Anyone who has ever read Fyodor Dostoyevsky, please comment

[virginiawang]

But romantic writers were driven by feelings to write, and intense feelings equal passion. I cannot see the difference. I am happy to know that you consider Prince Myshkin as being romantic, because it was the first time I had heard people say so, though I've always thought so since I read the book.

[Gladys]

When you read Brothers Karamazov, you feel the power of optimism in every line of the novel.

Poor Folk, Netochka Nezvanova, The Insulted and Humiliated, The House of Dead, Notes from the Underground, The Gambler, The Idiot, The Possessed, Raw Youth - do you see any optimism in these novels?

Yes, in relation to the ones I’ve read: Netochka Nezvanova, The Insulted and Humiliated, The Gambler, and The Idiot. As in The Brother Karamzov, there is always in Dostoevsky, salvation in suffering.


I must say, Virginiawang, how much I am enjoying our discussion on this superlative novel.

If he only had agape for all people, how did he fall in love with two women?

While appreciating their sensual attributes, the prince loved (agape) both women rather than falling in love (infatuation). Nevertheless, he well understood and was embarrassed by the romantic preconceptions of those around him. He loved (agape) all, including the two women.

But why do you, and everyone else, shy away from addressing the love (agape) the prince has for murderous Roghozin that is so fundamental to 'The Idiot', which begins and ends with Roghozin, not with Nastasya? In marrying her, the prince is focused on saving both.

The definition of agape does not include love between a man and a woman. By the way, no one forced him into marriage.

All relationships should be motivated by agape, married or unmarried, sexual or otherwise. The prince wished to marry out of love (agape). You seem to forget, Virginiawang, that in many cultures, romantic love is not the basis for marriage (e.g. arranged marriages). By the way, my original definition of 'agape' did not rely on dictionary meanings.

Prince Myhskin agrees to marry Nastasya, in part, to save Roghozin from himself. Hardly romantic!

"prevail" is not the right word. A sense of esthetic is not even an excuse.

The prince had an awareness of the aesthetic, but agape - the duty to love one’s neighbours as oneself - prevailed (won) over other considerations, and won always.

Yes or No. When affection between a man and a woman gets involved, it is no longer "agape", according to a dictionary

The prince acted out of agape, not affection. You seem to imagine that agape can’t apply in courtship or marriage. Not so, although the sad reality is that pure agape is rare in any relationship of any gender. While agape does not describe the sensual or sexual attraction between a man an a woman, agape and eros may coexist. The prince is a pattern we can aspire to. Let us be optimistic…like Dostoevsky himself.

After her seducer insulted her and left, she didn't commit suicide. She would not have died if the prince had left with Aglaya.

I’ll say it for the third time,

Do you really think Nastasya would have committed suicide if the prince had gone with Aglaya, from an objective standpoint?

The prince is probably more worried about Roghozin than Nastasya. And worried with good reason! As for Nastasya, in her desperation she was capable of anything dreadful; she might even get herself...murdered. Here is the paramount subtlety in The Idiot! The tears of the prince fall on murderer Roghozin's cheek: compassion for even the worst. An inspiring paradox.

Even the prince himself admitted once that he did love Nastasya and Aglaya as well

So true: he loved (agape) all.

[virginiawang]

You have to learn more and feel deeper before you can judge whether my opinion is a fact or not. Did Hemingway have epileptic fits, see you didn't grasp my points at all. I told you already I do not feel interested in Brazilian Literature. It does not make sense to show off how many books you've read when you had made such a shallow and ignorant comment in post number 2.
To misspell names is much better than to make grammatical miatakes from the beginning till the end. It is better on the whole to look into yourself than to criticize people. You really sounds funny. See, from what you said, you told everyone in this forum that you didn't know the difference between Psychological Realism and Realism. Here you don't even see the difference between," under the influence of" and "originate". The disclosure of the reality of a heart rather than that of practical events gives the word reality different connotations, but it seems that you failed to see the point. irrelevant? From the beginning of the thread, you told me Dostoyevsky's novels are not romantic because they are sad. I would have thought it were uttered by some children who never learned Literature. Is Bartleby a hero? How will people follow him. Sorry, I don't understand your English laden with grammatical mistakes. Mediocre? a best deacription for your shallowness. If you admit Melvile was a romantic, how do you folow his character, Bartleby, as a model? Obviously you ignored the fact that Romanticism also deals with sadness and pessimistic themes. To make comparisons was what I did.
But in post number2, you didn't seem to know anything about the negative side of Romanticism. Do you want me to quote the post? If you dare to challenge me, explain to me post number two. Your thought about Poe must have led you to think that I have also mentioned Poe, and it must be a sympton of brain defect.
Explain post number 2 in this thread to me, if you dare to challenge me in my study of Literature. POST NUMBER 2 is a proof of something both you and I know.

[virginiawang]

After you really understand the word agape, you'll know you were not making senses. In the situations where people are arranged to get married, they can not agape because they have to do what normal couples do at night. It's entirely different from Christian love and brotherly love. To get married due to agape means to have lust on the part of Jesus. It's even funnier to say one will love one's neighbor as he loves his wife. Is anyone allowed to do what he does with his wife with his neighbor, or according to you, with all mankind? Will the prince marry Nastasya or Aglaya and not perform the duty of a husband at night? How do agape and love coexist? Please show me how.
Here my point is that compassion does not lead to blindness. The probability that Nastasya would commit suicide if the prine left him was very little, and the fact that the prince was utterly convinced that she would showed only one thing. He was bewitched. You didn't address my point. Compassion does not lead to blindness.
1 Please answer to all my points rather than only some of those that you are interested in.
2 If you want to invent a new meaning to the word, agape, the discussion is not worthwhile.

[virginiawang]

Collins English Dictionary gave the word "Agape" the following definition: Christian love, esp as contrasted with erotic love; charity.
If you wish to respect your imagination rather than facts, I won't discuss with you.

[Mr Endon]

This is none of my business... but then again, as a foreigner and LitNet member, it is.

To misspell names is much better than to make grammatical miatakes from the beginning till the end.

It's preposterous that you should devalue JCamilo's comments just because he made a couple of typos. His command over the English language is remarkable. Even if it weren't, as is the case of a few posters, this is, like bazarov pointed out, an international forum, so you must be tolerant. Besides,

To misspell names is much better than to make grammatical miatakes from the beginning till the end.

What an unfortunate time to slip!

So maybe JCamilo was rather blunt in his reply to the OP; but still, he made his point, a valid one, and proceeded to explain his view in the following posts. Such explanation has clearly been overlooked or ignored by you, as you are kind enough to say explicitly:

From the beginning of the thread, you told me Dostoyevsky's novels are not romantic because they are sad.

He said nothing of the kind. This is beyond oversimplification or even misinterpretation: it's a malicious blend of the two.

Sorry, I don't understand your English laden with grammatical mistakes. Mediocre? a best deacription for your shallowness.

Not only is your typo timing exquisite, your ad hominem attacks are unfounded and gratuitous.


I visited this post expecting to learn more about an author I admire and all I got was this lousy rant.

[virginiawang]

Look, Dostoievisky is not romantic, neither his characters. He could write that Ivan, Dimitri and Aliocha are all happy. It would be a two pages book that nobody would read.
(In the end, you enjoy death, not felicity).

How do you read the above paragraph? Dostoyevsky and his chracters are not romantic, because they are not happy. Is it a shallow viewpoint, or do you agree with him? Obviously he didn't seem to know that some romantic works are tragedies. Many writers of American Romanticism created sad stories, for example, Edgar Allan Poe, Herman Melville, and Nathaniel Hawthorne. When I demanded his explanation, he beat around the bush and abused me harshly. Is that proper?

[Mr Endon]

Point well taken; as I said, his first post was rather dismissive, and had he written no more I wouldn't be sure as to his argument's strength.

However, his second post seems to me to be a much clearer explanation of what he had meant in the first post, and if you ask me it's a very perceptive analysis of the subject at hand (Romanticism in Dostoyevsky):

Look, the romantic traits of many of the characters of Dostoievisky are not a reflex of Dostoievisky ideas and aesthetical, Mishikin life is really tragic, but Dostoievisky is using them to express his own experience and disapointment with the ideals. He is a reflex of a world were the romantic ideals are already under criticism. He is after the romantics, not one of them, the contrast (the so called sadness) is what is relevant.
And while it is nice calling his writing beauty, he is not a great aestheticist like Tolstoy, I find the use of this word a bit outplaced.

This makes a lot of sense to me, as does this:

yeah, romantic in literature cannt be translated to normal day romantic idea. Dostoievisky is more a critic of romantic ideals than a romantic by himself (he is rather dispointed to be idealistic) unlike one of his precusors, Hugo or even Dickens.

So from what I understand from JCamilo's argument (my own knowledge of Dostoevsky is sadly limited to C&P and The Gambler) there's Romanticism in Dostoevsky, but it's only there to be discredited, just like Leibniz's "best of all worlds" philosophy is articulated in Voltaire's Candide only to be parodied.

[virginiawang]

If you only see one side of the argument and criticize it as much as you like, with abusing words, are you doing the same thing as JCamilo and I did? How are you different from us? It's better to know what you're doing than to point your fingers at someone else.

[Mr Endon]

I'm sorry if I've offended you. For example, the little typo-spotting flourish was perhaps too much. However, I'm not taking any of what I said back. I believe it was all constructive criticism.

[virginiawang]

The difference Virginia, is that Mishikin is not heroic, idealized, a model to be followed. In Romanticism those ideals are what you seek. Mishikin tragedy is more close to the greek Comedy, he is unable to be a hero despite his virtues and they, unlike the romantic heroes, do not fall because he is victim of those.

Does Romanticism only deal with heroes, models to be followed? I asked JCamilo the same question thousands of times, but he gave me thousands of unrelated answers and concluded that I didn't read enough.

[virginiawang]

His second post which you quoted did explain more what he had in mind about the genre of romantic writing, but it proved more plainly that his definition of a romantic work was still limited to idealism, which is only a glimpse of this type of work. As I said earlier, romantic tragedies can be found in both American and British Literature.
The next quote in your last post proved more that he was utterly convinced that to be romantic equals to be idealistic.
If you do agree with JCamilo's argument concerning a romantic piece of work, you do not really enjoy this type of writing, I believe.

[virginiawang]

So from what I understand from JCamilo's argument (my own knowledge of Dostoevsky is sadly limited to C&P and The Gambler) there's Romanticism in Dostoevsky, but it's only there to be discredited, just like Leibniz's "best of all worlds" philosophy is articulated in Voltaire's Candide only to be parodied.

The definition of the word," Romanticism" in your context is sadly limited to being idealistic when the word itself involves such profound meanings, which escaped the eyes of both you and JCamilo, or you wouldn't have made the above comparison and pronounced that Romanticism is being discredited in Dostoyevsky's works.

[JCamilo]

You are rude and offensive, I really lost the patience with you.
In the sentence you like to point I have made no cause-consequence between the two phrases. And it is an answer to your original question:

"His stories always end in a deathly sadness, but they are all romantic. That made me wonder at times why people who act in a romantic way cannot enjoy felicity at the end, or is it only a story that does not need too much thought?"

And futhermore, when you questioned for more explanation I gave to you.
I am not offending you at all (Neither did Mr Endon, who was polite enough to apologise for what he did not), If I acted like you, your sentence :

"Did Hemingway have epileptic fits, see you didn't grasp my points at all. I told you already I do not feel interested in Brazilian Literature. "

would mean that you think Hemingway is a brazilian? But I do not lower myself to think such absurdity is possible, I consider the fact that in an internet forum the writing style is often framentary and many times the posts are made without a futher scrutinization and edition. (I could even point that you claimed I am bringing brazilian names, when the one name I used was Machado de Assis, under the contests of realism, and he is an international writer often reckonized in the entire world. It is not about brazilian literature, but world wide literature). I refrain to do such conclusions, I wish you could do the same. Instead you are attacking me for typos? And then calling me ignorant? Trying to judge my knowledge? (When you say all , you mean everyone, not just the majority - which by the way is not something you would know either - and Poe, the most proeminent american critic of XIX century did not ranked Melville among the transcendentalists. And just like Melville closest literary friend, Hawthorne did not. Some critics believe Bartebly is a satyre to Thoureau and Confidance man to Emerson, and the question to which group Melville belongs is heat topic, because as I told you, Melville is not a typical romantic writer, his writings defy labelization.)

and finally:

Does Romanticism only deal with heroes, models to be followed with? I asked JCamilo the same question thousands of times, but he gave me thousands of unrelated answers and concluded that I didn't read enough.

And I have answered you countless times: I do not use the word "Only" a single time in the sentence you quote. It is your invention. I do not deal with absolutes, it is ridiculous. When a hero model is used, he is an idealised version (does not matter if the destiny is positive or negative) symbolizing ideals that you should sought for. With Dostoievisky (and other writers), those ideals are showed more like something that will not be possible. There is such negativity because it reflects real life or Dostoievisky own experience. (Please, saying that an author is limited by his health is not relevant, every author have such limitations, borges stopped to use free verse when blind. That would should not be used to analyse the writing style they use.)

And do not jump to conclusions: neither of those reasons are the sole reasons why Dostoievisky is not a romantic. He is closer to realism not only because the philosophy and tematics, but because the tecniques (He does not name the Underground Man, just like you pointed naturalists did; he uses inner monologue, in fact he should be considered the father of stream of conciousness; In Brother Karamazov he uses an omniscient narrator to allow every character to have their own voice while giving the credibility to the narration just like Flaubert did,after all he is a master of polyphony; the deep psychological without the symbolism or lyrism, are some examples) place him closer to the literature of the end XIX century than the literature of the begining of that century. Which should not be a surprise, since Dostoievisky wrote until the end of his life, near the end of XIX and not while Puchkin was alive, or the romanticism movement in his full power.

I did not said Romanticism is characterized by idealism only. You seem to think that if I say that a Parrot have feathers, I am defining a parrot only by an animal with feathers. Romanticism is chracterized by idealism, but it is not the only trait, altough one of the strongest.

[JCamilo]

So from what I understand from JCamilo's argument (my own knowledge of Dostoevsky is sadly limited to C&P and The Gambler) there's Romanticism in Dostoevsky, but it's only there to be discredited, just like Leibniz's "best of all worlds" philosophy is articulated in Voltaire's Candide only to be parodied.

Exactly. I am sure you do not believe in writers living in a vaccum and creating without the notion of their precusors.
Another good example would be Dom Quixote and no wonder, Mishkin is also labeled as a quixotic character.