Fyodor Dostoevsky"Life is in ourselves and not in the external"

1821 - 1881

Dostoevsky - Bio

• Born in Moscow in 1821

• Lived part-time – charity hospital, part-time country estate

• Domineering father who mistreated his serfs

Dostoevsky - Bio

• Early writings – socially liberal, politically reformist

• At 28, arrested by tsarist officials (1849)

• Came before firing squad

Dostoevsky - Bio• Exiled to Siberia 8 years (4 in prison, 4 in army)

• 1859 – Fully pardoned, began writing again

Dostoevsky’s Writings

• Uncanny insight into human motivation

• Fearless willingness to dig into human soul

• Tackles “big” questions—good/evil, faith/doubt

dostoevshchina

Dostoevsky’s Writings

Andrew MacAndrew (Russian scholar) says:

“Dostoevsky’s prophetic quality is precisely not what he says but the tone in which he says it, not his ability to solve metaphysical problems but his uncanny ability to convey the torments people go through in trying to solve them.”

Dostoevsky’s Writings

• What is the point of life?redemption through suffering and love

Yet…deep doubt persists……if there is no God, then suffering-for-redemption is all for naught.

• Published 1864

•A rejection of his former beliefs

•Its hero/antihero is new: the hypersensitive neurotic Underground Man

•“Notes from Under the Floor”

Notes from Underground

Dostoevsky reacting against:1) Victorian view of the universe as clockwork2) Enthusiasm for socialist utopia

What are these things doing in the novel…?:- Mouse- Anthill- Crystal Palace- 2+2 = 4- Laws of Nature- Toothache