Dostoevsky's novel, Crime & Punishment

The novel examines the crime of murder and its aftermath on two essential levels --- the psychological and the religious. Raskolnikov believes that the process is primarily or exclusively psychological, at least until he begins to deteriorate morally. As a psychological problem, Raskolnikov believes that he is able to overcome whatever problems arise from his crime. He believes that he has "thought ahead" far enough to foresee whatever such problems arise, and he sees himself as capable of confronting these problems and outsmarting whatever foes emerge in his pursuit of the crime and of controlling the consequences of the act.

However, the reader recognizes that Raskolnikov is hardly the master criminal, and hardly can be said to be in control of the consequences of his act. The act itself is one in which he is on the constant verge of outright swooning. As his victim says, "But what makes you so pale? And your hands are trembling. Are you ill or something?" (Dostoevsky 65). He is "hardly able to articulate his words. His strength was failing again" (Dostoevsky 65).

But after the crime has been committed, he is able to gather his wits: "He was quite collected, his faculties were no longer clouded nor his head swimming . . . " (Dostoevsky 66).

. . .
come monstrous. One cannot overcome this monstrous isolation by oneself alone. That is the message of the novel, at least in part. Raskolnikov's isolation is so great that only some tremendous and horrible act, perhaps, can break through the wall of his alienation. He can kill himself, or he can kill another. Later, driven by his conscience to the brink of suicide, he chooses instead to turn himself in. The message here is that if Raskolnikov truly believed in his alienating nihilistic philosophy of life, he would have killed himself: "Another thought added to his suffering: why had he not killed himself? Why, when he stood on the bank of the river, had he chosen rather to confess? . . . He tortured himself with these questions, unable to realize that perhaps even as he stood by the river he already felt in his heart that there was something profoundly false in himself and his beliefs. He did not understand that that feeling might have been the herald of a coming crisis in his life, of his coming resurrection, of a future new outlook on life" (Dostoevsky 459). This seeking of suffering for the sake of salvation, again, is not and cannot be a private and individual matter. Certainly, there must be in the individual's so
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Approximate Word count = 2475
Approximate Pages = 10 (250 words per page)

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