Part 1" of the novel, while Parts 4 - 6 are said to be "Part 2" of the novel. "Part 1" shows a proud and rational Rodya, but it also shows the decay and death of that side of him. It first starts partly because of his self-imposed extreme poverty, but more so because of the murder he commits. "Part 2" shows a new emerging personality, a personality stemming from long bouts of delirium and illness, but also a personality that is struggling to keep sane. At the very end you see a spiritual rebirth of the man, a man who finds his reason, a man who finds his purpose.

Now, as to how I feel about this particular novel, I did overall enjoy it. With that said, I couldn't possibly recommend this to anyone for reading (as someone had recommended that I not read it). I find the writing style to be somewhat boring. I almost considered not finishing the book after the first three chapters. I distinctly remember wanting to toss the book into the trashcan after the second chapter. It was page, after page of some description of Rodya's sister. It kept saying the same thing, but in different words - a common theme you find throughout the book; not to mention you had to remember the many different versions of the same name for each character you were introduced to.

What I did like, however, was the theme, the descriptive nature (when it was not so ridiculously wordy), and the subtle and sometimes not so subtle references to psychology on the personal level and on the societal level. There were many parts of the book where I simply could not bear to stop reading out of fear of the anxiety I could possibly receive by not reading more and more.

Clearly, the Punishment for the Crime is reading the book, and the Crime itself is actually enjoying the book more than you hated it. Perhaps that was secretly Dostoevsky's goal all long, to torment us with an intriguing and captivating story that was written in a manner that was often annoying. This is not a book I'll open again any time soon, but am still glad that I have at least read it. On a final note, I would read this book again if it was rewritten in a format that was well designed.