Just finished reading this mammoth work. What did I think of it?
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CRIME Shirt $21.68 |
Just finished reading this mammoth work. What did I think of it?
Just finished reading this mammoth work. What did I think of it?
CRIME Shirt $21.68 |
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CRIME Shirt $21.68 |
You cried at the last scene
No, the other two parts with Ilyusha/Snegiryov were sadder to me
The soppy religious parts felt cliché and had little effect on me
Holy filtered, the book was wasted on you. Next time please stick to YA.
>epic dosto defener can only drool out buzzwords
yawn. as dull and predictable as your hero
only people who are scared of life would cry at that and despair at Ivan's Grand Inquisitor speech
You found it to be rather mediocre, with flashes of excellent humor, but, alas, with wastelands of literary platitudes in between. A straggling play, with just that amount of furniture and other implements needed for the various actors.
Basically, yes. It's better than crime and Punishment but it's still lacking (for me at least), I'm still wondering if I'm missing something or I just don't like it
Tempted to get pic related just to see what I missed out on
I finished a few days ago as well. I've been collecting my thoughts about it.
The other main thing is that, no matter what the literal letter of the Bible says, or what people expect from it (sainthood, corpses that don't stink, the notion that everyone should just be pure and chaste and 100% believers), everyone should try and be good to each other. That's the main message. As Zosima says, everyone is responsible for each other's sins. The killer kills because he was given no love or attention ever. Whenever bad shit happens in the book, it can be traced to something other characters did. Conversely, the good small acts (Grushenka's onions) are the sources of good in the novel. These small, free acts of good are also what Zosima preaches for and they are a refutation of the Grand Inquisitor's views that freedom is a burden. In fact, the whole book is a refutation of the GI's thesis. Man reaches salvation only through conscious, active love.
My other main takeaway was that this must have been Dosto's way of grappling with how he himself saw Christianity: something he desperately wanted to have faith in, but somehow couldn't fully abandon himself into. Ivan's intellectual doubt must have been Dostoevsky's own. Maybe Dmitri the sinner's frenetic conversion mirrors his own, in Siberia.
Incidentally, I had a Covid-induced fever dream the other night where I saw myself filling an endless Excel spreadsheet, desperately trying to help Ivan prove the existence of God. It was the nastiest thing, kek.
I could go on but am too lazy to do it. I'm sure the archives have better discussion already.
>Live, Laugh, Love
So this is the power of Dostoevsky...
More like Vodka, Suffering, Rambling Speeches
you know nothing about literature
Neither did Dostoevsky, but he didn't let that stop him.
Yes
Yeah they do sound exactly the same as the kind of copes someone would come up with who's sympathetic to Christianity but just can't fully submit himself to it, that's why I thought it was a bit cliché. When so much of the book basically reiterates those same basic points it can get a little boring
I enjoyed how well the characters were written though, this above all else is why dosto's novels are good but they're never the focus of his books, it's just a means to make some pretty banal statements about faith and humanity or whatever, it's annoying. The way he's able to write a unique character, who's formed by his environment and own idiosyncracies is way more interesting than any points he tries to make about lief and sheit. He was obviously very insightful about what made a person the way they are
>getting defensive because I criticised an author you try too hard to like
I think Marvel movies are more your speed
There's a certain artistry in the BK's internal structure as well, besides the great characters. People's actions and statements have little impacts that pop up in the next few chapters, sometimes very subtle. He got good at carrying themes as well. I liked the lacerations subplot and how Ferapont saw the demons that afterwards were described by someone else (Khoklakova?). Not to mention the Devil himself.
Still, even though he always tries to cram his viewpoints in there, there's a certain weird cosiness to his books and to how unapologetically Dosto tries to make you believe the same as him. These things can be banal but I can tell they had deep meaning for him.
It's like listening to a friend earnestly grab you by the shoulders and give you a personal, somewhat misguided pep talk you didn't ask for, even if he does it so entertainingly you can't bring yourself to stop him.
After reading most of his books and finally ending with the BK, I'll miss this little homie like you wouldn't believe (until I reread all his stuff again).
By the way, this endearment that Dosto causes and his way of writing melodrama reminds me of Levin's brother in Anna Karenina (or rather, the other way around). Except that Tolstoy was a much better writer and artist, and managed to write Dostoevsky with greater skill and taste. He went as far as going with the same Christian conversion spiel, but again he pulls it off a bit less unobtrusively - I actually felt envious of Levin's conversion.
But none of this is to say Dosto is bad - he's an earnest, frenetic, rambling man on a mission, and this is part of his appeal. I just love him so much I'm willing to forgive his many artistic sins.
tolstoy is objectively a better writer, but he's a 3 star writer - ultimately it's just drama. Dostoyevsky while has many 2/5 slogs, reaches higher than Tolstoy ever did, with Notes from the Underground and Crime & Punishment. Though I admit that his obsession with romantic prostitutes is ever so silly.
>ultimately it's just drama.
How so? Then so is everything by everybody else.
Did you forget the massive wall of history theory he pulls out of his ass in W&P?
>reaches higher than Tolstoy ever did
Notes I'll agree it's very novel, but even so it was written largely as a reaction to other works. C&P I think it's actually his weakest work (apart from the Idiot). Apart from Svidrigailov, it's just a really good pulp novel with some unconvincing Christian guilt glued on.
If you had talked of Shatov, Kirillov or that guy in Demons who predicts the USSR, I might have agreed. But both writers have their moments. And they're a lot of great moments. It's a bit pointless to compare them as if it's a competition. I was just drawing parallels between them.
Have you read this
(book in the pic)? I'm thinking about reading it but it's a bit pricey
No, I didn't. I unironically got the most out of the book by writing some notes as I read the book, then reading the archives and following a leddit read-along. Look up some essays online and what Joseph Frank has to say about it. The book isn't really all that inaccessible though.
Maybe read up on the trials of Jesus to understand the GI.
you realize dostoyevsky got paid by the word, and that brothers k, the idiot and the demons are all symptomatic of this, that they're famous only due to few scenes padded with pages upon pages of irrelevant boring bullshit, and you move on with your life
That's true
I just felt like I had to read it because of autism
Dostoevsky novels have all the philosophical depth of a bad Hollywood movie.
Name me one movie that has the theme of man not being made to judge other men and that judgment is the job of God
How can you read 800+ pages without forming a single thought of your own?
Ivan best boy