Crime and Punishment

In an attempt to keep my brain from atrophying, I've started reading and rereading some classic literature. First on my list happened to be Dostoyevsky's Crime and Punishment (Norton Critical Editions). While there has been loads of scholarly analysis far more brilliant than anything I can come up with, I'll still offer my insight, for what it's worth.

While this is obviously a work about crime and the subsequent internal torment that follows a brutal murder, I found other themes far more compelling. To me, this was a work about the bitter consequences that arise from our vices if we fail to reign them in. Marmeledov, most obviously, was enfeebled by his alcoholism and though he watched it destroy his family and send his daughter into prostitution, he still sat at the pub. Svidrigailov pursued his lust and was by all accounts a cruel, calculating man and in the end, his faults prevented him from obtaining the one thing he wanted most--Dunya's love. And lastly, Raskolnikov's vice was an overabundance of reason untempered by compassion or mercy. He justified murdering the old woman with cold reason and rationality but it was his emotions that tortured him in the aftermath of her death. Oddly enough, Raskolnikov's salvation--his love for Sonya--seems like the triumph of feminine qualities (the whimsical emotions) over masculine ones (impassive reason).

The first time I read this book, I was 14. It was truly a pleasure to go through it again from a more adult perspective. It's not a terribly uplifting read, but the tragic characters are worth the study if you're feeling a bit moody.