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The Idiot
by Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Constance Garnett , Joseph Frank , Anna Brailovsky
by Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Constance Garnett , Joseph Frank , Anna Brailovsky
I love how Dostoevsky's plots are driven not by external circumstances but by the internal workings of his characters' minds, and the choices they make.
There were a few times when I actually slammed my book angrily against a table or wall and yelling "you stupid a** what did you do that for???"...my paperback is now a little worse for wear.
People in this book make stupid choices, and their misery is primarily a result of these stupid choices. "The Idiot" refers not to The Prince's intellectual capacity but to his inability to understand and emulate the manipulative, multi-layered social interactions of the society he enters upon returning to Russia. Because everything he does is simple and straightforward, he comes off as an "idiot".
The forward says that this story is often interpeted as a Christ allegory... I have to say I had trouble seeing it. Dostoevsky claims to portray The Prince as a "purely beautful man" - the opposite of his "Crime and Punishment" protagonist. The Prince is almost infuriatingly humble and always apologizing for...sometimes I don't even know what he's apologizing for. Usually he ends up upsetting people for accidentally calling them out on being sleazy by asking what he thinks is an innocent question. So really he has nothing to apologize for but all he can understand is that he's offended someone. What really ticked me off was how at the end, when he actually DID do something stupid, he obviously regretted his decision but still persisted in it, and expected everyone he had hurt to just understand. NO. PRINCE - IF YOU KNOW SOMETHING IS STUPID, DON'T DO IT. IT'S YOUR OWN FAULT. YOU MADE A BAD CHOICE NOW DEAL WITH IT. End of rant.
While I do really, really love Dostoevsky he has always struck me as having an extremely external locus of control (yay psych 101). Instead of holding his characters responsible for their actions, he seems to feel like some external forces are driving them to misery when clearly it is their own choices and attitudes. It's like a multi-layered psychological study.
I'm done now this review is far too long.
There were a few times when I actually slammed my book angrily against a table or wall and yelling "you stupid a** what did you do that for???"...my paperback is now a little worse for wear.
People in this book make stupid choices, and their misery is primarily a result of these stupid choices. "The Idiot" refers not to The Prince's intellectual capacity but to his inability to understand and emulate the manipulative, multi-layered social interactions of the society he enters upon returning to Russia. Because everything he does is simple and straightforward, he comes off as an "idiot".
The forward says that this story is often interpeted as a Christ allegory... I have to say I had trouble seeing it. Dostoevsky claims to portray The Prince as a "purely beautful man" - the opposite of his "Crime and Punishment" protagonist. The Prince is almost infuriatingly humble and always apologizing for...sometimes I don't even know what he's apologizing for. Usually he ends up upsetting people for accidentally calling them out on being sleazy by asking what he thinks is an innocent question. So really he has nothing to apologize for but all he can understand is that he's offended someone. What really ticked me off was how at the end, when he actually DID do something stupid, he obviously regretted his decision but still persisted in it, and expected everyone he had hurt to just understand. NO. PRINCE - IF YOU KNOW SOMETHING IS STUPID, DON'T DO IT. IT'S YOUR OWN FAULT. YOU MADE A BAD CHOICE NOW DEAL WITH IT. End of rant.
While I do really, really love Dostoevsky he has always struck me as having an extremely external locus of control (yay psych 101). Instead of holding his characters responsible for their actions, he seems to feel like some external forces are driving them to misery when clearly it is their own choices and attitudes. It's like a multi-layered psychological study.
I'm done now this review is far too long.
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