Anyone who has ever read Fyodor Dostoyevsky, please comment

[JCamilo]

As I understand the prince, he is not really out-placed or naive. He is supremely self-sacrificing, driven by a Christ-like love. Adults, whether in Switzerland or Russia, will always find such a love offensive: excessive, threatening and mad.

Completely out-placed. The hypocritical russian society is exposed by the more idealistic characters of Dostoievisky like the prince or Aliosha. Reflects Dostoievisky own desillusion from his youth days. He was a critical of the individuals who are all for a change but less effective. Dostoievisky did not believe anymore in those changes just like Basarov pointed, it is Victor Hugo realm. There is a bit of irony in the works of Dostoievisky. (The prince is willing to self-sacrifice, but this does not change the fact that he is naive in many aspects)


Virginiawang

Romanticism does not deal with heros and heroines, and on the contrary they deal with the trueset feelings of ordinary people. Those writers did not pretend, boast or mislead. They simply said how they felt. That's the magic. Myshkin was romantic both in his character and his love, not because he was ideal like a saint , but rather because he had a beautiful soul and devoted his heart to his love without any practical considerations. He could never be a saint but he was only childlike and innocent.

I do not know a single literature that does not deal with heroes. The romanticism created the Anti-hero in the Byronic sense. We also have the natural naive man from Rousseau.
All writers do not pretend, boast and mislead and all of them do it. And everyone just said what they feel. Romanticism also have a strong sense of individualism, but writing about the commum people was a trait of all literature after the romanticism. Joyce wrote about it and it was not a romantic.
And talking about romanticism without idealism is funny. The idea of democracy, communism, socialism, anarchism...

And again, It is not that he is not good, pure, etc. It is how he is used. All his troubles in the book is to conect with others because they are not like him. His fate is tied to that as well. He is a romantic like character, Dostoievisky, not. Mishikin is an irony. That is why he is showing a drama, a sad reality, because he was telling to the idealistic youth of his country that all goodness they pretend was not effective. The whole, "the path to hell is filled with good intentions" thing...

[bazarov]

If prince Myshin was a saint and really so self-sacrificing, where was his compassion for Agala, to whom he was engaged already? Did he not know that it would be the greatest insult to a woman when her bethrothed left with another woman? If he had known this, why did he choose to do what he did? Is it really absurd to hurt a woman without limits in the hope of saving another woman, whom, according to you, he did not truly love? Why did he have compassion for one but oblivion for another? Will Jesus do the same, to hurt one in order to save another? A self-sacrificing saint is supposed to be one like Jesus, who poured out his love equally to all human humans. I don't think there are such stories in Bible, where Jesus wounded someone on the purpose of saving another more in need of him. Do you know such a story in Bible, please show me where.

Mishkin had to choose one of those womens, so naturally; when you have to pick someone, you will always hurt the other. Do you see any possibility? He didn't also, so he decided to pick Nastasya - she was more unhappy and in need for real friendship and protection (I doubt Miskin was capable to give her true love, only his friendship and compassion).

But you didn't answer my question above? Jesus or someone like Jesus would never have done such a thing even if he had been put in the same situation. He would not hurt anyone under any circumstances because he was a real saint. A saint will never lie. He will always keep his promise, and he will always have the wisdom to do the right thing at the right moment. Have you ever heard of a saint who did not care about his words to one woman and trampled her dignity at the instant he saw another woman? If the act were a sort of self-sacrifice and compared to Jesus, I believe Jesus would jump out of his grave and give vent to his fury.

Prince is not and was not Jesus. Jesus never loved women in sexual context and nobody loved him in that way so he never was in danger to hurt someones feelings. So comparing Jesus and Prince is absurd. Dostoevsky never said that Prince is Jesus; he just wanted to create character who supposed to be ''pure merit'', something like Don Quijote and he showed, of course; that there is no place for such mens on this world.

If the book, The Idiot, does not involve selfish love and is merely an account of some deeds of self-sacrifice, how does it diffrent from Bible? I am sure you can find similar stories from Bible, the best book of self-sacrifice. Will you give me one example?

Every love between men and women is actually selfish because we can make someone happy only and only if we are also happy; so we are the important one. From other side of that ''love'', it's completely the same.
Jesus and Maria Magdalena - Mishkin and Nastasya? Only compassion and love for humans, not love for specified person.

Oh, you haven't answered any of the questions above. If you cannot answer those questions, you don't really understand how he was like Jesus. I think he loved Nastasya at the first sight, and fell in love more and more as days went by. Though he had treated everyone he knew generously and benevolently and harbored the most beautiful sentiments, he could not conquer his heart with his head at the moment he saw Nastasya.

From the first moment, he saw something frightening in her eyes, he realized then and even more later how unhappy she is and how unfair she is treated by others. He had never seen someone unhappy and miserable like her - that was reason for his ''great love'' toward her.

[JCamilo]

I think there is a super valorization of the goodness of Mishkin in this thread that is missing the stage where Dostoievisky placed him and the contrast caused by such option. This missing the irony of Dostoievisky and reducing him to a "emotional drama writer", what his critics most accuse instead of his cleaver critics to the russian society, pointing to the future, which is the area where he surpass Tolstoi.

[Gladys]

He had never seen someone unhappy and miserable like her - that was reason for his ''great love'' toward her.

I agree with all you say.

Completely out-placed. The hypocritical Russian society is exposed by the more idealistic characters of Dostoievisky like the prince or Aliosha.

The Prince is no more out-placed in Russia than Jesus was in Jerusalem. As the old doctor in Pavlofsk told Lebedev, just days before the fateful wedding day, it won’t do to dismiss the prince as mad ('no one left for keepers').

Prince Myshkin is the sanest of men! Far from naive, the prince is insightful, intelligent, compassionate and far seeing. That he seems naive to fellow Russians, is an indictment of their petty society, shallow ethics and blinkered vision.

As an instance of Nietzsche's Superman (Übermensch), Prince Myshkin lays bare 'hypocritical Russian society' just as Jesus once exposed Pharisaic hypocrisy in Palestine. No 'emotional drama writer', Dostoevsky presents a character as intellectually radical as Meursault in Albert Camus' L’Étranger.

If the book, The Idiot, does not involve selfish love and is merely an account of some deeds of self-sacrifice, how does it different from Bible? I am sure you can find similar stories from Bible, the best book of self-sacrifice. Will you give me one example?

The prince and Jesus equate to Nietzsche's Superman. Soren Kierkegaard, the father of existentialism, first categorised Jesus in the way, and Dostoevsky was much influenced by the Danish genius.

You ask, Virginiawang, for a Biblical example of self-sacrifice comparable to Myshkin's. Jesus, like the prince, was crucified by his society. Jesus' parable of the lost sheep parallels the central theme of The Idiot:

Matthew 18:12____ How think ye? if a man have an hundred sheep, and one of them be gone astray, doth he not leave the ninety and nine, and goeth into the mountains, and seeketh that which is gone astray?

And if so be that he find it, verily I say unto you, he rejoiceth more of that sheep, than of the ninety and nine which went not astray.

It is crystal clear that Nastasya Filippovna and Roghozin are lost sheep, and Prince Myshkin the shepherd.

[virginiawang]

First of all, I would like to tell you American Romanticism deals with the true feelings of ordinary poeple, so those writes had been unconventional in a time when most writers focused on secenes of a higher level of society. If you wish to know more, you may want to read Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nathanial Hawthorn, Herman Melville or David Henry Thureau, to get to know more about this type of work.
I agree with you, Bazarov, that prince Myshkin was not Juses, not Christ-like, so not a saint, but he was pure and innocent. However I want to offer my opinion here. It's hard to analyze an attachment between a man and a woman, and it's beyond our power to say which part of my affection is drawn by compassion, which part is caused by neccisity, or which part presents only frindship. When prince first saw the portrait, he was conquered by some feelings indescribable, perhaps fear, shock, amazemention, and compassion, all of which being parts of what was going on deep within himself, constituted love, I believe.
I agree with you in what you said about love between a woman and a man being selfish. The reason why I chose to compare Jesus and Myshkin was that I hoped people would understand that Myskin did involve himself in some selfish love affairs. Though he is pure, and compassionate, his attachment for Nastasya was so strong that he couldn't have cared anybody else, including his bethrothed. At the moment he decided to stay with Nastasya, his heart took the reign. That's why I said he was being romantic.
By the way, to have true emotions involved is a good thing that makes this piece of literature worth reading. It does not lessen its value.

[virginiawang]

One like Jesus, trampled upon the dignity of his bethrothed to stay by the side of another woman whom he could never get out of his head for no reasons at all throughout his life and married her after a fortnight. He broke his promise for the first one, went astray in moral concerns, and deeply wounded the feelings of his bethrothed. All he did was out of a wish to sacrifice himself, just like Jesus, and he never really loved another woman. Is that logical? By the way, I have to point out that the example you gave me did not address the most important point, for Jesus, though let go of the missing sheep, did not wound the animal in any way. Will you give me another example where Jesus wounded one living being for the purpose of saving another more in need of Him?

[JCamilo]

The Prince is no more out-placed in Russia than Jesus was in Jerusalem. As the old doctor in Pavlofsk told Lebedev, just days before the fateful wedding day, it won’t do to dismiss the prince as mad ('no one left for keepers').

Prince Myshkin is the sanest of men! Far from naive, the prince is insightful, intelligent, compassionate and far seeing. That he seems naive to fellow Russians, is an indictment of their petty society, shallow ethics and blinkered vision.

As an instance of Nietzsche's Superman (Übermensch), Prince Myshkin lays bare 'hypocritical Russian society' just as Jesus once exposed Pharisaic hypocrisy in Palestine. No 'emotional drama writer', Dostoevsky presents a character as intellectually radical as Meursault in Albert Camus' L’Étranger.

First, I am not bothered at all with Mishkin and Jesus relations. I am talking about the notion that Dostoievisky is a romantic writer in the first post of this thread. I think Bakarov can easily reply reasons why Jesus and Mishkin are also different.
Someone can be only naive in relation to others. The prince is naive because he can see those around him but not perceive the underneath of the individuals, his trust is too big to see the hypocrisy. That is what give to him the idea of martir, but it is a futile martir and that is something due to Dostoievisky own cinism. I doubt dostoievisky saw Jesus martyridom as ineffective, simple because Jesus action is also in the dialetic level. But what I want to make clear is that both Mishkin and the society around him are critics by Dostoievisky. To Dostoievisky both dialect side of russia at that momment are stuck, ineffective. Alioacha, who shares a lot of with the prince, perceives the flaws of russian society and prefer to avoid it. He is an evolution of Mishkin reaction.

[JCamilo]

First of all, I would like to tell you American Romanticism deals with the true feelings of ordinary poeple, so those writes had been unconventional in a time when most writers focused on secenes of a higher level of society

Romanticism as a whole dealt with ordinary people. William Wordsworth Ballads are about ordinary people, Victor Hugo dramas are about ordinary people, Charles Dickens dealt with ordinary people, Gogol dealt with ordinary people. And of course, it is considerable harder to americans write about a upper class that didn't exist in their country. But it is not dealing with ordinary people the definitive trait of Romanticism. Later writers are going to still deal with that without being romantic, Balzac, Zola, Eça de Queiroz, Joyce, Kafka, etc.

If you wish to know more, you may want to read Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nathanial Hawthorn, Herman Melville or David Henry Thureau, to get to know more about this type of work.

I have read all of them. Emerson is the only who can fit in this category, because he is the great democrat of early american writers, and there is Thoureau. Hawthorne have Scarlet Letter but also several gothic tales - which due to Washington Irving are a key feature of american literature - which do not deal with Ordinary people only. Melville certainly do not deal with ordinary people. He deals with Exotic people, who are close to the natural man and the urban city type, but there is nothing ordinary about Ahab. If we consider Emily Dickinson in the package, she is the only ordinary people she dealt with. Futher we may have Whitman or Poe and things got complicated. But a great deal of American romanticism is the influence of Rousseau and democracy - the idealism and notion of progress - and this is romanticism. Not dealing with ordinary people.

Now, I have no idea which literature showed us false emontions.

[virginiawang]

But you have to know that a very romantic writer can have very antagonistic attitudes towards the current society. If you are willing to spend some time reading Walden, written by David Henry Thoreau, you'll get the point. Another piece of work by this author, Resistance To Civil Govenment, tells us more clearly how the author celebrated his idividuality and isolation from the multitude. However I quite agree with you in that prince Myshkin was naive and innocent rather than being intellectual as a saint. He did not have the wisdom to discern the hypocricy of most people around him because he was simply like a baby, so pure in its mind.

[virginiawang]

Sorry, I don't understand what You meant. Not only Emerson but all the romantic writers make up American Romanticism, that does deal with ordinary people, when compaired with writers before them, who wrote a great deal about upper class decorium and things like that. Romanticism deals with the feelings of ordinary people, but not all writings that deal with ordinary people are categorized into Romanticism. I've been dwelling on the feelings, not ordinary people.

[JCamilo]

I have read Thoureau, and here lies the difference: Thoureau idealism against Dostoievisky strong pessimism. The end of romanticism is exactly when they start to consider that progress is not leading foward, but we are stuck. That is why Dostoievisky is that important to XX century, because he was already showing the chaos and desillusion of moderm world. That is why he is not a romantic.
All writings deal with feeling as well.

[virginiawang]

How about the pessimistic romantic writer Herman Melville, who wrote, Bartleby, the Scrivener, in which the author portrayed a tragedy of a man who could not fit into society and died in the end?

[Gladys]

The prince is naive because he can see those around him but not perceive the underneath of the individuals, his trust is too big to see the hypocrisy. That is what give to him the idea of martyr, but it is a futile martyr and that is something due to Dostoievisky own cinism.

Our understanding of Prince Myshkin, JCamilo, is radically different.

You say that he does 'not perceive the underneath of the individuals'. I argue that he sees with incomparable insight, with the vision of genius. Prince Myshkin alone is able to filter out the bad and see clearly the good in such pariahs as Ippolit and Roghozin. You say 'his trust is too big'. Not too big: infinitely big, boundless, divine!

How is such fearless magnanimity and selflessness naive? Rather, the prince sees through enlightened eyes, as guileless Vera Lebedev, child-like Lizabetha Prokofievna, and sceptical playboy Evgenie Pavlovitch are realising in the last page of the novel.

Would we were all like Prince Myshkin. You say he is 'a futile martyr'. It is not Dostoevsky who’s cynical, but yourself.

[JCamilo]

Mishkin have a vision of genious? He is a mockery, Dostoieviksy intents him as a critiic of naivity... How come he saw really what is underneath his peers? He often trust them basead on his own godness. Apparently, irony in Dostoisviksy is lost by the feelings towards Mishkin.

Dostoievisky is cynical, are you joking me? The underground man, his own experiencer ithat almost resulted with his death on siberia, brothers karamazov, works of genial cynic

Dostoieviisky is so good that you are seeing his trick as truth, the book name is the idiot, and even if the russian name is not perfectly fit.

[virginiawang]

The difference Virginia, is that Mishikin is not heroic, idealized, a model to be followed. In Romanticism those ideals are what you seek.

Will you please tell me how we should follow Bartleby as a model in Bartleby, the Scrivener, wriiten by a pessimistic writer of the American Romanticism? By the way, I quite agree with you in believing the innocence of the prince.