/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.22656303]

I just finishes Demons. So officially I‘ve read all the big works by Dostoevsky including short works like Undergroundman, Light nights, feverdream. Who wants to discuss or has any interesting takes on this one? What do you think about Stepan‘s son or the Gigachad Stawrogin? I know that the main characters and their sons are like old vs new generation and ideologys. What do you think about Kirilov?

[Anonymous No.22656320]

kirilov is literally, unironically, sincerely me

[Anonymous No.22656327]

>>22656303
One day I’ll make a thread posting sections of Joseph Frank’s book on Dostoyevsky. He does a good breakdown of all his books

[Anonymous No.22656338]

>>22656303
rank em for us lad. I finished House of the dead not too long ago, enjoyed it a lot but it dragged toward the end. will read demons if you enjoy it.

[Anonymous No.22656444]

>>22656338
1. Brothers Karamazov. Actually read this one first, started this book in 2018 after finishing my A Levels and was quite isolated. It definitely made me more interested in literature again and made me appreciate the little things more. I‘ll always love Father Zossima.
2. C&P. Mainly because because I could identify with Raskolnikov so much, also he had a great friend.
3. Idiot. Sometimes you‘ll hate the prince because you‘ll think what a fool, but you‘ll eventually learn to appreciate the „christ-like“ character of the Prince. I watched a theatre version of this one and was disappointed how foolish they made him act, almost cartoonish.
4. Light nights. Just read it, very short and beautiful.
5. NFTE. This is what I‘ve read during TBK (it took me very long to finish it) and I loved it at first and could identify with the MC very much. After I thought how I would rather transmute from this mentality and thinking to a more Zossima like one. I definitely still am more like the Underground guy than Zossima but I know I don‘t want to be like this just a cynic guy who‘s afraid to be authentic because you fear being hurt.
I’d say the best advice one can get from reading Dostoevsky is: Just be yourself (do not lie to yourself), do your best, let it happen and trust in God.

[Anonymous No.22656448]

>>22656303
>Undergroundman
New capeshit just dropped?

[Anonymous No.22656517]

>>22656303
>What do you think about Kirilov?
Probably the most interesting character in the book, and a good demonstration of a character completely eaten up by his destructive ideology

[Anonymous No.22656589]

>>22656448
Kek>>22656517
You think so? I was fascinated by Stawrogin, and think he was the „mastermind“ behind Kirilov

[Anonymous No.22656599]

>>22656303
Nigga I had the same idea to speedrun Dosto but I'm only two books deep, you'd have to wait for me in the Sun

[Anonymous No.22656687]

>>22656303
>Gigachad Stawrogin

I wouldn't characterize Stavrogin as a chad. He's a very complex, deceptively intellectual and inward-directed person, one of the great tragic figures of literature.

[Anonymous No.22657567]

>>22656303
Stavrogins ending made a lot more sense taking the missing chapter into account. I felt like it really flushed his character out. Pyotr is the face of the no father/father figure crisis in the west. At least he had the ability to get shit done. Can’t say the same for modern “revolutionaries”

[Anonymous No.22657586]

>>22656303
If you are alluding to Dostoevsky’s worst novels, then, indeed, I dislike intensely The Brothers Karamazov and the ghastly Crime and Punishment rigamarole. No, I do not object to soul-searching and self-revelation, but in those books the soul, and the sins, and the sentimentality, and the journalese, hardly warrant the tedious and muddled search. Dostoyevsky’s lack of taste, his monotonous dealings with persons suffering with pre-Freudian complexes, the way he has of wallowing in the tragic misadventures of human dignity – all this is difficult to admire. I do not like this trick his characters have of ”sinning their way to Jesus” or, as a Russian author, Ivan Bunin, put it more bluntly, ”spilling Jesus all over the place." Crime and Punishment’s plot did not seem as incredibly banal in 1866 when the book was written as it does now when noble prostitutes are apt to be received a little cynically by experienced readers. Dostoyevsky never really got over the influence which the European mystery novel and the sentimental novel made upon him. The sentimental influence implied that kind of conflict he liked—placing virtuous people in pathetic situations and then extracting from these situations the last ounce of pathos. Non-Russian readers do not realize two things: that not all Russians love Dostoevsky as much as Americans do, and that most of those Russians who do, venerate him as a mystic and not as an artist. He was a prophet, a claptrap journalist and a slapdash comedian. I admit that some of his scenes, some of his tremendous farcical rows are extraordinarily amusing. But his sensitive murderers and soulful prostitutes are not to be endured for one moment—by this reader anyway. Dostoyevsky seems to have been chosen by the destiny of Russian letters to become Russia’s greatest playwright, but he took the wrong turning and wrote novels.

[Anonymous No.22658033]

>>22656599
have fun Anon
>>22656687
He had the potential to be one of the greatest Gigachads in literature. From a well respected wealthy family, European education, military career, handsome fella -> got all the bitches but married a retard, because of a bet and just out of spite. He was a mastermind, some of his conversations just for entertainment, led to becoming the main ideology of the other guy. That’s why Pyotr saw that in him.
>>22657567
Respect the manipulative grind, he didn’t gaf about communism at the end of the day. Just on some Machiavelli type shit

[Anonymous No.22658733]

>>22657586
All my homies hate Nabokov

[Anonymous No.22659008]

>>22656303
>He didnt read A Little Hero

[Anonymous No.22659347]

I remember absolutely hating the first half of Demons. Nothing seemed to happen for at least 300 pages - Dosto went through the same trite characterizations over and over again just to really hammer home how out-of-touch the older generation was and it wasn't done skillfully or in an entertaining way.

[Anonymous No.22659366]

>>22657586
Ok pedo

[Anonymous No.22659876]

>>22659347

Could be worth reading again once you know who the characters are and what happens to them you probably will have quite a different experience with the first 300 pages

[Anonymous No.22659911]

>>22659347
Ive heard this a lot but for me the first half of C&P was much more boring besides the murder

[Anonymous No.22660132]

>>22658033
He wasn't a mastermind. He raped a child and could never love himself after. He was a victim of his ideas: he claimed he couldn't tell the difference between good and evil but he still felt guilty enough to consult a priest. He cared enough about good and evil to think about it. He didn't mastermind any of the events, and was only conscious of the plan to murder Marya. It was precisely because he didn't care about what he said that people around him were inspired by ideas he didn't believe in. Thinking he's a mastermind is ironically thinking like Pyotr, who didn't understand why Stavrogin risked his life in a duel or his marriage to Marya. He couldn't see that Stavrogin had values that he'd permanently compromised, which caused him to disregard both upright living and machiavellian manipulation. It's my favourite novel for it takes the claims of many egoistic thinkers and applys them to a soul which feels its deeply, instinctively, wrong to rape a child; a soul like ours I'd imagine, and shows how lesser minds are drawn to machiavellianism and perform it without a conscience. Pytor is the manipulator and gets away, Stavrogin shoots himself.

[Anonymous No.22660220]

>>22660132
The genius was making Stavrogin a Byronic hero, the romantic solitary all boys want to imitate. Makes the commentary on the problem of idealizing others in the vacuum of Christian belief even more poignant. You replace Christ with a guy who can't.

[Anonymous No.22660324]

He started attending Church after reading "At Tikhon's". Honestly really powerful chapter. Just shows how much power shame has over your actions and goals. You are ready to do even evil things to be feared or ostracised or whatever but even after commiting great evil you will be afraid of shame. "Oh, he thought he made something... great. Yeah, he greatly overestimated his abilities". "Heh, what a worm. Raped a girl and then she killed herself. I'm trembling in fear!"
Dostoevsky wrote about immense pride that criminals have in prison. I think it some sort of holding it together for prison is one of Hell zones on earth: it takes real penitence to overcome it without making a wolf out of your soul.
Why be sheep and not wolf?
Wolf doesn't know what a sheep it is. Wolf lives devouring. Sheep dies devoured. But both die anyway. And then there will be weep for they remember every deed they commited. Wolf will see it never was one: it was a sheep or a goat.
Life whatever weak it may be is always stronger than hatred for it cannot destroy life. There will suffering. But joy will be too. Despite whatever happened.

[Anonymous No.22660437]

>>22656303
He's right tho. Unironically, a teacher shouldn't be dressing like that and bending over like that in class. Her behavior is more inappropriate than the boy's.

[Anonymous No.22661006]

>>22660437
I agree

[Anonymous No.22661040]

>>22657586
now this is humberposting

[Anonymous No.22661047]

>>22660437
The teacher knows exactly what she's doing and gets off to it

[Anonymous No.22661063]

>>22659347
Took me 3 attempts to finish Demons, but i'm glad I did. The last 200ish pages is some of the best literature I have ever read

[Anonymous No.22661257]

>>22656303
Great novel, Dostoevsky's funniest by some distance. Pyotr Stepanovich is a very entertaining character.

[Anonymous No.22661740]

bump

[Anonymous No.22662833]

>>22656303
When I was a kid I didn't care about womens asses at all

[Anonymous No.22663681]

>>22661257

Not as entertaining as his father.

[Anonymous No.22663686]

>>22662833
>When I was a kid I

We live in different times now (the end times...)

[Anonymous No.22663695]

>>22656444
karamazov is objectivelly not as good as crime and punishment.

[Anonymous No.22664622]

>>22663681
They're both great, but villains, especially active ones, are always the most fun to follow.

[Anonymous No.22665667]

>>22663695
I personally liked C&P much more. But TBK is imo the greatest novel of all time.
>>22661257
The Prince was his funniest book

[Anonymous No.22666108]

>Hasn't even read The House Of Dead, Poor Folk, The Gambler, The Double, Humiliated And Insulted or Raw Youth.
You're not even halfway done