Crime and Punishment Parts I & II

Crime and Punishment

Prestuplenie i nakazanie: Title

• Prestupit’ – ‘to trespass’, ‘to overstep’

• Is it a good title?

• Does it apply only to the main character Raskolnikov?

• Should it be in the plural?

• Cf Woody Allen: Crimes and Misdemeanours

• Is there a true punishment?

Dostoevsky’s St Petersburg

•Catherine the Great Canal, the Nikolsky Market and the Haymarket

•Many events from Dostoevsky’s works take place here

St Petersburg Slums

Typical inner yard of

the city’s centre

where Raskolnikov

lived

Dostoevsky’s Petersburg (cont.)

The House where Raskolnikov supposedly rented his room

Dostoevsky’s Petersburg (cont.)“With a sinking heart and a nervous tremor, he went up to a huge house which on one side looked on to the canal, and on the other into the street.”

Crime and Punishment

Chapter One

Pawnbroker’s House

The Poetics of the novel • Omniscient narrator – does not impose

his perspective

• Polyphony – each character has his own perspective, none is privileged

• Variety of types of narrative:

• “chronotope” – description of location and time of day; character portrait

• Dramatic collision of characters

• (interior) monologue, dialogue, letter, dream, scandal

Raznochintsy

• people of various ranks

• became the main social stratum for the formation of the Russian intelligentsia

• Bureaucrats and seminarists

February 1st: Questions• Parts I and II

• What main themes do you discern?

• What characters do we meet?

• Which is your favourite character?

• Pick out a recurrent motif in these two Parts

• Which scene or passage do you find the most striking?

Rodion Romanovich Raskolnikov

His name:

• 1. raskolot ‘to cleave’, ‘to chop’, ‘to split’

• 2. Raskól - ‘schism’ (religious)

The raskolniks were a sect of “Old Believers”

Alyona Ivanovna

• Widow, pawnbroker, plans to leave her wealth to monastery

• Sister Lizaveta (pious, always pregnant!)

Semyon Zakharovich Marmeladov

• Marmelad: Jellied candy

• Daughter Sonya (from Sophya – “wisdom”)

Katerina Ivanovna Marmeladova

• Three children: Polya, Lyonya, Kolya

• Archetypical widow dying of tuberculosis

Dmitry Prokofievich Razumikhin

• Razumikhin – razum – ‘reason’

Pyotr Petrovich Luzhin

• Possible significance of first name and patronymic?

• Luzhin – ‘puddle’

Events: Day One

• One/1 Raskolnikov visits Alyona Ivanovna for a “rehearsal”

• One /2 Goes to drinking den, meets Marmeladov, goes with him to his family’s room

Events: Day Two

• One/3 Raskolnikov wakes up, Nastasya brings letter from R’s mother

• One /4 Ponders letter, goes out, sees young drunk girl, sets off to see friend Razumikhin

• One/5 Falls asleep, has dream, returning home, overhears conversation with Lizaveta on Haymarket

Events: Day Three

• One/6 Flashback to discussion between two officers about Lizaveta and her sister; Nastasya tries to feed him; he goes to pawnbroker’s

• One /7 The murder

Day Four

• Two/1 Raskolnikov wakes up, hides blood-stained clothing, loot in hole. Summoned to police, scene in police office

• Two/2 Hides loot under block, goes to visit Razumikhin; returns home, falls into delirious sleep.

Three (?) Days Later…

• Two/3 Wakes up, Razumikhin arrives Raskolnikov receives 35 roubles sent by mother, Razumikhin gets him new clothes

• Two/4 Zosimov (doctor) arrives, discussion of details of murder.

• Two/5 Luzhin visits, ejected by Raskolnikov

Three (?) Days Later (cont.)

• Two/6 Raskolnikov goes out, talks to prostitute in Haymarket, goes into “Crystal Palace,” taunts Zamyotov. Goes home, bumps into Razumikhin, then walks off, sees a woman throw herself in canal; then goes to scene of murder, pulls the bell.

Three (?) Days Later (cont.)

• Two/6 Raskolnikov witnesses Marmeladov’s accident, his death in his room, first sees Sonya, gives 20 roubles to Katerina Ivanovna, goes to Razumikhin’s housewarming party, returns home with Razumikhin, his mother and sister are there.