1. Fyodor Mikhaylovich Dostoyevsky Фёдор Миха́йлович Достое́вский 1821-1881

2. Parents Father (Mikhail) Mother (Maria) Moscow physician
Violent, tyrannical, controlling alcoholic
Persuaded Fyodor to train in St. Petersburg as an engineer
Killed by own serfs in 1839
Freud on Dostoevsky’s epilepsy
Mother (Maria)
Mild, pious woman
Dead before Fyodor turned 16

3. Early Years & Writings 1st novel = Poor Folk (1846)
Social concerns
Praise by Belinsky, reaction of friends
2nd novel = The Double (1846)
Psychological novel
Cold reaction by Belinsky

4. SIBERIA Tsarist Russia Petrashevsky Circle (1848)
Alexander I ( ) – enacts reforms
Nicholas I ( ) – reactionary, crushes rebellions (1848)
Alexander II ( ) – reinstates liberal reforms (1861)
Petrashevsky Circle (1848)
Westernization and Europeanization of Russia
Utopian socialism
Threat to Czar Nicholas I
Decembrists Revolt (1825)
Series of European rebellions (1848)
Imprisonment ( )
Death by Firing Squad
Four years at labor camp
Six years in military

5. Return to St. Petersburg
Study of New Testament
Conservative Christian
Rejects former socialist views
Advocates return to Russian/Christian simplicity
Belief in “redemption through suffering”
If faced with choice between Truth and Faith/ Christ, he’d choose Faith/Christ

6. Notes from Underground (1864)
The House of the Dead (1862)
Agonies of prison life, tales of prisoners
Death of first wife, brother
Gambling, Alcohol addictions
Notes from Underground (1864)
“I am a sick man. I am a wicked man. An unattractive man.”
Freedom vs. self-interest
Anti-Rationalism, Anti-progressive (leads only to sterility, inaction, inertia)

7. The Big Four Crime and Punishment (1866) The Idiot (1868)
Raskolnikov = nihilist, “Schism”/”Split”
Published in literary journal alongside Tolstoy’s War and Peace
The Idiot (1868)
Prince Myshkin = Christ-figure, innocent simpleton
The Possessed (The Devils) (1873)
Stavrogin = radical group, nihilist
The Brothers Karamazov (1880)
Murder of despicable father, Fyodor Karamazov
Three sons: Dmitry, Ivan, & Alyosha (also: Smerdyakov)
“The Legend of the Grand Inquisitor”

8. The Brothers Karamazov

9. “To his contemporary readers, Dostoevsky appeared as a writer primarily interested in the terrible aspects of human existence. However, later critics have recognized that the novelist sought to plumb the depths of the psyche, in order to reveal the full range of the human experience, from the basest desires to the most elevated spiritual yearnings. Above all, he illustrated the universal human struggle to understand God and self.”