Crime and Punishment (Parts V, VI, Epilogue)

25Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: 26And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. (John 11)

Raskolnikov’s realization

• Three / 6 (325-326) • “The real overlord…”• “I killed the principle”

• Raskolnikov’s dream: Three / 6 (pp. 328-330)

Sonya Marmeladova

• Paradox of virtue and ‘vice’: how can one remain chaste and be a prostitute

• Sonya (from Sophia – “wisdom” St Sophia was the mother of three daughters Faith, Hope and Love)

• One of a ‘paradigm of prostitutes’ in the novel• The path of degradation and destruction• First description: Two/7 (pp. 220-221)

Raskolnikov and Porfiry’s three questions

• “So you still believe in the New Jerusalem, do you.” “Yes I do.”

• “And do you believe in God?” • “And do you believe in the resurrection of

Lazarus”• (Three/5, pp. 310-311)

Raskolnikov’s painful Resurrection

• Raskolnikov and Sonya: the reading of the Gospel

• Regarding the Resurrection of Lazarus • (Four/4 pp. 388-91)• Sonya, like Maria Magdalena, a prostitute• Go to the crossroads (Five/4 p. 501)

Raskolnikov’s imitation of Christ

• Six/8 (pp. 626-7)• Jerusalem• Via dolorosa• Drain this cup. • Crossroads

The epilogue

• Raskolnikov’s Dream (Epilogue/2 p. 651-2)• “In his illness he dreamt that the entire world

had fallen victim to some strange … plague…. Everyone was to perish, apart from a chosen few, a very few.”

The Revelation

• “Never had they believed so unswervingly in the correctness of their judgements, their scientific deductions, their moral convictions and beliefs. Entire centres of population, entire cities and peoples became smitten and went mad…. No one could agree about what should be considered evil and what good.”

• “Only a few people in the whole world managed to escape: they were the pure and chosen, who had been predestined to begin a new species of mankind and usher in a new life, to renew the earth and render it pure…”

The New Jerusalem

• Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in the temple of my God, and he shall go no more out: and I will write upon him the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, which is new Jerusalem, which cometh down out of heaven from my God: and I will write upon him my new name.

The Holy City

• “And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.” (Revelation 21.2)

• (Epilogue/2 p. 652)

Arkady Ivanovich Svidrigailov

• Parallel to Raskolnikov: resurrection or suicide.

• We are privy to the dreams only of Raskolnikov and Svidrigailov

• From St Petersburg – returns to Babylon• Description Three/4 (p. 290)• Responsible for the death of his wife, Martha

Petrovna

Svidrigailov

Intends to marry a sixteen-year old girlSix/4 (571-73)

The Sistine Madonna vs the Icon

Svidrigailov and Dunya

• “You poisoned your wife, I know that now, you yourself are a murderer.” (Six/5, p. 590)

• She flings the revolver aside. • “So you don’t love me?” • “There ensued a moment of terrible, dumb

conflict within Svidrigailov’s soul.” (592)

Svidrigailov’s Dreams(Six/6, pp. 603-5))

• The mouse dream• The drowned girl dream

Svidrigailov’s suicide

• S chooses suicide at the end of Six/6 (p. 611)• Parallels Raskolnikov’s confession at the end

of Six 8 (pp. 632-3)

Dmitry Prokofievich Razumikhin

• Razumikhin from razum – ‘intelligence’• Vrazumikhin – from Russ. Vrazumit’: ‘to bring

to senses’• Luzhin misnames him Rassudochkin from

rassudok (logic, rationality)• Energetic, hardworking, but not a slave to

rationalism

SECONDARY CHARACTERS

Alyona Ivanovna

• Widow, pawnbroker, plans to leave her wealth to monastery

• Sister Lizaveta (pious, always pregnant!)

Pyotr Petrovich Luzhin

• Possible significance of first name and patronymic?

• Luzhin – ‘puddle’

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

Later, in confessing the murder to Sonya, Raskolnikov claims, "Did I really kill the old woman? No, it was myself I killed.... And as for the old woman, it was the Devil who killed her, not I.“ What does he mean by this? What motive does Raskolnikov give for his murder?

Discussion (cont.)

Why does he confess to Sonya? Why doesn't the confession ease him of his inner torment?

Discussion (cont.)

Discuss Raskolnikov's theory of the ordinary versus the extraordinary man. Can you think of modern-day examples of this theory put into practice?