Study Guide to The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Intelligent Education

• Publisher: Influence Publishers
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781645421436
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Study Aids
• Subtopic: Study Guides

A comprehensive study guide offering in-depth explanation, essay, and test prep for Fyodor Dostoyevsky's The Idiot, a literary classic due to Dostoyevsky’s unique shifting writing styles and characterizations. As a mid-nineteenth century European work, The Idiot aims to highlight perfection in an imperfect world as a major theme. Moreover, this classic will encourage students to think in a more philosophical manner and look for a deeper theme in other works and real world situations. This Bright Notes Study Guide explores the context and history of Dostoyevsky’s classic work, helping students to thoroughly explore the reasons it has stood the literary test of time. Each Bright Notes Study Guide contains: - Introductions to the Author and the Work
- Character Summaries
- Plot Guides
- Section and Chapter Overviews
- Test Essay and Study Q&As The Bright Notes Study Guide series offers an in-depth tour of more than 275 classic works of literature, exploring characters, critical commentary, historical background, plots, and themes. This set of study guides encourages readers to dig deeper in their understanding by including essay questions and answers as well as topics for further research.

INTRODUCTION TO FYODOR DOSTOYEVSKY

 

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF DOSTOYEVSKY

Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoyevsky was born October 30, 1821, in Moscow, the second son of Mikhail, a physician at the Mariinsky Hospital for the Poor. The family belonged to the hereditary nobility and possessed a small country estate worked by some one hundred “souls” as serfs were then called. Late every spring the family left Moscow to spend the summer there.

After Fyodor completed his secondary education, his father sent him in 1838 to St. Petersburg where he entered the College of Engineers, a military school run by the Czar. Although he studied hard and in general made a good impression on his teachers, the young cadet was in constant financial straits. Always writing home for more money, he describes his “terrible plight” in the most urgent terms. When money came, though, he celebrated its arrival with a huge banquet and drinking party for his friends, or gambled it away shooting pool. He was generous to the point of self-destruction. When his brother Mikhail was married, Fyodor sent him one hundred fifty rubles. Two weeks later he was broke again, begging him for five. This inability to manage his finances persisted throughout his life. In fact, he was nearly always on the brink of bankruptcy.

Despite his ups and downs in Petersburg, the twenty-three-year-old Dostoyevsky became so attached to the city that the mere thought of living elsewhere was unbearable for him. So when he learned that he was about to be posted to the provinces, he resigned his commission and resolved to support himself by writing. In 1846 Poor Folk was published and immediately became a best seller. The young author was lionized as the new Gogol, received into the best houses, and became the object of unrestrained praise. The novel is a brilliantly written though sentimental story about the destructive effects of poverty. In quick succession there followed The Double (1846) and a collection of short stories under the title White Nights (1848).

About this time Dostoyevsky became seriously ill, both mentally and physically. Poor, quarrelsome, the victim of unpredictable fevers and convulsions, he soon alienated his admirers as well as his editors. Furthermore, since his erratic behavior was put down to personality rather than to the illness that it was, he was frequently laughed at, jeered, and mocked. Turgenev, for instance, so despised him that he would engage him in conversation merely for the pleasure of torturing him. Still, Dostoyevsky was reckoned among the most promising young writers of the day. Unfortunately, his literary career was suddenly interrupted by a remarkable incident that was the direct consequence of his political involvement.

SENTENCED TO DEATH

Ever since the Decembrist revolt in 1825 it had become fashionable for men of learning to promote social reform. Revolutionary manifestoes were printed abroad, smuggled into the country, and widely distributed. Czar Nicholas I, however, was determined that there would be no revolution in Russia under him. Censorship was severe and many domestic and foreign authors were banned. The penalties for revolutionary activity were increased, and government spies were everywhere. Notwithstanding, Dostoyevsky joint a group of political rebels who met even Friday evening at Mikhail Petrashevsky’s apartment. Here they discussed different political trends, plotting revolution on the side in a rather harmless way. All the same, the government became suspicious. The members of the circle were arrested, brought to trial, and Dostoyevsky, along with several others, was sentenced to death.

Finally, on a cold winter morning after a miserable stay in prison, the future author and his co-conspirators were driven to their place of execution. There, tied to stakes, the unlucky men faced the firing squad. However, as the soldiers were given the order to aim, a horseman suddenly appeared riding full tilt across the square. He bore a letter from the Czar commuting all the death sentences to prison terms. The entire affair was prearranged to frighten them and others of their kind into submission to the Czarist regime.

“TO LIVE, NO MATTER HOW”

Needless to say, Dostoyevsky was profoundly affected by this brief encounter with death. So much so in fact that the theme of the condemned man appears on countless occasions in his letters, articles, and novels. Among the most forceful passages describing the condemned man’s state of mind occurs in Crime and Punishment when Raskolnikov says: “Someone condemned to death thinks an hour before his death that if he had to live on a steep pinnacle or on a rock or on a cliff edge so narrow that there was only room to stand, and around him there were abysses, the ocean, and everlasting darkness, eternal solitude, eternal tempests - if he had to remain standing on a few square inches of space for a thousand years or all eternity, it would be better to live than to die. Only to live, to live, to live, no matter how.”

Dostoyevsky’s will to live was severely tested by the Czar’s verdict. He was sentenced to four years’ hard labor in Siberia followed by another five as a common soldier in a penal battalion. The years of physical hardship, loneliness, and the study of the Bible, the only reading allowed the prisoners, completely changed the author’s way of thinking. In both religion and politics he turns into an outspoken conservative, a staunch supporter of the Czarist regime, and the Russian Orthodox Church. He becomes convinced that an Orthodox Christian will, of his own accord, subject himself joyfully to the will of God. Furthermore, by some mystic fiat, a true Russian’s political strivings will miraculously coincide with the will of the Czar Emancipator. These attitudes form the basis of Dostoyevsky’s dialectical thought and ultimately determine whether his heroes are saved or destroyed.

Thus when in 1859, ten years after his arrest, Dostoyevsky is permitted to resign from the army and return to Petersburg, we meet a changed writer, but not a less productive one. Shortly after his release he publishes an account of his imprisonment, Notes from the House of the Dead (1860). This is followed by the short novel The Insulted and the Injured (1861). He even tries his hand at journalism, successfully editing his own paper. Unfortunately, his troubles with the regime are not over. His journal, Vremya, is considered subversive and ordered closed. Disgusted, Dostoyevsky decides to leave Russia for Europe.

In Wiesbaden he won a large sum of money which allowed him the luxury of an affair with the beautiful, charming, and intelligent Polina Suslova. They toured Europe together visiting all the “in” places until he lost his money. Possessing a destructive passion for gambling, he could not keep away from the casinos. On several occasions he lost everything and had to write friends in Russia for the fare home.

The novel The Gambler (1866) is a thinly veiled autobiographical account of this trip. The book is also the third major work in the most productive period of his life which begins in 1864 with the publication of Notes from Underground. During the next sixteen years Dostoyevsky worked feverishly, producing among other things five major novels and The Diary of a Writer. In addition, he maintained a voluminous correspondence with friends, acquaintances, and various admirers who wrote for advice.

MARRIAGE AND FAME

Dostoyevsky’s existence changed for the better with his marriage to Anna Snitkina, his secretary. Among her many qualities was a good business sense that enabled her to offset her husband’s inability to manage his finances. There were trips abroad and every summer the family rented a small cottage in the country. Dostoyevsky could now truly enjoy his fame as one of Russia’s leading authors and was finally able to write at his leisure.

Yet Dostoyevsky’s health was always bad. Since his return from Siberia he suffered from epilepsy and these attacks increased with alarming frequency in the 1860s. During the worst period the fits came once a month and so exhausted him that he needed several days to recover. In addition, he contracted tuberculosis in the 1870s which, together with lung cancer, precipitated his death January 28, 1881.

ST. PETERSBURG: DOSTOYEVSKY’S BAD DREAM

The background of many of the author’s stories, Dostoyevsky’s St. Petersburg seems to be a flat, featureless wasteland. Its buildings lack character and its streets are dismal alleyways rarely touched by daylight. To Dostoyevsky, St. Petersburg seemed often so unreal that he was haunted by the prospect that it was simply someone’s dream and that upon awakening everything would disappear leaving only the marshes and lakes. Others had felt likewise before him. When Peter the Great realized his ambition to build a city upon the Finnish marsh, the peasants living in the vicinity thought that it had been pulled down from the sky. It is only fitting that in such a city human activity is subdued. There is no hustle and bustle in Dostoyevsky’s city streets, nor do we find the comforting noise of people going about their daily business. Rarely anything takes place in open daylight. The city seems to be condemned to perpetual twilight through which Dostoyevsky’s characters hurry to their non-descript lodgings.

Thus, Dostoyevsky never describes a city in the manner of Balzac. In fact, he had an antipathy toward any kind of description of buildings or landscapes, saying that he had better things to do than waste time over creating word pictures. Consequently, he draws the barest outlines and leaves the reader to fill in the details. From another angle, this method is all the more effective because it allows the reader to create his own image of the city.

We could say that the author conceives St. Petersburg like a map. He chooses a location and then strictly adheres to its dimensions. In Crime and Punishment, for example, we know exactly where Raskolnikov lives, how many paces to the moneylender’s house, and how far it is to the police station. Often Dostoyevsky’s favorite places are the ones he personally knows. Central to Crime and Punishment is Haymarket Square close to which the author lived for many years. An unbelievably filthy quarter, it is the gathering place of thieves, prostitutes and the like. Surrounding the square are the stalls from which are hawked all manner of merchandise of use only to the destitute. Leading off the square are trash-filled alleyways bordered by pothouses and bodakings of the worst kind. Like Raskolnikov, Dostoyevsky loved to wander aimlessly about the place filling his lungs with the fetid air as if he were inhaling the essence of being. Still, precise descriptions of the place are absent. The scenery resembles a rather hastily erected stage set. Yet, we sense it as real because the characters are real, often uncomfortably so.

INTRODUCTION TO THE IDIOT

CHARACTER OF PRINCE MYSHKIN

In letters written to friends and relatives at the time, Dostoyevsky stated that The Idiot was to be the portrait of a “perfect man.” Prince Myshkin (who is called an “idiot” because his epileptic condition was thought to have resulted in mental illness at one time) is a simple, painfully honest and completely good person. He is unable to believe that anyone is bad; even when he realizes that someone wishes him harm, he forgives his “enemy” and feels that he himself must be at fault. In other words, he possesses that rarest of Christian virtues, true humility. There are numerous indications in the novel that Prince Myshkin is a Christ-figure. Indeed, Dostoyevsky’s notes for the novel indicate that the Prince is to represent Christ. Unfortunately for the Prince, his Christian virtues have no place in the real world; he is laughed at, and his efforts to help the various people whom he meets are unsuccessful.

PLOT

It is difficult to summarize the plot of The Idiot in a few words, but briefly, the core of the novel concerns the Prince’s relationships with three people: Nastasya Filippovna, a “fallen woman”; Aglaia Epanchin, a “pure” and wholesome girl of good family; and Rogozhin, a fairly wealthy young man who is the Prince’s opposite and his antagonist. The Prince loves both of these women, but his love is Christian, rather than sexual. He offers to marry Nastasya, because he pities her, but she laughs at him and runs off with Rogozhin. Eventually Nastasya returns and forces the Prince to choose between her and Aglaia. Prince Myshkin chooses Nastasya, again because he pities her. But just before their marriage is to take place, on the very steps of the church, Nastasya sees Rogozhin in the crowd and runs away with him. The Prince follows them to St. Petersburg, meets Rogozhin, and together they keep watch over Nastasya, whom Rogozhin had murdered, as the Prince had long feared he would.

FAILURE OF PRINCE MYSHKIN

Prince Myshkin’s attempts to practice Christian love and humility failed because the real world in which he found himself was unable to accept his love. In many ways, The Idiot foreshadows “The Legend of the Grand Inquisitor” in The Brothers Karamazov, where Christ, returning to the world during the time of the Inquisition in Spain, is arrested by the Grand Inquisitor and told that his teachings are dangerous and unsuitable for mankind. Just as Christ is told by the Grand Inquisitor to “go and come no more,” Prince Myshkin is utterly defeated and must return to the Swiss sanitarium in which he had spent his youth. The Idiot also reminds us of Don Quixote, Cervantes’ picaresque novel about a would-be knight in an age no longer chivalrous. Prince Myshkin, a Christian in a materialistic world, is just as out of place as Don Quixote.

MYSHKIN VERSUS ROGOZHIN

In Dostoyevsky’s first notes for The Idiot, the “idiot” was a character having both sublime good and diabolical evil contained in him. Eventually, the character became two, Prince Myshkin and Rogozhin. Dostoyevsky’s interest in the “split personality” (of the Dr. Jekyl and Mr. Hyde type, although ...