Just as I am closing this book, after reading its 870th page I have a lot of thoughts in my head and don’t know where to commence. This edition was translated on 1912, so the book must be even older. I am not really used to Russian realism, this must be the first book of such kind I read, but I believe that since literature was the only means of entertainment at the moment, authors were encouraged to create deeply descriptive books, with a lot of little tales in it. Education was also scarce, and the author uses his novel as a way to spread morality, religion and to invite the society to be good people. I will emphasize more about this later on.
I started reading this book because Infinite Jest had been somehow based on it. I only could find one direct inspiration for David Foster Wallace: Kolya Krassotkin laid under a train in the tracks to prove his bravery to the other kids: I hypothesize this is were DFW drew inspiration to create Le Jeu of the train prochain. Anyways, somewhere else I read that the relationship of the Incandenza brothers are somehow similar to the relationship of the Karamazov brothers, but I still need to reflect about that.
The main story is the murder of Fyodor Karamazov. And no, I am not spoiling anything: the back cover of the book states it in its first sentence. I was extremely mad when I googled something about certain character and came across the fact that Fyodor had been murdered, thinking I had been spoiled. The book is so descriptive and detailed, however, that the actual murder takes place around page 500, more than half the book in, and the rest of the book is focused on the testimonies from the witnesses, and the trial.
I will introduce the characters, obviously the main characters are the brothers Karamazov. The Karamazov blood is a lusty blood, fond of women and pleasures, and thus, Fyodor Karamazov, the father spent his youth with prostitutes until he married his first wife, with whom he procreated Dmitry (or Mitya for friends). Fyodor was lucky because both his wives had been rich (providing wealthy inheritances to their children), and died young (this is another aspect of the book that is really interesting: the state of medicine in early 1900s, no antibiotics, no treatment, terrible diagnoses such as nervous fever, hysteria, brain fever, and a high mortality). The second wife was the mother of Ivan, and Alyosha, the youngest. Every son had a different personality. Dmitry was the most alike to his father: he only knew how to spend money on pleasures, and his way of life was asking his father for his inheritance money. Dmitry became a captain and betrothed a really beautiful woman, Katya Ivanova when he lent her money to pay her dad’s debt. The next son is Ivan, the rebellious intelectual with modern European ideas. He studied and wrote articles criticizing the union of the state and the church, and a bizarre poem where Jesus comes back to Earth but is taken by an Spanish Inquisitor who condemns him. The youngest brother is Alyosha, a man pure of heart, noble, honest, who would never lie, and who decided to pursuit his life in the monastery following the teachings of Father Zossima.
Father Zossima deserves a paragraph for himself. He was the wiseman of the town, and people came to him to pray or to fix their problems. This is the way we get introduced to him: Fyodor and Dmitry have an appointment with him to determine the what is just regarding the money Dmitry should receive from his inheritance, Fyodor says he has already given him all his money, but Dmitry feels entitled to a bigger amount. Anyways, in his deathbed Father Zossima tells his story, and tells his teachings. As I was telling earlier, Dostoevsky uses his work as a moralizing work. According to Father Zossima everyone can go to Heaven and there is no hell, but that is no excuse to be bad. Father Zossima tells a story about a man who killed a girl who rejected her and escaped, married, became wealthy and had children, but was agonizing by his feelings of guilt, until he confessed and nobody believed him. When Father Zossima died everyone expected miracles, but instead got a rotting body, and when people smelled the nastiness they were convinced he wasn’t actually a saint man.
But I am distressing (as was Dostoevsky when he included so many, in my opinion loose ends that eventually led nowhere). Dmitry was a reckless and impulsive man, who didn’t hide his hatred toward his father, claiming a couple of times he would kill his father, and went as far as to hit him once in his house. Now, I must add that Fyodor was never a good father: the upbringing of the brothers Karamazov was done by Grigory and his wife, Fyodor’s housekeepers. Ivan didn’t like his father either and could not care less if he died (actually, he did care, because he wanted to receive his inheritance).
The catalyst of the action in the book is a woman. Grushenka was a lady who was once betrothed to a mysterious Pole who abandoned her. Grushenka came to the town and started earning money helped by Fyodor who taught him how to buy debts. Fyodor fell in love with her, but so did Dmitry. Dmitry was already betrothed to Katerina Ivanova, but she was in love with Ivan (so kind of a love triangle situation here). Dmitry was not only mad at his father for stealing his money, but for trying to steal his girl. Grushenka says she was only playing with both of them, but Fyodor was very serious when he said he would give Grushenka everything if she married her (thus, none of the brothers Karamazov wanted them to get married, they would lose their inheritance, and Dmitry his love). Fyodor was made to believe by Grushenka that she would visit him at night, and Fyodor kept waiting for her every night with an envelope containing 3000 roubles just for her.
Now, the 300 roubles are very important because previously Katerina Ivanova had given 3000 roubles to Dmitry asking him to send the money to her sister in Moscow. Dmitry being the spender he was took the money and went on a spending spree with Grushenka to Mokroe, a town nearby. According to Dmitry, he would repay Katerina those 3000 roubles because “he was a scoundrel but not a thief”, when he could get back the same amount from his father, because according to Dmitry, Fyodor still owed him 3000 roubles of his inheritance, casually the same 3000 roubles Fyodor had laying there waiting for Grushenka.
We learn about the fatal night from Dmitry’s perspective, when after failing to find Grushenka in her house, he goes to Fyodor’s house looking for her. He doesn’t find her and flees the place, but accidentally hits Grigory and makes him bleed. Later one he learns that Grushenka went to Mokroe to meet his former Pole lover, so he runs to Mokroe with champagne and all the luxuries to impress her. Once in Mokroe, Grushenka tells her she loves him, and not the Poles and they party all night until the police officers get there and arrest him for the murder of his father, finding only 1500 roubles, raising the question of where is the other half he supposedly stole.
Now, a comment about Smerdyakov. He was Fyodor’s valet. He was an epileptic man son of nasty Lisetza, a poor woman who allegedly was raped by Fyodor, making Smerdyakov his illegitimate son. This man confessed his guilt to a febrile Ivan, telling Ivan that Ivan had implicitly asked Smerdyakov to kill his father, that he was waiting until Ivan had left the town to kill him. He tells him how he had suggested Fyodor to hide the money somewhere else, and details how the night of the murder he heard the noises when Dmitry came in, ran and killed Fyodor, taking the money (and leaving the empty envelope there). To prove his story, he gave Ivan the 3000 roubles he had stolen. However, he killed himself after confessing to Ivan, so he could not testify at the trial. Ivan had been having visions of the devil, and began suffering brain fever during the trial, so his evidence was not very reliable. He got worse after the trial and we don’t know if he lived.
The trial was going well thanks to a lawyer from Petersburg who knew how to interview the witnesses, until Katerina Ivanova pulled a letter written by Dmitry saying he would kill his father. The defense had been very convincing, refuting every piece of evidence (even the letter), stating the money had not being found, raising the theory of Smerdyakov as the murderer, since he had a motive: he was an illegitimate son, and thus would not get inheritance, and had the opportunity. Nevertheless, the jury decided Dmitry to be guilty. This may be a critique to the judicial system and the jury system, how the faith and the life of one person depends on “evidence” which ends up being pure tales from the people around.
The book finishes with Dmitry in the hospital with nervous fever on the eve of being sent to Siberia. However, Ivan had schemed his escape to America. Grushenka and Katerina Ivanova meet at the hospital and Grushenka says she will forgive Katerina if she helps Dmitry escape.
The last scene is the funeral of Ilusha, the son of a captain Dmitry had hit in a tavern. Speaking of stories that are loose ends, this one was one of them: the whole story about the school kids throwing stones at Ilusha, the story about Ilusha feeding knives to dogs (this was proposed to him by Smerdyakov, by the way) and the whole story of Kolya, his mother upbringing him raise more questions than answers. Also, whatever happened to madame Hohlakov and her sister Lise who was supposedly in love with Alyosha? What happened with the monks at the monastery and with Rakitin?
After all I think it is open to the reader’s interpretation to believe if Dmitry is innocent. His father was no good man, it must be said, but that does not justify a murder. I side with the brothers Karamazov, and I always thought Semrdyakov to be a vile and malicious being. Sadly, the judicial system didn’t help Dmitry on this one, let’s hope he could escape, and that Ivan recovered from his disease and could marry his true love Katerina Ivanova.
by LiterallySagan