The Epilogue, Why People Dislike It

When I first read this book at a teenager, I agreed with a lot of critics that the epilogue was tacked on, and did not do justice to the intensity of Raskolnikov in the rest of the novel.

I thought perhaps it was Dostoevsky's attempt to add on a Christian ending, though the real truth of the novel was otherwise.

When I re-read it recently, my opinion was absolutely changed, and it struck me that maybe it is that the people who dislike the ending are those that basically share Raskolnikov's original philosophy.

Not that they condone murder, or are anywhere as extreme as Raskolnikov was, but that they basically have a materialist, utilitarian philosophy where the end justifies the means, that there is really not an innate value in every life, that reason, and ideology based on reason, trumps all.

I now see the epilogue as an organic part of the novel. The novel ended in a kind of intense cresendo, and in the aftermath Raskolnikov seems angry, perhaps beginning to renege on the renunciation of his former philosophy, until he has his dream of the virus, and the subsequent realization of Sonia as a way out of the mess his former ideology entailed.

This is how changes in outlook often happen, I think. We don't often logically re-assess our belief structures and sort everything out methodically. Rather, something from the subconscious shifts, as in Raskolnikov's dream and moment after seeing Sonya at the prision gates, and everything reorders on its own.

As a Christian myself, I'm probably a little biased when I say that people are crazy when they say that the epilogue in C+P is "tacked on" or "unnecessary." Still, I believe that it is a beautiful way to end such a intense, psychological novel. Roskolnikov does take a violent turn from his former mindset of ruthless materialism to a more idealistic, hopeful one, but why is that a bad thing? A turn to the Christian worldview (I believe) should result in many changes in state-of-mind as well as real life action. In short, I guess I agree with you.

When I said to my teacher that book has a happy ending, she looked at me angry, like ''what are you talking about...???''. But she was weird... :D Some people thinks that Dostoevsky finished epilogue of C&P shortly quickly beacuse of his gambling debts...

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Originally Posted by bazarov

Some people thinks that Dostoevsky finished epilogue of C&P shortly quickly beacuse of his gambling debts...

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Yes, i heard that too. Do you think that this is possible, Baz?

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Originally Posted by Asa Adams

Yes, i heard that too. Do you think that this is possible, Baz?

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Well, I don't want to believe in that but...He did finished some books in very short time because of it deadlines, and he also admited that he has material for at least 2-3 books lefted from his earlier books. One would be about a great siner and his forfeit; and second about a life of a kid, from his bearth to his teenage years. His debts might have been solved earlier if he had only recieve same money per page as Tolstoy who was getting three times higher amounts then Dostoevsky.

I would find it a lot easier to say it wasn't just Dostoevsky plugging Christianity if he didn't plug it in so many other books that he wrote, in similar ways (ie. an answer to philosophical questions which the non-Christian characters, given whatever talents they have and have not, can't find anywhere else), and if he didn't write so extensively about the not-yet-understood importance of the Russian Christ to the rest of the world (though the world would understand this when Russia "revealed it to her," which was, according to him, Russia's highest purpose and goal) as well as Panslavism and Jews being the scourge of the Earth, in his Diary of a Writer, as well as in many of his articles for Pravda themselves. Christ was a philosophical as well as a spiritual solution.

Not to say that it wasn't ALSO bad/good/whatever it was because he wrote it quickly to pay off debts.