crime and punishment: part one
selected passages from dostoevsky
ChatGPT summary of Part One:
In Part One of Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky, we are introduced to Rodion Raskolnikov, a destitute and alienated former student living in St. Petersburg. Tormented by poverty and driven by a warped philosophical theory that some individuals have the right to commit crimes for the greater good, he plans to murder Alyona Ivanovna, a cruel and exploitative pawnbroker. After much internal turmoil, Raskolnikov carries out the crime, also killing her innocent sister, Lizaveta, who unexpectedly arrives at the scene. Following the murders, he becomes consumed by paranoia, guilt, and feverish delirium, setting the stage for his psychological unraveling.
chapter 1
Cliffsnotes summary:
On a hot and sultry day in July, Rodion Romanovitch Raskolnikov, a young student, slips past his landlady to whom he is heavily in debt, and roams aimlessly towards an old and despicable pawnbroker, Alyona Ivanovna. He has cut himself off from everyone and furthermore shrinks from any type of human conduct. His little cupboard of a room, his debts, and his crushing poverty depress him to the point of rendering him incapable of attending classes or tutoring his own students.
On the way to the pawnbroker's, he simply cannot believe that he is going to perform some loathsome action. He also realizes that his thoughts are confused, partly because he had eaten practically nothing for two days. Even though he was a strikingly handsome young man, he dresses so wretchedly in rags that no one would notice his secretive behavior.
It was not far to the pawnbroker's house — "exactly seven hundred and thirty" paces. Upon arriving, he seems to be disgusted with the entire proceedings and finds his plans to be loathsome and degrading. The old pawnbroker is cautious about opening the door, and when she does, she appears dried up and very old, with sharp, malicious eyes and nasty grease in her hair. Raskolnikov tells her he has something else to pawn, and they haggle over the price, but he has to accept her offer because "he had nowhere else to turn." As he leaves, he tells her that he has something more valuable to pawn and he will bring it later. He leaves in a state of extreme agitation.
Highlights:
It’s just a fantasy to amuse myself; a plaything!
Phenomenological description of how fantasies are self-indulgent and lack any sense of substance, even when we act them out.
he walked along not observing what was around him and not caring to observe it.
Description of how many sensory experiences fail to register, and how that is often our choice; a deliberate attempt to not engage with the world that lies around where our feet are.
At the time he had put no faith in those dreams and was only tantalizing himself with their hideous insolence.
Again, re-emphasizing the seeming unreality of fantasies, even though they create lasting impressions that drive our behavior.
“And how could such an atrocious thing come into my head? What filthy things my heart is capable of. Yes, filthy above all, disgusting, loathsome, loathsome!”
As the main character recognizes that he is mulling the murder of an old woman. showcases the lack of inner coherence of Raskolnikov’s thoughts, and how even he was conscious of its reprehensibility.
It’s simply physical weakness. Just a glass of beer, a piece of dry bread — and in one moment the brain is stronger, the mind is clearer, and the will is firm! Pah, how utterly petty it all is!
But, though he spat this out so scornfully, he was by now looking cheerful as though he were suddenly set free from a terrible burden: and he gazes round in a friendly way at the people in the room. But even at that moment he had a dim foreboding that this happier frame of mind was also not normal.
Captures so well the temptation of drugs! The first encounters are blissful (makes the brain strong, the will firm, makes things click into place, etc. This so, so accurately maps to my phenomenological experience — “liquid courage”. but also there’s that haunting sensation that we willfully disengage with that this state of consciousness lacks any tether and will soon drift away and come back to normal — even when you’re not sober and experiencing euphoria, you know it’s artificial, and “dim foreboding” is the best way to describe the awareness of this artificiality.
chapter 2
Cliffsnotes summary:
At the end of the last chapter, Raskolnikov notices an apparently disturbed person in the tavern drinking. After his visit with Alyona Ivanovna, he feels the need of a drink, and the lonely man begins a conversation with him. He identifies himself as Semyon Marmeladov, a clerk in the Civil Service. He has neither undressed nor washed for five days. His greasy red hands were dirty, his nails filthy, and his clothes disreputable.
Marmeladov spills out his entire recent history, telling how he had been in government service but had lost his position because of alcoholism. However, he had recently been reinstated as a clerk in a government office, but as of now, he has been drinking constantly for five days and is now afraid to go home. He tells of his marriage to Katerina Ivanovna, a widow of a higher social class and a mother of three young children who married him out of destitution. He also reveals that he has a daughter Sonya who has entered into prostitution because there was no other way to feed the family. He stole the money his daughter earned from prostitution to pay for his five-day binge. He asks Raskolnikov "Can you say with conviction that I am not a swine?"
He asks Raskolnikov if he knows what it is like to have absolutely no place to turn to, to be in utter despair and to suffer without recourse to any action. He took Sonya's last 30 kopecks to buy drinks. He is scared to go home because Katerina will beat him and he deserves it.
Raskolnikov, who has wanted to leave, decides to help Marmeladov home where he sees the abject poverty that he, Katerina, and the three children live in. After witnessing a horrible scene between Marmeladov and Katerina, he scrapes through his pockets and leaves them some of his scant money.
Highlights:
He was so weary after a whole month of concentrated wretchedness and gloomy excitement that he longed to rest, if only for a moment, in some other world, whatever it may be
Escapist fantasies
“That’s why I drink, to find sympathy and feeling in drink…I drink because I want to suffer profoundly!”
We know the damage that we’re inflicting on ourselves; that’s the masochistic repressed fantasy that is rarely expressed with as much awareness as it is here.
I am glad that, though only in imagination, she should think of herself as having once been happy
How the memory deceives! the idealized memory of a former time in which bliss is seemingly secured torments. Marmeladov is talking about how his wife, no matter how depressed she is, finds contentment in knowing that there was a time at which she was happy. But is this really better? I think that those memories are often idealized, and often turn us further away from finding beauty and meaning in the present
And all that, let me tell you, she has simply made up for herself, and not simply out of thoughtlessness, for the sake of bragging; no, she believes it all herself, she amuses herself with her own imaginings
Same as above; fantasies as being self-indulgent. “amuses herself with her own imaginings” — haunting!
She said nothing, she only looked at me without a word…Not on earth, but up there…they grieve so over men, they weep, but they don’t blame them, they don’t blame them! But it hurts more, it hurts more when they don’t blame!
Marmeladov is talking about his experience begging for money from his daughter who turned to prostitution to support the family…
“it hurts more when they don’t blame” — deep cuts! when we are doing something we’re ashamed of, we want to be blamed and want physical punishment; I don’t know why.
And he will forgive my Sonia, He will forgive, I know it . . . I felt it in my heart when I was with her just now! And He will judge and will forgive all, the good and the evil, the wise and the meek . . . And when He has done with all of them, then He will summon us. ‘You too come forth,’ He will say, ‘Come forth ye drunkards, come forth, ye weak ones, come forth, ye children of shame!’ And we shall all come forth, without shame and shall stand before him. And He will say unto us, ‘Ye are swine, made in the Image of the Beast and with his mark; but come ye also!’ And the wise ones and those of understanding will say, ‘Oh Lord, why dost Thou receive these men?’ And He will say, ‘This is why I receive them, oh ye wise, this is why I receive them, oh ye of understanding, that not one of them believed himself to be worthy of this.’ And He will hold out His hands to us and we shall fall down before him . . . and we shall weep . . . and we shall understand all things! Then we shall understand everything!
This is the line where Marmeladov highlights his faith in God and that all will be forgiven at some point; even if we can’t understand now, we will understand at some point
“Bravo Sonia! What a well they’ve dug! And they’re making the most of it! Yes, they are making the most of it! Got used to it. They’ve wept a bit and grown used to it. Man grows used to everything, the scoundrel!”
He sank into thought.
“And what if I am wrong,” he suddenly cried involuntarily. “What if man is not really a scoundrel, man in general, I mean, the whole race of mankind—then all the rest is prejudice, simply artificial terrors and there are no barriers and it’s all as it should be.”
This is Raskolnikov criticizing how Marmeladov has “normalized” Sonia’s prostitution, signifying their amorality. But then he questions this thought — if acceptance of Sonia’s prostitution doesn’t make Marmeladov a “scoundrel”, then there is no good or bad; there is no right or wrong; and “it’s all as it should be”.
chapter 3
Cliffsnotes summary:
The next day, Raskolnikov awakens in his dirty cubbyhole of a room, feeling disgusted with his slovenly and degraded manner of living. He withdraws from human contact but still suffers. Nastasya, the servant meant to look after him, tells him that the landlady, Praskovya Pavlovna, is going to report him to the police because he has not paid his back rent. She also brings him a long letter from his mother.
When Nastasya leaves, he kisses his mother's letter and with trembling hands, he reverently opens it. His mother, Pulcheria Alexandrovna, writes of her abiding love for him and that his sister, Dunya, has been working in the Svidrigailov household as a governess. Unfortunately, Svidrigailov, a well-known sensualist, formed an intense attachment for Dunya and made unwarranted overtures and improper advances, including trying to persuade her to run away with him. The wife, Marfa Petrovna, overhears part of a conversation and believes that the attachment is all Dunya's fault even though she is fully aware of her husband's sensual propensities. Furthermore, Marfa spreads the lie all through the countryside. Later, Svidrigailov corrects her and even shows her a letter reprimanding him for his improper advances and admonishing him to be faithful to his wife. Upon discovering her mistake, once again Marfa Petrovna goes about the countryside showing the letter and proclaiming Dunya's innocence and goodness.
At this time, Marfa Petrovna had a kinsman, Pyotr Petrovitch Luzhin, visiting her who wanted a wife. He is searching for a poor wife with a sound reputation who is without a dowry so that his wife will be always indebted to him for his generosity. Thus he proposes to Dunya, who has accepted him.
Finally, Pulcheria Alexandrovna tells her son that both she and Dunya will soon be in St. Petersburg so as to be with Luzhin who will find them proper living quarters, and she promises to send Raskolnikov more money as soon as she can borrow it.
This was a fascinating chapter to read. The tone of Raskolnikov’s mother was one of overwhelming love and gratitude and excitement — she was so excited that she and Dunia were making sacrifices that would improve their material standing and also help Raskolnikov. As a chronic people pleaser, I’ve noticed many of my thoughts take this shape and form, with the implicit assumption that this would make others happy and as a result improve my relationship with them. Instead, Raskolnikov grows extremely agitated and upset!
Highlights:
Moreover, in order to understand any man one must approach gradually and carefully to avoid forming prejudices and mistaken ideas, which are very difficult to correct and remedy afterwards.
So true! This is from Raskolnikov’s mother.
Besides he is a man of great prudence and he will see, to be sure, for himself that his own happiness will be the more secure, the happier Dunechka is with him.
Happy wife, happy life!
But Dunia was vexed, and answered that ‘words are not deeds,’ and that, of course, is perfectly true.
The context of this line is that Raskolnikov’s mother is slightly skeptical of Pyotr’s intentions and character based on some things she’s heard him say. Dunia stays level-headed and requests her mother to not judge a man by his words, but rather by his actions. Really interesting exchange! Although I’d say that in the context of marriage and lifelong commitments, there has to be a balance. But then again, in the context of the earlier line from the mother, any judgment, even if mistaken, is hard to shake. How do you maintain the balance of remaining open-minded while also being fully aware and careful?
chapter 4
Cliffsnotes summary:
Upon finishing the letter, Raskolnikov resolves that Dunya will never sacrifice herself by marrying Luzhin, which she is doing only to be able to help him. He adamantly refuses such a sacrifice by saying, "While I live, this marriage will never take place."
Furthermore, he sees Luzhin as a mean and stingy person who would allow his fiancée and her mother ride in a peasant's cart for "seventeen versts" (around 12 miles) and to travel in third class accommodations on the train. After he considers Luzhin's entire proposal, Raskolnikov declares that "I will not have your [Dunya's] sacrifice, I will not have it. ..It shall not be, while I live, it shall not, it shall not! I will not accept it!" However, he has nowhere to turn to prevent such a disgraceful liaison.
While thinking about Dunya's plight, he observes a young 15-year-old girl staggering down the street as though she were either drunk or drugged. This young girl is being followed by a "foppish" and plump man; the man's intentions towards the young girl are obvious. Raskolnikov interferes and accosts the dandy. The police arrive and they get the girl into a cab; Raskolnikov offers his last 20 kopecks for the cab, but then "at this moment an instantaneous revulsion of feeling" causes him to reverse himself. He decides that he is interfering in something that does not concern him: "What does it matter. . .Let him [the dandy] amuse himself [with the girl]." He leaves resenting that he has lost his last 20 kopecks. "How dared I give away those twenty copecks? Were they mine to give?"
At the end of the chapter, he decides to visit Razumihkin, one of his best friends of times past, whom he has not seen in about four months.
Highlights:
It’s clear enough: for herself, for her comfort, to save her life she would not sell herself, but for someone else she is doing it! For the one she loves, for the one she adores, she will sell herself! That’s what it all amounts to; for her brother, for her mother, she will sell herself! She will sell everything! In such cases, we squash our moral feeling if necessary, freedom, peace, conscience even, all, all are brought into th estreet market. goodbye life! If only these our dear ones may be happy. More than that, we become casuits, we learn to be Jesuitical and for a time maybe we can soothe ourselves, we can persuade ourselves that it is, really is one’s duty for a good cause.
Unbelievable! Cuts the people-pleasing fantasy at its core. I’ve never seen it described this well. Raskolnikov is saying that Dunia’s only reason for marrying Luzhin is for her family and not for herself.
‘There can be no question of love,’ mother writes. And what if there can be no repsect either, if on the contrary there is aversion, contempt, repulsion, what then? Then you will have to ‘keep up your appearance,’ too. Is that not soo? Do you understand, do you, do you, what that cleanliness means? Do you understand that the Luzhin cleanliness is just the same thing as Sonechka’s and may be worse, viler, baser, because in your case, Dunechka, it’s a bargain for luxuries, after all, but there it’s simply a question of starvation. ‘It has to be paid for, it has to be paid for, Dunechka, this cleanliness!’ And what if it’s more than you can bear afterwards, if you regret it? The grief, the misery, the curses, the tears hidden from all the world, for you are not a Marfa Petrona. And how will your mother feel then ?Even now she is uneasy, she is worried, but then, when she sees it all clearly? And I? Yes, indeed, what have you taken me for? I won’t have your sacrifice, Dunechka, I won’t have it, Mother! It will not be, so long as I am alive, it will not, it will not! I won’t accept it!”
Raskolnikov’s mother argues that this arrangement is okay because Luzhin loves Dunia. Raskolnikov counters by saying that love is insufficient; lack of respect and the requirement of “keeping up appearances” will bring a different kind of misery upon Dunia; that this bargain will prove to be meaningless since it’s for “luxuries” and not necessity. He refuses to be the cause of his sister’s misery, arguing that he’ll refuse the sacrifice. Amazing.
So he tortured himself, taunting himself with such questions, and finding a kind of enjoyment in it. And yet all these questions were not new ones suddenly confronting him, they were old familiar aches. It was long since they had first begun to grip and rend his heart. Long, long ago his present anguish had its first beginnings; it had waxed and gathered strength, it had matured and concentrated, until it had taken the form of a horrible, wild and fantastic question, which turtured his heart and mind, clamoring insistently for an answer. Now his mother’s letter had burst on him like a thunderclap. It was clear that he must not now languish and suffer passively, in thought alone, over questions that appeared insoluble, but that he must do something, do it at once, and do it quickly. He must decide on something no matter what, or anything at all, or…”Or renounce life altogether!” he cried suddenly, in a frenzy—”accept one’s lot humbly as it is, once for all and stifle everything in oneself, giving up every right to act, live, and love!'“ “Do you understand, dear sir, do you understand what it means when there is absolutely nowhere to go?” Marmeladov’s question of the previous day came suddenly into his mind, “for every man must have somewhere to go…”
So he initially criticizes Dunia for self-sacrificing for the sake of others, but then he goes on a tangent, asking himself what right he has to be criticizing Dunia; his family needs help and support, and he’s certainly not in any situation to offer it. He must do something; he must “decide”; he must act in order to save his family from the fate he sees them accepting. This later becomes part of his justification for the crime he will soon commit — he’s growing frantic and desperate.
But what does it matter? That’s as it should be, they tell us. A certain percentage, they tell us, must every year go…that way…to thedevil, I suppose, so that the rest may remain fresh, and not be interfered with. A percentage! What splendid words they have; they are so scientific, so consolatory…Once you’ve said ‘percentage,’ there’s nothing more to worry about. If we had any other word…maybe we might feel more uneasy.
This is a quote from Raskolnikov after he sees the girl who is wildly drunk on the streets. This quote was a deep cut. How quickly we rationalize people who have gone down tragic paths; we just group them with others, as if it’s inevitable that some people will go down that path. Raskolnikov understands this and recognizes that maybe we’d have more empathy, compassion, and attention for the truly tragic cases if we didn’t just bucket them away.
chapter 5
Cliffsnotes summary:
Before he reaches Razumihkin's place, Raskolnikov changes his mind but promises that he will go the "the day after, when that is over and done with," but then in despair he wonders if it will really happen. It frightens him so much that he goes into a tavern and has a glass of vodka. Since he was unaccustomed to alcohol, he walks unsteadily to a park and immediately goes to sleep.
He dreams that he is back in his childhood, seven years old, and as he is walking with his father, he sees a drunken peasant trying to make his old horse pull a heavy wagon full of people. When the crowd laughs at him and the ridiculous spectacle, the peasant gets angry and begins beating the old, feeble horse. He beats so ferociously that others join in the "fun." Finally they begin to use crowbars and iron shafts. The old horse at first tries to resist, but soon it falls down dead. The boy in the dream, feeling great compassion for the stricken and dead mare, throws his arms around the beast and kisses it. All through the dream the peasant owner is screaming that the mare was his and he had a right to do whatever he wanted to with her.
Upon awakening from the dream, Raskolnikov renounces that "accursed dream of mine" and wonders in horror: "Is it possible that I really shall take an axe and strike her on the head, smash open her skull. . . God, is it possible?" He then ". . .renounces this accursed fantasy of mine" because he will never summon up enough resolution to do it.
However, as he walks through the Hay Market, he overhears a conversation between tradespeople and Lizaveta Ivanovna, the half sister to the old pawnbroker, that on the next night "at seven o'clock in the evening the old woman would be at home alone."
Highlights:
The question why he was now going to Razumikhin agitated him even more than he was himself aware; he kept uneasily seeking for some sinister significance in this apparently ordinary action.
I just liked this line; I’ve often found myself similarly grasping at straws, searching for significance or meaning when there often isn’t any.
“After it,” he shouted, jumping up from the bench, “but is it really going to happen? Is it possible it really will happen?”
By it, Raskolnikov is clearly referring to the crime he intends to commit. It never seems real; more of a mental fantasy than anything.
In the morbid condition of the brain, dreams often have an extraordinary distinctiveness, vividness, and extraordinary semblance of reality. At times monstrous images are created, but the setting and the entire process of imagining are so truthlike and filled with details so delicate, so unexpected, but so artistically consistent with the picture as a whole, that the dreamer, were he an artist like Pushkin or Turgenev even, could never have invented them in the waking state. Such sick dreams always remain long in the memory and make a powerful impression on the overwrought and excited nervous system.
This is Dotsoevsky’s narration. Very similar to the Jungian notion of the “collective unconscious” manifesting its intelligence within dreams.
It is a gray and stifling day, the country is exactly as he remembered it; indeed, he recalled it far more vividly in his dream than he had done in memory.
I’ve noticed this too sometimes! Crazy how that works.
“But why am I going on like this?” he continued, sitting up again, as it were in profound amazement. “I knew that I could never bring myself to it, so what have I been torturing myself for till now? Yesterday, yesterday, when I went to make that . . . experiment, yesterday I realized completely that I could never bear to do it . . . Why am I going over it again, then? Why have I till now been hesitating? As I came down the stairs yesterday, I said myself that it was base, loathsome, vile, vile . . . the very thought of it made me feel sick when I wasn’t dreaming and filled me with horror.”
“No, I couldn’t stand it, I couldn’t stand it! Granted, granted that there is no flaw in all that reasoning, that all that I have concluded this last month is clear as day, true as arithmetic . . . My God! Still I couldn’t bring myself to it! I couldn’t stand it, I couldn’t stand it! Why, why then am I still . . . ?”
After he wakes up from his horrifying dream, seeing the senseless violence on the helpless animal, he questions whether he could ever bring himself to do the crime, regardless of the seeming validity of his justifications. He still doesn’t believe he’s capable of it, yet he’s still tormented by it!
“Lord,” he prayed, “show me my path—I renounce that accursed…dream of mine.” Crossing the bridge, he gazed quietly and calmly at the Neva, at the glowing red sun setting in the glowing sky. In spite of his weakness he was anot even conscious of fatigue. It was as though an abscess that had been forming for a month past in his heart had suddenly broken. Freedom, freedom! He was free now from that spell, that sorcery, that enchantment, that obsession!
It’s as if the knowledge that he isn’t capable of it is sufficient for him to free himself of his tortuous obsession; he so desperately wants to be rid of it! At least at the moment. He prays for a release from the compulsion. He’s completely helpless.
He was only a few steps from his apartment. He went in like a man condemned to death. He thought of nothing and was completely incapable of thinking; but he felt suddenly in his whole being that he had no more freedom of thought, no will, and that everythign was suddenly and irrevocably decided.
What happens right before this is interesting; he overhears a conversation that highlights the fact that the old pawnbroker will be home alone for a period of time the next day, presenting Raskolnikov the perfect opportunity to commit the murder. Given the opportunity, he felt a “now or never” pressure, and it was so intense that his mind stopped thinking; the compulsion had fully taken over and there was no thought, no freedom, no ability to contemplate or choose, despite the seeming horror he had felt just earlier. He thought himself incapable, but at this moment, he was “condemned” to act.
I was so struck by this sequence (and everything in the preceeding chapters that led to this). It so clearly highlights the psychological torment that accompanies crimes like this; it’s not coherent, and it doesn’t have to come from a place of desire to harm. In Raskolnikov’s mind, his options are to throw away his theories/justifications and silently accept his fate, or act on his ideas and rationalizations and prove himself having a place in this world. The murder is completely ancillary; this is a glorified hypothesis test in his mind. The fact that he’s able to reduce the world and other people to instruments in his mind is a separate horror in and of itself though.
chapter 6
Cliffsnotes summary:
Raskolnikov remembers that Lizaveta has the appointment with the tradespeople because she acts as a go-between for impoverished families forced to sell their goods. He then remembers that he had the address of Alyona Ivanovna from a fellow student and even before he went to see her he had "felt an irresistible dislike for her."
While he is thinking about how obnoxious the pawnbroker is, he overhears a conversation between two young officers who had recently had business with her; they were enumerating all of her horrible flaws. Alyona Ivanovna is spiteful, cranky, and hateful. She charges an exorbitant usurious, interest rate (five to seven percent), is sadistic, and beats her half sister, Lizaveta Ivanovna. She greedily forecloses if one is even one day late, causing poor people to lose valuable property.
Raskolnikov hears the two officers justifying a proposition that the old woman was a detriment to society because actively causes harm and destroys the lives of innocent people by her usury. On the other hand, a person could kill her and use the money to save "scores of families. . .from beggary, from decay, from ruin and corruption." Would not thousands of good deeds wipe out one small transgression? The supposition ends when one of the officers asks the other: "Would you kill the old woman with your own hands?" Both agree that they would not, and that is the end of it.
After recalling this conversation, Raskolnikov begins to make preparations by sewing a noose into his overcoat and wrapping the pledge securely. He goes to steal the axe, but Nastasya, the servant, is sitting in the door. He takes an axe from the porter. These preparations delay him and it is 7:30 p.m. before he reaches the pawnbroker's. As he arrives, he notes that there is an empty flat under the pawnbroker's and workers are in there painting it. He climbs to Alyona Ivanovna's flat and rings the doorbell several times before she opens the door.
Highlights:
What do you think, would not one tiny crime be wiped out by thousands of good deeds? For one life thousands would be saved from corruption and decay. One death, and a hundred lives in exchange—it’s simple arithmetic! Besides, what value has the life of that sickly, stupid, ill-natured old woman in the balance of existence! No more than the life of a louse, of a cockroach, less in fact because the old woman is doing harm. She is wearing the lives out of others; the other day she bit Lizaveta’s finger out of spite; it almost had to be amputated!
This dialogue occurs when Raskolnikov is talking with two people in a tavern. It’s an innocuous conversation that quickly turns serious as the two people begin seriously discussing the validity of murdering the old pawnbroker; they argue that it’s a practical and even compassionate act. They’re clear that this is only a thought experiment, but little do they know that Raskolnikov has been mulling the same idea. It’s easy to craft justifications like this, but the one thing that keeps running through my head as I read this is that no human alive has the right to make such an assessment.
“You are talking and speechifying away, but tell me, would you kill the old woman yourself or not?”
”Of course not! I was only arguing the justice of it…It’s nothing to do with me…”
”But I think, if you would not do it yourself, then there’s no justice in it!”
This is such an interesting dialogue! Raskolnikov presses the person who argues that it is just to kill the old woman by arguing that the fact that the person wouldn’t do it himself highlights the lack of justice in the act. It’s shocking that he’s the one saying this given the thoughts that have been tormenting him. It’s almost as if he feels compelled to act on it to justify the thought.
This coincidence always seemed strange to him. This trivial talk in a tavern had an immense influence on him as the action developed further; as though there had really been in it something preordained, some guiding hint…
Again, it’s the motif that fate is pushing him towards acting upon his idea; that it’s out of his hands.
We may not in passing, one peculiarity in regard to all the final resolutions taken by him in the matter; they had one strange characteristic: the more final they were, the more hideous and the more absurd they at once became in his eyes. In spite of all his agonizing inward struggle, he never for a single instant all that time could believe in the carrying out of his plans.
And, indeed, if it had ever happened that everything to the least point could have been considered and finally settled, and no uncertainty of any kind remained, he would, it seems, have renounced it all as something absurd, monstrous, and impossible. But a whole leap of unsettled points and uncertainties remained.
Dostoevsky places this dialogue as Raskolnikov is about to steal the axe with which he plans to commit murder. It’s all still an experiment to Raskolnikov! He still doesn’t believe he’s capable, or that it’s actually happening, even as he’s carrying out the actions. The actions are subordinate to this grand hypothesis test that he’s running. The second paragraph is so crucial — the uncertainty in the proposition, or the question of whether there is justice in the act that Raskolnikov is committing is the only thing that enables such an act to occur. It’s a creative act; there is self-discovery inherent in what he’s doing. If it was simple execution, he would not do it.
But those were all trifles which he had not even begun to consider, and indeed he had no time. He was thinking of the chief point, and put off trifling details, until he could believe in it all. But that seemed utterly unattainable.
It’s the age-old question of why criminals make such obvious mistakes even when committing pre-meditated crimes.
Even his recent experiment (i.e., his visit with the intention of conducting a final survey of the place) was simply an attempt at an experiment, far from being the real thing, as though one should say “come, let us go and try it—why dream about it!”—and at once he had broken down and run away cursing, furious with himself. Meanwhile it would seem, as regards the moral question, that his analysis was complete; his casuistry had become keen as a razor, and he could no longer find conscious objections in himself. But in the end he simply ceased to believe himself, and doggedly, slavishly sought arguments in all directions, fumbling for them, as though someone were forcing and drawing him to it. This last day, however, which had come so unexpectedly deciding everything at once, had an almost completely mechanical effect on him, as though someone took him by the hand and started pulling with unnatural force, irresistibly, blindly, without his objections. It was as though a part of his clothing had gotten caught in the wheel of a machine, and he was being drawn into it.
At first—long before, in fact—he had been extremely occupied by a single question; why are almost all crimes so badly concealed and so easily detected, and why do almost all criminals leave such obvious traces? He had come gradually to many different and curious conclusions, and in his opinion the chief reason lay not so much in the material impossibility of concealing the crime, as in the criminal himself. Almost every criminal is subject to a failure of will and reasoning power by a childish and phenomenal heedlessness, at the very instant when reason and caution are the most essential. It was his conviction that this eclipse of reason and failure of will power attacked a man like a disease, developed gradually and reached its highest point just before the perpetration of the crime, continued with equal violence at the moment of the crime and for longer or shorter time there after, according to the individual case, and then passed off like any other disease. The question whether the disease gives rise to the crime, or whether the crime, due to its own peculiar nature, is always accompanied by something like a disease, he did not yet feel able to decide.
When he reached these conclusions, he decided that in his own case there could not be such morbid reversals, that his reason and will would remain unimpaired at the time of carrying out his design, for the simple reason that his design was “not a crime…” We will omit all the process by means of which he arrived at this last conclusion; we have run too far ahead already…We may add only that the practical, purely material difficulties of the affair occupied an altogether secondary position in his mind. “So long as one keeps all one’s will power and reason to deal with them, they will all be overcome at the time when one has familiarized oneself with the minutest details of the business…” But the business wouldn’t begin. His final decisions were what he continued to trust least, and when the hour struck, it all turned out quite differently, as it were accidentally and even unexpectedly.
Stunning. Raskolnikov fails to bucket himself with the class of criminals who fail to properly conceal their crime because he doesn’t believe he’s committing a crime, so he doesn’t think his willpower or reason will fail! And again, in the first paragraph is the theme that this is something he is propelled to do. He feels as if he has no choice! He’s powerless.
“When reason fails, the devil helps!” he thought with a strange grin. This incident raised his spirits extraordinarily.
Raskolnikov says this after his initial plan of getting the axe was thwarted. After that happened, he immediately had the opportunity to steal another axe from the porter who had left his door wide open. A simple coincidence, but something that adds fuel to Raskolnikov’s burning belief that this is something that is divinely orchestrated; it wouldn’t happen this way if he didn’t have the right to do it.
When he had happened to imagine all this beforehand, he had sometimes thought that he would be very much afraid. But he was not very much afraid now, not afraid at all, in fact. His mind was even occupied by irrelevant matters, but by nothing for long.
Shocking! I’m curious if this is generally the phenomenology of crime. It makes sense; given that they feel they have the right to do what they’re doing, they don’t feel fear as they’re doing it. They only feel a fear of getting caught which doesn’t set in until later.
“So probably men led to execution clutch mentally at every object that meets them on the way,” flashed through his mind, but simply flashed, like lightning; he himself quickly extinguished this thought…
Two things to note here: 1) he feels like he’s being led to an execution! He intuitively knows he’s leading himself to disaster! Yet he can’t stop! 2) Maybe this is what’s happening; it’s a coping mechanism for his mind to avoid thinking too deeply about what he’s doing…that’s the only thing that enables him to keep going.
For one instant the thought flashed through his mind “Should I leave?” But he made no answer
He’s still not fully committed; he still doesn’t fully believe in what he’s doing or what’s happening.
Had I better wait a little longer…till my heart stops thumping?” But his heart would not stop thumping. On the contrary, as though on purpose, it throbbed more and more and more…He could stand it no longer, slowly put out his hand to the bell and rang. Half a minute later he rang again, more loudly.
This is him ringing the pawnbroker’s doorbell.
Recalling it afterwards, that moment stood out in his mind vividly, distinctly, forever; he could not make out how he had had such cunning, especially since his mind was as it were clouded at moments and he was almost unconscious of his body…
This is after he decided to start moving around a little so that the pawnbroker wouldn’t get the impression that he was hiding or being stealthy. It’s again that same symbology of the devil; it’s not something he consciously orchestrated or decided, but something that possessed him to act in a certain way. Even after, he can’t recall how it happened! He’s a passenger in his own body!
chapter 7
Cliffsnotes summary:
As soon as the door was opened a crack, Raskolnikov forced his way into the pawnbroker's. She is frightened, and he gives her the pledge that he had wrapped so carefully, telling her that it is a silver cigarette case. As she laboriously unwraps the package, he removes the axe and, while her back is turned, he hits her with the butt end of the axe. He then strikes her again and again with the blunt end of the axe. Very carefully, he lays the axe down by the body and begins to search through her pockets for keys.
While searching for the keys, he notices that Alyona Ivanovna wears two crosses, one of cypress wood and one of copper. He then finds some keys and a small leather purse stuffed very full and he takes them. As he searches the rooms, he finds all sorts of gold and silver items, but he suddenly hears footsteps in the entranceway. He discovers Lizaveta standing over her murdered half sister. Raskolnikov immediately takes the axe and with Lizaveta staring at him in utter horror, he strikes her with one heavy blow "with the sharp edge just on the skull and splits at one blow all the top of her head." This "second unpremeditated murder" makes him want to completely abandon the entire project. After the second murder, he begins to think of confessing and immediately begins to cleanse the blood from his axe, hands, and clothes.
As he is ready to leave, the doorbell rings. Two individuals wait outside for their appointments with Alyona Ivanovna. As they try the door, they realize that it is locked from the inside. One leaves to go get the porter and then when the other leaves for a moment, Raskolnikov slips out and hides in the empty, newly painted room just below the pawnbroker's flat. When the murder is discovered, he slips out unnoticed and returns to his own room, where he replaces the axe in the porter's lodge and then falls into a state bordering on unconsciousness.
Highlights:
He seemed not to use his own strength in this. But as soon as he had once brought the axe down, strength was born in him.
Again, it seems as if it’s not him. This is after he makes the initial strike with the axe. Right before, he had been pale, trembling, and weak as he was talking to the pawnbroker, trying to get properly inside to carry out the crime. But once his arm was in motion, his body was again possessed.
He was in full possession of his faculties, free from confusion or giddiness, but his hands were still trembling. He remembered afterwards that he had been particularly cautious and careful, trying all the time not to get stained…
Even though he’s not fully conscious, it’s not mindless! He wasn’t caught up in emotion or a fit of rage or passion.
If at that moment he had been capable of seeing and reasoning more correctly, if he had been able to realize all the difficulties of his position, the hopelessness, the hideousness and the absurdity of it, if he could have understood how many obstacles and, perhaps, villainies he had still to overcome or to commit, to get out of that place and to make his way home, it is very possible that he would have abandoned everything, and would have gone to give himself up, and not from fear for himself, but from simple horror and loathing of what he had done. The feeling of loathing especially surged up within him and grew stronger every minute. Not for anything in the world would he now have gone to the strong-box or even into the room. But a sort of blankness, even dreaminess had begun by degrees to take possession of him; at moments he forgot himself, or rather, forgot what was of importance, and caught at trifles.
Even though he fully believes in the validity and justice of what he’s done, he’s not spared from the self-loathing and self-hatred! There’s a greater intelligence where those feelings are coming from, far greater than the intelligence of his mind which can create no rational objection to what he’s doing.