Psycho Killer, The Russian Edition

[bounty]

i think for sure its possible Dostoevsky could write pro-family themes into his stories as a response to Marxist thought, but I don't see the brief interaction between raz and raskols family as necessarily being evidence of that. if we want to make that argument, there would have be a lot more of the remainder of the story grounded in and around his mother and sister. and maybe not even then---raz's interaction can easily be viewed as a one-off, and raskols having them in his life is just a normal matter of course; family has been important ever since theres been family, so families appear in stories. their presence just as easily could have been written at any time period in history regardless of what social-political movements were afoot.

I just finished chapter 3 in part III, and it ends with a little hook of dounia and her mother saying they want raskol to appear that evening, even after luzhin tells them to not. brava!

[Sancho]

The chapter that covers the evening meet-up is a good one. (I’ve been reading ahead. I can’t help myself. I have no will power. I’ve been known to be in the kitchen, at the table, at 2am, with a jar of Nutella and a wooden mixing spoon, you see.)

[bounty]

who doesn't like Nutella!

i appreciate your restraint on posting until im caught up, thank you. im partway into the chapter where raskol meets porfiry.

I had just been thinking again about Dostoevsky's "need" to introduce the predominant trait of young men, that is, thinking about young women, when raskol seemed to have gotten the revelation that raz has the hots for his sister.

I thought it was fascinating that Russians could use "Romeo" in the same way we would use it here.

I wonder if raskol is going to end up attracted to Sonia.

and he seems to be constantly plagued by viewing everything in life as either suspecting or indicting him on the murder. he's frequently a bundle of nerves.

[Sancho]

No spoilers.
You know Darth Vader is Luke’s pops, right?
Aaarrrggg!

Anyway, this book seems like it sticks tightly to it’s outline, with sections and chapters logically presented and, as I mentioned earlier, a sort of hook at the end of each chapter. This ain’t no spoiler but here’s the hook at the end of Chapter 5, Section 4:

But here a strange incident occurred, something so unexpected, in the ordinary course of things, that certainly neither Raskolnikov nor Porfiry Petrovich could have reckoned on such a denouement.

I mean, even if I planned to stop there, I’m gonna go ahead and read the next few pages. And I’m pretty sure the 19th century folks who were reading the book in serial installments in the periodical, The Russian Messenger, would go ahead and plan to buy the next issue just to see what Raskol and Porfiry could not have reckoned.

But… narration-wise the book seems loose to my 21st century sensibilities. And I think this is because I just haven’t read that many modern books written with a third-person omniscient narrator. I’ve read a number of books recently that’ll take turns, chapter by chapter, going from one character’s perspective to another’s, but in C&P we can go from Raskol’s thoughts to Porfiry’s thoughts from one sentence to the next.

I donno. Has anybody here read a recent book that uses a third person omniscient POV?

[bounty]

yes but I don't know who shot JR.

you are five chapters ahead of me, im just wrapping up the last few pages of section III.

that particular chapter seems to be very revelatory---holy cow, raskol wrote a paper on crime that got published in a magazine! and he's still, maybe all the more so given the topic of conversation and the people with whom he's having it, a bundle of nerves.

its fun to consider the narrative style. the book I read just before this, house of sand and fog took turns chapter by chapter telling the story from the first person point of view of each of the two main characters.

as we're doing crime and punishment im also reading broken prey by john Sandford. id call that a 3rd person omniscient narration. some of the lee child "jack reacher" books I enjoy change styles between books.

[bounty]

double holy cow batman! near the end of the section, some random fellow purposely sought out raskol, walked away, and when the latter confronted him, the random fellow shouted "murderer!"

[Sancho]

Jumpin' Jehoshaphat!

At first I thought he hallucinated it.

[Sancho]

I had to take a side trip and learn the story of Lazarus as is laid out in The Gospel of John. Four days dead and shazam!

And it's been 4 days since Raskol murdered Alyona and Lizaveta and I'm thinking the sh*t's about to go down.

[bounty]

i wondered too, and had to go back to read if he was dreaming at night, hallucinating, or otherwise unconscious---he does seem to pass out a lot.

maybe I remember a reference to Lazarus in passing---or am I making that up? do you remember what page that was on? I can go and take a peek.

I just finished the chapters where dounia's old employer, svidrigailov, shows up and tries to enlist raskols help with what---putting the moves on his sister? and with quite a bit of financial influence to boot.

and then the chapter where raskol and luzhin were together visiting mother and sister. that was a great read. though Dostoevsky didn't mention it, raz must have been loving it.

[Sancho]

Man! They are sick a lot in this book. Raskol’s sickness seems to be psychosomatic, but Katerina’s “consumption” is real and probably not all that unusual for the people of Petersburg in the mid 1800s. I’m thinking she has tuberculosis.

There’s a passing reference to Lazarus in Part 3, Chapter 4. In a conversation with Raz, Raskol wonders if he’ll have to “sing Lazarus” to him, which is a reference to beggars in St. Petersburg asking for alms.

Then in the next chapter Lazarus comes up again. Raskol is talking with Porfiry, ostensibly trying to reclaim his property from the murdered pawn broker. Porfiry however is gently interrogating Raskol for the murder. The paper Raskol had published comes up and Raskol goes into a long monologue defending his ideas and he finishes with this:

In short, for me all men's rights are equivalent—and vive la guerre éternelle—until the New Jerusalem, of course!

According to the annotations in my copy of the book, “New Jerusalem” comes up in Revelations at the end of the New Testament as a sort of heaven on earth. New Jerusalem was interpreted and adopted as a popular theory in Russia at the time as a Socialist utopia. That gives rise to this exchange:

“So you still believe in the New Jerusalem?”

“I believe,” Raskolnikov answered firmly; saying this, as throughout his whole tirade, he looked at the ground, having picked out a certain spot on the carpet.

“And...and...and do you also believe in God? Excuse me for being so curious.”

“I believe,” Raskolnikov repeated, looking up at Porfiry.

“And...and do you believe in the raising of Lazarus?”[79]

“I be-believe. What do you need all this for?”

“You believe literally?”

“Literally.”

But then the big Lazarus part is in Section 4, Chapter 4. Raskol and Sonya have a heart-to-heart. In the interest of no spoilers, I’ll leave the discussion for later. I will say though that I think it’s an important part of the book.

[bounty]

and also raped, and suicided, and murdered and apparently all of Katerina's children are sick too.

yes, "consumption" is an old term for tuberculosis.

im just about to start chapter 5

a few things from the most recent chapters:

the little section where raskol and raz are facing each other and...

something strange as it were, passed between them...some idea, some hint as it were, slipped, something awful, hideous, and suddenly understood on both sides...razumihin turned pale.

when I first read that, my impression was, okay, raz knows raskols the murderer, and raskol knows that raz now knows. on second thought, its possible that interaction might be interpreted to be in reference to raskol abandoning his family, which seems the more likely.

the whole chapter/interaction with Sonia was both interesting and a puzzler. im at a loss to understand his insistence on hearing the account of Lazarus being raised from the dead. I think something so weighty is bound to be important (as you are hinting at) so it remains to be seen as to how.

raskol, seems to be on the cusp of something---apart from leaving his family, he told Sonia if she sees him tomorrow, he'll tell her who killed lizeveta.

and to add to the intrigue, svidrigailov was eavesdropping!

[Sancho]

I thought it was interesting how Porfiry sowed the seed and then Raskol went to Sonya to hear the story of Lazarus. Sonya resisted mightily reading the bible to him, but Raskol persisted. I think Sonya, as a devout believer, resists reading to Raskol because she thinks he is contemptuous of the bible. But Raskol genuinely wants to hear the story. He is keenly interested when he finds out the bible was given to Sonya by Lizaveta, the primary source of his feelings of remorse.

Not sure but I think he still sort of believes Alyona had it coming and the world is a better place without her. But how does he atone for killing Liz? He contemplates suicide while standing on a bridge, staring down at the water, but weirdly a distraught woman beats him to the punch and leaps off the bridge right beside him. He contemplates running to America and starting a Wild West Show (I added that last part). He has already isolated himself from Mom and Sis. Now he seems to be asking himself if wasting away in an arctic prison will cleanse him of his (sins?). Is redemption even possible?

I gotta say, I was again reminded of Flannery O’Connor’s writing, particularly a couple of stories in her collection, A Good Man Is Hard To Find. I am certain she was influenced by Dostoevsky. She definitely explored some of the same ideas.

Anyway, last night La Señora and I were watching a documentary about a hiker whose emaciated corpse was found in a tent, in a remote place in southwest Florida. So the authorities set out to find out who he was. Turns out he’d hiked the Appalachian Trail, north to south, and had met a lot of people along the way, but nobody knew his name. Hikers of the AT tend to know each other by trail names — his was “Mostly Harmless”. Everybody liked the guy. Most of the show was about figuring who he was, and it was way more difficult than anyone thought it would be. ***Spoiler Alert*** When they finally get an identity on the guy, they find out he was not at all the easy-going hiker he seemed to be, but rather he’d been a bit of a-hole in his previous life. So I was thinking he was on a Raskol-like journey, trying to think about how to deal with things. He hadn’t killed anybody, but he had been abusive to people who loved him. His conclusion, evidently, was to starve himself to death. Raskol’s conclusion is yet to be seen.

HBO MAX — They Called Him Mostly Harmless
Was based on an article by Nicholas Thomson in Wired magazine

[bounty]

im nearing the end of chapter 5 with raskol in Russian columbo's office...

I don't know what the number is but ive read something like there are basically 7 (or 12 or whatever) stories that exist, just told in different ways. Id have to guess that how humans deal with guilt is one of them. in my view, that's gotta be Dostoevsky's aim and that'll be the eventual ending of crime and punishment.

not that O'Connor couldn't have been influenced by him, but i suspect the relative reductive universality (if that phrase makes sense) of stories helps to explain similarities too. all the more so as I understand she was a devout catholic and her faith infused her writing.

and that all helps to explain the unfortunate "mostly harmless" hiker too.

and interesting timing---I just finished a ride while watching another DS9 episode. the spiritual leader (kai winn) of bajor (the nearby planet) has devoted her life to the prophets, but in actuality, she has been more motivated by her own power and political gain, and the prophets have never spoken to her. she just recently had a vision/visitation that she originally thought was the prophets, but it turned out it was from their demonic counterparts, the pah-wraiths. when she realizes this, she is crushed, and the pain initially seems to humble her. she seeks guidance from one of the main characters who is bajoran. the character tells her she should step down from being kai, that its her lust for power that's interfering with a her spiritual well-being. but instead of continuing on her humbling path, repenting and seeking forgiveness, she hardens her heart, turns away from the prophets and embraces the pah-wraiths.

as you hinted at---the remainder of the book for me is a matter of how raskol ultimately deals with his guilt and what becomes of him when he's decided that question. among other things, it'll be interesting to see if the solution can be tied back to the Lazarus passages.

[Sancho]

That theory about 7 or 12 types of stories rings true to my ear and I know you've heard the quip that there's only 2 plots — Stranger comes to town, and Hero takes a journey. Iliad and Odyssey. Inevitably any road-trip story with adventures and stuff is going to be compared to Homer. No doubt about it, I'm always seeing correlations between what I'm reading and what's currently going on. The better the book the more connections I see. I can't help but to think the tragedy of Alexei Navalny is in Dostoevsky somewheres.

Anyway the theory kinda reminds me of the world's greatest country song, You Never Even Call Me By My Name, by David Allen Coe. (The last verse is the clincher)

https://youtu.be/Sco_eBvXGTQ?si=lFg8fAJOrNWlGqN9

I was drunk the day my mama got out of prison
And I went to pick her up in the rain
But before I could get to the station in the pickup truck
She got ran over by a damned old train.

The song was written by Steve Goodman ( yep the same guy who did the Call Me Ismael tune over on the Moby! tread)

[Danik 2016]

I think, since there exist values at all one of the basic narratives literature is reproducing again and again is this fight between good and evil in a multiplicity of forms.

i I don´t know if the notions of guilt and repentance were introduced together with the idea of Religion. It probably was and it is one of the recurring Themes of Dostoevsky.

In "Crime and Prejudice" some of the characters seem to serve as a sort of guides to Raskol in his fight between guilt and repentance. One of them is this detective Porfiry, who seems to have come of a Freudian school of psychoanalysis rather than the police.