Crime and Punishment as a Novel of Consciousness

Download:

PDF
Author: Vladimir A. Viktorovich
Information about the author:

DSc in Philology, Professor, Department of Russian Language and Literature, State Social and Humanitarian University, Zelenaya 30, 140411 Kolomna, Russia.

https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9576-9522

E-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
For citation:

Viktorovich, V.A. “Crime and Punishment as a Novel of Consciousness.” Dostoevsky and World Culture. Philological journal, no. 3 (23), 2023, pp. 28–42. (In Russ.) https://doi.org/10.22455/2619-0311-2023-3-28-42
Received: 29 July 2023
Published: 25 Sept. 2023
Issue: 2023 no. 3 (23)
Department: HERMENEUTICS. SLOW READING
Pages: 28-42
DOI: https://doi.org/10.22455/2619-0311-2023-3-28-42
EDN:

https://elibrary.ru/ABCGJK
UDK: 821.161.1.0+23/28
BBK: 83.3
Keywords: Dostoevsky, Crime and Punishment, novel of consciousness, allhumanity, receptive strategy, improper directed speech.
Abstract: The article proposes a genre definition of Dostoevsky’s novel as a novel of consciousness. The term has been used relatively recently, mainly in English-language literature of the last decades. In this article, it is used in a slightly different sense, emphasizing not the plurality of consciousnesses, but the universalization of consciousness in general. The difference of Crime and Punishment from the tradition of Western European and Russian social and psychological novel was already felt by its first readers and formulated initially by critics N.D. Akhsharumov, N.N. Strakhov, and Fr. Theodore (A.M. Bukharev). The unique fusion of the novel’s hero with the reader was achieved by Dostoevsky on the basis of the postulated common nature of human consciousness. The new aesthetics found its expression in the narrative structure, as the use of improper direct speech builds the communicating vessels (author-hero-reader) of the flowing unified “all-human” consciousness.

References

1. Akhsharumov, N.D. “‘Prestuplenie i nakazanie’, roman F.M. Dostoevskogo” [“Crime and Punishment. Dostoevsky’s Novel”]. Vsemirnyi trud, no. 3, 1867, pp. 125–159. (In Russ.)

2. Bakhtin, M.M. Problemy poetiki Dostoevskogo [Problems of Dostoevsky’s Poetics]. 2nd ed., rev. and edd. Moscow, Sovetskii pisatel’ Publ., 1963. 362 p. (In Russ.)

3. Arkhimandrit Feodor (Bukharev, A.M.) O dukhovnykh potrebnostiakh zhizni [About the Spiritual Needs of Life]. Moscow, Stolitsa Publ., 1991. 320 p. (In Russ.)

4. Viktorovich, V., and Zakharova, O. F.M. Dostoevskii v russkoi kritike. 1845–1881 [Dostoevsky in Russian Criticism. 1845–1881]. Kolomna, Liga Publ., 2021. 536 p. (In Russ.)

5. Vinogradov, V.V. Izbrannye trudy: Poetika russkoi literatury [Selected Works: Poetics of Russian Literature]. Moscow, Nauka Publ., 1976. 511 p. (In Russ.)

6. Vinogradov, V.V. Izbrannye trudy: O iazyke khudozhestvennoi prozy [Selected Works: About the Language of Literary Prose]. Moscow, Nauka Publ., 1980. 360 p. (In Russ.)

7. No Author. “Zhurnalistika” [“Journalism”]. Golos, no. 48, 17 Feb. 1866. (In Russ.)

8. Dostoevskii, F.M. Polnoe sobranie sochinenii: v 30 tomakh [Complete Works: in 30 vols]. Leningrad, Nauka Publ., 1972–1990. (In Russ.)

9. Ivanov, Viach.I. Lik i lichiny Rossii: Estetika i literaturnaia teoriia [Faces and Figures of Russia: Aesthetics and Literary Theory]. Moscow, Iskusstvo Publ., 1995. 699 p. (In Russ.)

10. Kasatkina, T.A. Sviashchennoe v povsednevnom: dvusostavnyi obraz v proizvedeniiakh Dostoevskogo [The Sacred in the Ordinary: The Two-Folded Image in the Works of F.M. Dostoevsky]. Moscow, IWL RAS Publ., 2015. 528 p. (In Russ.)

11. Kasatkina, T.A. “My budem — litsa…” Analitiko-sinteticheskoe chtenie proizvedenii Dostoevskogo [“We Will Be Faces/Persons…” An Analytical-Synthetic Reading of Dostoevsky’s Works]. Moscow, IWL RAS Publ., 2023. 432 p. (In Russ.)

12. Rogachevskaia, M.S. “Roman soznaniia kak zhanrovaia raznovidnost’ v sovremennoi britanskoi literature” [“The Novel of Consciousness as Genre Variety in Contemporary British Fiction”]. Mirovaia literatura v kontekste kul’tury, no. 5 (11), 2016, pp. 139–148. Available at: https://elibrary.ru/item.asp?edn=vpscts (Accessed 08 Aug. 2023) (In Russ.)

13. Strakhov, N.N. Literaturnaia kritika [Literary Criticism]. Intro, comp. N.N. Skatov, comm. N.N. Skatov and V.A. Kotel’nikov. Moscow, Sovremennik Publ., 1984. 431 p. (In Russ.)

14. L.N. Tolstoi i N.N. Strakhov. Polnoe sobranie perepiski: v 2 tomakh [Lev Tolstoy and Nikolay Strakhov. Complete Correspondence: in 2 vols]. Ottawa, Moscow, 2003. (In Russ.)

15. Turgenev, I.S. Polnoe sobranie sochinenii i pisem: v 30 tomakh [Complete Works and Letters: in 30 vols], vol. 7. Moscow, Nauka Publ., 1990. 443 p. (In Russ.)

16. “‘Dostoevskii — literaturnyi titan. Eto prigovor’: bol’shoe esse Devida Fostera Uollesa o Fedore Dostoevskom” [“‘Dostoevsky is a literary titan, and in some ways this can be the kiss of death:’ David Foster Wallace’s Essay on Fedor Dostoevsky”]. Pravila zhizni, 13 Nov. 2021. Available at: https://esquire.ru/hero/301383-dostoevskiy-literaturnyy-titan-eto-prigovorbolshoe-esse-devida-fostera-uollesa-o-fedore-dostoevskom/#part0 (Accessed 08 July 2023) (In Russ.)

17. Jaspers, Karl Theodor. Filosofiia. Kniga tret’ia. Metafizika [Philosophy. Book 3. Metaphysics]. Trans. by A.K. Sudakov. Moscow, Canon+ ROOI Reabilitatsiia Publ., 2012. 296 p. (In Russ.)

18. Lodge, David. Consciousness and the Novel. Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 2002. 320 p. (In English)