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ذكريات من بيت الموتى

Fyodor Dostoyevsky

4.05 · Rating details · 20,674 ratings · 1,450 reviews

رواية شهيرة للاديب الروسي الكبير فيودور ديستويفسكي(1821-1881)البارع في التحليل النفسي في رواياته... تناول فيها جزءا من سيرته الذاتية اثناء النفي الى اصقاع سيبيريا الباردة جدا وفيه يعيش الانسان في بيئة صعبة جدا...ومن المصادفات الشخصية مروري بنفس الحياة بعد الانتهاء من الرواية بفترة قصيرة ولذلك دائما اذكرها وهي دلالة على معاناة الانسان من الظلم الذي يقع عليه من جراء اختلاف ا ...more

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Jul 11, 2008 Ahmad Sharabiani rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction, 19th-century, novels, classics, literature, russia, listening

Записки из Мёртвого дома = Zapiski iz Myortvovo doma= Souvenirs de Ia maison des morts = The House of the Dead = Memoirs from the House of The Dead, Fyodor Dostoyevsky

The House of the Dead is a semi-autobiographical novel published in 1860–2 in the journal Vremya by Russian author Fyodor Dostoevsky, which portrays the life of convicts in a Siberian prison camp. The novel has also been published under the titles Memoirs from the House of The Dead, Notes from the Dead House (or Notes from a Dead H ...more

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May 05, 2014 Vit Babenco rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Cancel my subscription to the resurrection… Send my credentials to the house of detention…

Our prison was at the far end of the citadel behind the ramparts. Peering through the crevices in the palisade in the hope of glimpsing something, one sees nothing but a little corner of the sky, and a high earthwork covered with the long grass of the steppe. Night and day sentries walk to and fro upon it. Then one suddenly realizes that whole years will pass during which one will see, through those same cr

Cancel my subscription to the resurrection… Send my credentials to the house of detention…

Our prison was at the far end of the citadel behind the ramparts. Peering through the crevices in the palisade in the hope of glimpsing something, one sees nothing but a little corner of the sky, and a high earthwork covered with the long grass of the steppe. Night and day sentries walk to and fro upon it. Then one suddenly realizes that whole years will pass during which one will see, through those same crevices in the palisade, the same sentinels pacing the same earthwork, and the same little corner of the sky, not just above the prison, but far and far away.

The House of the Dead is the chronicle of a prison camp, coming straight from the horse’s mouth, so to speak. The prison camp is shown as a world within the world – a hermetic community of the strictest hierarchy, living by its own severe cruel criminal laws.
And on the language side The House of the Dead is one of the lushest books by Fyodor Dostoyevsky.

The criminals most cruelly whipped, and who were celebrated as first-rate villains, enjoyed more respect and attention than a simple deserter, a mere recruit, like the one who had just been brought in. But in neither case was any particular sympathy manifested, nor were any annoying remarks made. The unhappy man was attended to in silence, above all if he was incapable of attending to himself. The assistant-surgeon knew that they were entrusting their patients to skilful and experienced hands. The usual treatment consisted in frequent application to the poor fellow’s back of a shirt or piece of linen steeped in cold water. It was also necessary to extract from his wounds the splinters of the rods which had been broken on his back. This last operation was particularly painful to the victims, and the extraordinary stoicism with which they supported their sufferings astonished me greatly.

I am sure that this gloomy experience of incarceration eventually allowed Fyodor Dostoyevsky to penetrate the human nature right to the bottom and to peruse all the darkest nooks and crannies of human consciousness. ...more

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Mar 07, 2012 Mohit Parikh rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: paradigm-shifters-sacred, stillness-in-fiction, russian

I have been frequenting an open-air restaurant for 7 years now. Hiding on the roof of a rickety building, in one of the small tributaries of the Jaipur's busiest road, it is aptly named Cocoon. The place is shady, unknown, and visited only by international tourists living in its cheap guest-house.
Nothing unusual seemed to happen at that place and nothing unusual did happen the last time I visited it: I drank two cups of hot lemon tea, I followed short arcs sketched by listless eagles in the even I have been frequenting an open-air restaurant for 7 years now. Hiding on the roof of a rickety building, in one of the small tributaries of the Jaipur's busiest road, it is aptly named Cocoon. The place is shady, unknown, and visited only by international tourists living in its cheap guest-house.
Nothing unusual seemed to happen at that place and nothing unusual did happen the last time I visited it: I drank two cups of hot lemon tea, I followed short arcs sketched by listless eagles in the evening sky, I breathed in volumes of busy city smoke; but while leaving for home, as I turned on the ignition key of my bike, I caught hold of a loud, clear, distinct feeling. It was so distinct that I did not know at first what it was trying to convey; that is to say, my natural thinking process had reverted to a background noise and I could only listen with attention to the wordless outwardly buzz around my ears and inside my chest, which seemed to be growing... keener and keener. I stood motionless for a second or two, and then, a picture of a shop flashed inside the head. I turned my head to find the same shop in the ground floor of that building. 7 years and I had never once noticed that shop! From across the street, it appeared to be a wholesaler's office, with its glass partition displaying drawing and craft notebooks, paper-thin local guides to health and fitness, bedroom life, and tourism in Rajasthan. Curious, however, I trudged towards the store, my attention fixed mostly on that outwardly buzz which I wasn’t hearing – if it can be called hearing – for the first time.
The store was large and largely empty. Two men were gossiping in the middle of the room across an unbalanced wooden table, which, helped by either one’s dangling feet, made a rhythmic thud-thud. It stopped abruptly: the thud-thud, and the the gossiping too, and they looked up surprised to find a visitor. I caught their amazed disoriented gaze, but, to avoid any verbal distractions, I looked towards a shelf on my immediate right. I was at once stunned.
Dostoyevsky, Turgenev, Pasternak, Gibran... hard copy editions of rarest of their works, thick with time and grime, casually stacked together in a single shelf. With my mouth half open, I plugged out 10 titles, not once leafing through them, not once checking the blurb, and plopped the bulk on the owner's creaking desk.
He too was excited but he concealed it, and overcharged me. I did not cross-check the MRP nor did I request for a discount; he may have charged me even more and I would have happily emptied my wallet. Such was my state! I felt unworldly. What did it matter which books I was buying, at what price and who from? Trifles! Mere trifles. What mattered was that I see through the task, witness what I was being shown, stay ‘connected’. The buzzing humming feeling had now enlarged and transmuted into a quietude donning my whole being – not the other way round. I returned home after a short ride, but I was now proud for some reason and happy; the quietude only a memory, an object for analysis. For rationalizations. I dusted the books, and arranged them neatly on my desk, as if they were sacred idols I was going to worship every day.
For 6 months I did not go to them: laziness, thoughtlessness, fear. The books would change me somehow, I knew, and I wasn't too prepared to let go of whatever they may ask me to let go of. No, not unless the sentries of my rational mind were welcoming and unsuspicious.
And here now I am, reading, having read. Something indeed did happen. Something unidentifiable. But what exactly did the book do? So that my intellect does not become restless, I will give it a word to chew over and flaunt. Not the same word Leo Tolstoy used for this work: edifying; not the same word that settled on my mind for Dostoyevsky’s influence on an aspiring writer: uncorrupting; but: purging. The book purged me, emptied me, humbled me; cleaned me of the grime I had gathered over time.
This book is sacred.
...more

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May 13, 2018 Steven Godin rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: classic-fiction, history, russia-ukraine

"During the first weeks, and naturally the early part of my imprisonment, made a deep impression on my imagination. The following years on the other hand are all mixed up together, and leave but a confused recollection. Certain epochs of this life are even effaced from my memory. I have kept one general impression of it though, always the same; painful, monotonous, stifling. What I saw in experience during the first few days of imprisonment seems to me as if it had all taken place yesterday. Suc "During the first weeks, and naturally the early part of my imprisonment, made a deep impression on my imagination. The following years on the other hand are all mixed up together, and leave but a confused recollection. Certain epochs of this life are even effaced from my memory. I have kept one general impression of it though, always the same; painful, monotonous, stifling. What I saw in experience during the first few days of imprisonment seems to me as if it had all taken place yesterday. Such was the case"

These words arrive quite early on, and set the scene for Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s extraordinary, heartened, semi-fictional account of the internment he endured in a Siberian prison camp after being sentenced to four years of hard labour for his involvement in a revolutionary conspiracy. Dostoyevsky completed this work six years after his release, and across its two main sections you can feel him organising his memories, vividly revising them, and struggling to get them down before they fade. Under the circumstances, he did a remarkable job, after all, I am sure he would rather have written about something else, but his experiences are that important, he simply had to get it down on paper. Few books give such a vivid picture of the sort of setting from which many great works of prison literature emerge, the power of certain writing done from prison has to do with the way it alternatively staves off and gives rein to restlessness, fervour, and desperation. Dostoyevsky’s narrator insists even the most docile prisoners sometimes need an anguished, convulsive recklessly hopeful display of personality.

Most of the book’s action revolves around the convicts attempts to make room for some colour and change in their days, but this is obviously limited, card games, knife fights, thefts, drinking sprees, escape attempts, holiday celebrations, a play, anything to stop madness setting setting in. But the most dramatic such attempt in the novel is the shape of the narrative itself. Alexander Petrovich is a bit of a sloppy storyteller. He keeps filling in background information belatedly, as many of the novel’s chapters are really loose assemblages of anecdotes and essayistic fragments. In a way, 'The House of the Dead is constantly at odds with its subject matter; wherever the narrative calls for a dreary roll call of routine tasks and daily humiliations, the book darts off, digresses or swerves to the side. Which makes me ask the question, why didn't Dostoyevsky just write an out and out autobiographical account of his experience?

This felt to me like a brother version of Solzhenitsyn’s 'One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich', but with less of the bleak, fully clear, almost documentary-style narrative. To be fair, the book moves around genres really well, shifting fluidly between fiction, philosophical meditation, and memoir. I was expecting something more hard-hitting, and emotionally draining from the reader's perspective, that would long live in the memory, but it fell short of this. There are however, for Dostoyevsky fans plenty of lovely philosophical musings, where the narrator ponders the nature of freedom and the importance of hope, the inequality of punishments for the same crime, the gap between appearance and reality, the nature of free will, and other heavy themes.

To me, it was like standing just outside the prison gates getting a glimpse, rather than truly feeling the blood, sweat, and tears from within. Very well written (it's Dostoyevsky after all), just not entirely what I had hoped for. ...more

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Jun 30, 2016 Amalia Gkavea rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: russia, european-heritage, european-literature, russian-literature, classics, 19th-century

“Tyranny is a habit which may be developed until at last it becomes a disease. I declare that the noblest nature can become so hardened and bestial that nothing distinguishes it from that of a wild animal. Blood and power intoxicate; they help to develop callousness and debauchery. The mind then becomes capable of the most abnormal cruelty, which it regards pleasure; the man and the citizen are swallowed up in the tyrant; and the return to human dignity, repentance, moral resurrection, become ...more

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Jul 10, 2015 Darwin8u rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 2015

"What I have said of servitude, I again say of imprisonment, we are all prisoners. What is our life but a prison? We are all imprisoned in an island. The world itself to some men is a prison, our narrow seas as so many ditches, and when they have compassed the globe of the earth, they would fain go see what is done in the moon."

- Robert Burton, Anatomy of Melancholy: S2.3.4

description

Not top-half Dostoevsky, but a must read still. This book (and Dostoevsky's four years in Siberia) are an obvious rough draf "What I have said of servitude, I again say of imprisonment, we are all prisoners. What is our life but a prison? We are all imprisoned in an island. The world itself to some men is a prison, our narrow seas as so many ditches, and when they have compassed the globe of the earth, they would fain go see what is done in the moon."

- Robert Burton, Anatomy of Melancholy: S2.3.4

description

Not top-half Dostoevsky, but a must read still. This book (and Dostoevsky's four years in Siberia) are an obvious rough draft to his later GREAT novels (Crime & Punishment, The Brothers Karamazov, etc). Even without the early draft qualities of this novel, 'Notes from a Dead House' is a critical novel. This novel IS the godfather of all prison memoir/novels. Orange might be the new black, but the Big D was there first. Actually, it is probably worth a few minutes exploring the similarities between OITNB and 'Notes from a Dead House'. Both explore how prison impacts those who are sent there, the way people survive, the things that drive people mad inside, the things that are core about being human within an environment meant to limit the very essence of humanness, how punishment is relative, etc, and ad nauseam.

description

I think the brilliance of prison writing is the way it can be used as a microcosm of life. We are all trapped by something. Nihil enim refert, rerum sis servus an hominum (“It matters little whether we are enslaved by men or things.”). We are all controlled by something, tortured by someone, addicted to vice, sin, or our own fears. Exploring the idea of prison and prisoners can open us up to not just the difficulties we all face, but the way(s) we can survive life's fetters, our body's constraints, the darkness of this mortal coil. Dostoevsky give us hints. Dreams, hope, faith, purpose and relationships all allowed him to survive his four years in Siberia. Those same characteristics increase the odds that not only will we survive our incarceration on this Earth, but we might even grow fond of it and find beauty and love in the process. ...more

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Dec 14, 2011 Sean rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: read-in-2012, 19th-century, russian

Prison Life in Siberia. It is a phrase synonymous with misery and suffering. Below zero temperatures. Hard labor. Isolation. Physical punishment. It is everything that reminds me of how fortunate I am to be reading Dostoyevsky’s semi-autobiographical work instead of actually living it. It paints an image of prison life that is a hundred times more primitive than many of the lazy country club prisons of today’s western world. Just how bad was it in 19th century Siberia? My curiosity found this no Prison Life in Siberia. It is a phrase synonymous with misery and suffering. Below zero temperatures. Hard labor. Isolation. Physical punishment. It is everything that reminds me of how fortunate I am to be reading Dostoyevsky’s semi-autobiographical work instead of actually living it. It paints an image of prison life that is a hundred times more primitive than many of the lazy country club prisons of today’s western world. Just how bad was it in 19th century Siberia? My curiosity found this novel irresistible. I just had to find out what this lifestyle was in a bygone time in a country that has had a very troubled and complicated past. I was ready to enter the House of the Dead.

description

In 1849, Fyodor Dostoyevsky was accused of reading and distributing several banned works of literature and subsequently sentenced to prison by the Russian government to four years hard labor in Siberia followed by mandatory military service. During this time the writer experienced unendurable hardship. His experience of this period inspired him to write a work of fiction that brought this previously unknown world to light. After his release from prison he penned a work that would become the first work that would describe in vivid detail the horrors of his four excruciatingly long years in the awful Siberian prison.

description

Dostoyevsky portrays a very realistic and expressive account of his earliest impressions of entering prison life. He introduces the fictional narrator of Alexander Petrovitch, who classifies himself as a “gentleman of the noble class” of Russians much like Dostoyevsky himself. The author touches upon many different aspects of life in the prison. He describes the work schedule, the food, the living conditions, the punishment, the sick hospital all with distinct detail.

A very large focus of Fyodor’s narrative is his examination of the Russian character. It is unclear if any of the other prisoners described are based on actual convicts that Dostoyevsky knew during his incarceration. However, he provides a very interesting account of the attitudes and behaviors of several characters who have adapted to life of punishment and isolation.

description

Overall, Dostoyevsky has written one of his most personal and realistic works that is definitely worth reading. It is among some of his shorter works and gets passed up for his four elephants, Crime and Punishment, Brothers Karamazov, The Idiot, and Demons. However, this work should not be ignored. It has excellent writing and is recommended for anyone interested in this unusual and primitive world.
...more

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Apr 11, 2020 Piyangie rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: russian-lit

"Here there is a world's apart, unlike everything else, with laws of its own, its own dress, its own manners and customs, and here is the house of the living dead - life as nowhere else and a people apart." And the story of this living dead is what Dostoevsky brings to us readers. Based loosely on his own prison experience, this semi-autobiographical novel chronicles the ten-year prison life of Alexander Petrovich in a Siberian prison.

The story begins with "gentleman" Alexander's arrival at the "Here there is a world's apart, unlike everything else, with laws of its own, its own dress, its own manners and customs, and here is the house of the living dead - life as nowhere else and a people apart." And the story of this living dead is what Dostoevsky brings to us readers. Based loosely on his own prison experience, this semi-autobiographical novel chronicles the ten-year prison life of Alexander Petrovich in a Siberian prison.

The story begins with "gentleman" Alexander's arrival at the prison which overflows with the peasant community. From the beginning, he is an outsider in every possible way. Imagine, leaving one's own country, surrendering one's liberty and coming into a prison to serve a ten-year term of penal servitude just to face the cold and unfriendly multitude of peasants; how alone one must feel. The wide gap between the gentry and the peasants in the free world is also preserved in this confined world.

Alexander's mental suffering is acute, for the surrounding is too harsh for his gentlemanly breeding and his intelligence. But he has no choice except to endure the suffering for ten long years amidst a handful of gentlemen and multitude of peasants. He has to prepare him mentally to acquiesce this new life. It is by no means easy. Alexander details his first year in prison which is the hardest of all years. The loathing of the surroundings, his agony at having to live daily in stifling condition, at his distress at the unfriendliness of the fellow convicts leave him ill. It is a painful and melancholy account. With time, he reconciles with his condemned life and earns a few friendly acquaintances.

Alexander's observation of the convicted peasants helps him to acquire a good understanding of them. The prejudice he entertained as a gentry against them slowly evaporates as he learns to appreciate their simplicity and good-naturedness. His study of their characters brings to the chronicle a true account of the thoughts and conduct of the peasant class.

The chronicle also details to some extent the nature of corporal punishment and the general conduct of the prison officers. The corporal punishment was cruel and inhumane and it was a painful knowledge to know that at some point in our history such punishment was thought as just. Being something of a reign of its own, certain commanding officers tended to be tyrants. But generally, according to Alexander's account, the officers were considerate of the convicts.

The ten years Alexander spent in prison helps him reflect on the true meaning of life and important values of life. His perception of life and liberty alters, and he leaves the life of the "living dead" a wise man eager to begin his new life. "Freedom, new life, resurrection from the dead...What a glorious moment!"

Reading this melancholy account of Alexander Petrovich made me realize that we too are globally undergoing a similar situation due to the pandemic. We don't live in a "house of dead" of course, but our free movement is restricted. Liberty is curtailed to some extent. Perhaps, it is time for us to reflect on the important things of our lives as Alexander did and to bask in the glory the new resurrected life will bring when the freedom is fully restored to us. ...more

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Aug 22, 2014 E. G. rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: translated, fiction, 5-star, own, russia-ukraine, dostoyevsky

Translator's Introduction

--The House of the Dead

Notes
Chronology
Further Reading
...more

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Aug 26, 2017 Tara rated it really liked it · review of another edition

This intelligently written book was full of details taken from the actual Siberian prison experience of Dostoevsky himself. It contained a fair amount of that deep psychological insight Dostoevsky is known for. His position as an outsider (nobleman) was often painful, and he described in detail how that loneliness wears on one. This is the case though one is never actually physically alone in prison, which, as he points out, is another reason that kind of life is so hellish.

Also, his analyses of This intelligently written book was full of details taken from the actual Siberian prison experience of Dostoevsky himself. It contained a fair amount of that deep psychological insight Dostoevsky is known for. His position as an outsider (nobleman) was often painful, and he described in detail how that loneliness wears on one. This is the case though one is never actually physically alone in prison, which, as he points out, is another reason that kind of life is so hellish.

Also, his analyses of his fellow prisoners were generally superb. In my opinion, one of the funniest descriptions in the book concerned a rather odd hospital patient: “Having finished sneezing, he opened the handkerchief, attentively examined the abundant phlegm accumulated in it, and immediately smeared it on his brown hospital robe, so that all the phlegm remained on the robe, while the handkerchief was only left a little damp. He did that for the whole week.” Bizarre, right?

Another prisoner I enjoyed hearing about was Petrov. I loved how he “…became very devoted to [the narrator], though he never stopped stealing from [the narrator] on every suitable occasion. He did it without any embarrassment, almost unconsciously, as if out of duty, and it was impossible to be angry with him.” He was said to steal almost “inadvertently.” What a great description, and what a fascinating character!

Their pet eagle was also pretty neat: “Solitary and angry, he awaited death, trusting no one and making peace with no one.”

I shall conclude with some of Dostoevsky’s more intriguing quotes regarding human nature:

“Man is a creature who gets used to everything, and that, I think, is the best definition of him.”

“I may be mistaken, but it seems to me that you can know a man by his laughter, and if from the first encounter you like the laughter of some completely unknown person, you may boldly say that he is a good man.”

“Each man of us was so gloomy and vain that he had contempt for anyone who was kind and without vanity.”

“However, here I am now trying to sort our whole prison into categories; but is that possible? Reality is infinitely diverse compared to all, even the most clever, conclusions of abstract thought, and does not suffer sharp and big distinctions. Reality tends towards fragmentation…”

A truly insightful, thought-provoking book! ...more

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Sep 16, 2011 Rakhi Dalal rated it really liked it · review of another edition

The first question that intrigued me the instant I laid my eyes on the book was, “Why the name House of the Dead?” Particularly, why the word “Dead” for convicts? Is it

(a) Because the life that convicts lived was supposedly the worst ever?
(b) Because their presence didn't actually matter in this world, and hence, they might better be dead?
(c) Or for the reason that they possessed character not fit to be possessed by common people (people possibly more human?)?

I wondered, and hoped to find the ...more

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Jan 31, 2018 Elie F rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: russian

This is not Dostoyevsky's most memorable work, but a must-read for anyone interested in Dostoyevsky the man. Dostoyevsky usually distances himself from his work, which is still the case in The House of the Dead as he creates the narrator Goryanchikov, but this experience of exile in Siberia is no doubt his own.

This is a book about collective psychological portraits, and every single character is so complicated that Dostoyevsky's observations and comments often contradict themselves, which make ...more

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Feb 25, 2017 Magdalen rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: russian-roulette

A very autobiographical novel of Dostoyevsky, which at first i read in greek and boy the translation was the worst.. Thank God I switched to an english one otherwise I would have disliked it for no particular reason.

Για όσους ενδιαφέρονται να το διαβάσουν αποφύγετε την έκδοση από τις εκδόσεις Δαμιανός. Δεν έχω συναντήσει χειρότερη επιμέλεια . Ένα βιβλίο γεμάτο γραμματικά και ορθογραφικά λάθη, συν το γεγονός ότι έλειπαν κομμάτια από το πρωτότυπο. Το λιγότερο απαράδεκτο.

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Jan 16, 2018 Felek rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

The fetters fell off. I picked them up. I wanted to hold them in my hand, to look at them for the last time. I seemed already to be wondering that they could have been on my legs a minute before.
"well, with God's blessing, with God's blessing!" said the convicts in coarse, abrupt voices, in which, however, there was a note of pleasure.
Yes, with God's blessing! Freedom, new life, resurrection from the dead... What a glorious moment!

I enjoyed the first part of the book more, the second part got ...more

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Jan 22, 2012 David Sarkies rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Recommends it for: Those who like prison stories

Shelves: dark

A prison story - Gulag style
3 February 2012

This is one of those very rare books where I read the first two sentences and know instantly that I was going to love it. The House of the Dead is one of the post-imprisonment books that Dostoevsky wrote, and in short, it is the story of a man sentenced to ten years imprisonment for the murder of his wife. The story is set in 19th Century Russia during the reign of the Czars and imprisonment pretty much meant exile to the frozen wastes of Siberia. Furt A prison story - Gulag style
3 February 2012

This is one of those very rare books where I read the first two sentences and know instantly that I was going to love it. The House of the Dead is one of the post-imprisonment books that Dostoevsky wrote, and in short, it is the story of a man sentenced to ten years imprisonment for the murder of his wife. The story is set in 19th Century Russia during the reign of the Czars and imprisonment pretty much meant exile to the frozen wastes of Siberia. Further, even if one was not imprisoned in one of the 'Special Divisons' (the camp in which this book is set), one is still imprisoned not only by the vast emptiness and frozen wastes of Siberia, but also due to the fact one once one has been sent there, unless special dispensation was granted by the Czars, one would never leave Siberia. In many ways it mimics the method of incarceration by the British in the 18th and 19th Centuries, where convicts would be sent out to the colonies and one would only return on pain of death.

Dostoevsky did spend four years in one of the Gulags, and it was only by the grace of the ruling Czar that he was allowed to return. His crime was being involved with a socialist group connected with the intelligensia of Russia. While his group was not necessarily violent in nature, there were a number of violent revolutionary groups in Russia at the time and Dostoevsky happened to get caught up in the purges. Prior too his imprisonment Dostoevsky had already made his mark as a writer, however many of his pieces were pretty much overlooked. It was not until he returned from exile (as is the case with many other writers) that he went on to write his classics, such as the Brothers Karamazov and Crime and Punishment (a bit of which I will discuss here).

However, this is not an autobiographical novel. Dostoevsky does not write about his experiences, but the experiences of a fictional character. Maybe it was a form of self-censorship: by writing about a fictional character he would be less likely to attract unwanted attention from the powers that be. By writing a true story about life in the Gulags could easily have brought trouble upon himself. As such, by writing a fictional account he could easily say that the events in the book never actually happened, however he was using his experiences to outline what life was like in the gulags.

The House of Death is not a continuous story but rather jumps all over the place. It is not a linear narrative that intends to tell a story, but rather written as the thoughts and recollections of the narrator. There is a large section at the beginning where he describes his first experiences in the Gulag, but as time drags on everything tends to settle down. As such, he ends up focusing on the characters, and descriptions of everyday life. Obviously it is the first section where he is learning and discovering about life in the gulag that brings out the most detail.

Dostoevsky discusses punishment in the book, and I suspect that it is a glimpse into what he intended to write with regards to his book Crime and Punishment (however at this stage I have not read the book so can't comment beyond speculation, though a quick look on Wikipedia suggests that it is not). His argument here is that while in some cases punishment may appear consistent with a crime, depending on the culprit, it is not. For instance, if a peasant were to murder somebody, and be sentenced to ten years in the Gulag, he would not be too concerned as life both before and after the sentence was harsh, and in some ways, life in the Gulag is better because at least one is fed (barely), clothed, and given shelter. However, for one of the elite to be punished for the same crime in the same way, the punishment is much harsher, since all of the luxuries and benefits of his class is taken away from him. In fact it is very much the same today as there is actually a class of people who, if released from prison, will immediately go an commit a crime so that they can return simply because life in prison is so much easier.

Dostoevsky is very detailed in the book, with everything from the food, the beds, to life in the hospital, the festive period of Christmas, and details on the rare showers that the prisoners might have. When we enter the prison, we hear about how money exists, but is generally kept hidden from the guards, how trades people will go and perform their trades, and be paid for them, while others work in the work gangs. We learn of food and vodka being smuggled into the prison, and of prisoners becoming exceedingly violent while under the influence. We also learn that all books, with the exception of the New Testament, are banned.

I guess the book finishes off in the same way that it begins. At the opening we are told that it is about life in the Gulag, and how he survived, and by the end we see that he survived. He is finally released, and taken to the blacksmith to have his fetters removed. Once free, Dostoevsky writes 'Freedom, new life, resurrection from the dead … what a glorious moment!'. ...more

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Jan 15, 2017 Elizabeth (Alaska) rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: classics, nineteenth-century, 19thc-read, russia

Dostoyevsky spent four years in a Siberian prison as a political prisoner for having read works banned by the government. It is from this experience that he penned The House of the Dead. It is classed as fiction, but it feels as if it lies somewhere in the gray area between fiction and nonfiction. It is written in the first person from the perspective of a man sentenced to 10 years hard labor for having murdered his unfaithful wife. Through Aleksandr Petrovich's eyes, we see prison life and lear Dostoyevsky spent four years in a Siberian prison as a political prisoner for having read works banned by the government. It is from this experience that he penned The House of the Dead. It is classed as fiction, but it feels as if it lies somewhere in the gray area between fiction and nonfiction. It is written in the first person from the perspective of a man sentenced to 10 years hard labor for having murdered his unfaithful wife. Through Aleksandr Petrovich's eyes, we see prison life and learn something about the convicts with whom he is surrounded.

The book is not a novel, but doesn't fit short stories either. It is a series of anecdotes and vignettes. Convicts and their interactions with each other are described. I thought often how Dostoyevsky must have used his observations of these different men as he penned his novels - and they were as different from each other as any other men in the normal walk of life.

These men, exiles for and from life, seemed to be either in a perpetual smouldering agitation, or else in deep depression; but there was not one who had not his own everyday ideas about one thing and another. That restlessness which, if it did not come to the surface, was still unmistakable; those vague hopes which the poor creatures entertained in spite of themselves, hopes so ill founded that they were more like the illusions of approaching insanity than anything else; all stamped the place with a character, an originality, peculiarly its own. One could not but feel that there was nothing like it anywhere else in the world. Everybody moved in a sort of waking dream; nor was there anything to relieve or qualify the impression made by the place on each man’s personality. All seemed to suffer from a sort of remote hypersensitivity, and this dreaming of impossibilities gave to the majority of the convicts a sombre and morose aspect for which the word morbid is not strong enough.

The edition I read was translated by Constance Garnett. I don't know how good are her translations, but I have read more than one, and she makes the text quite readable. I think she must have worked hard at it, as there was at least one phrase in this where her footnote was that the Russian was truly untranslatable.

I'm more likely to remember this only for the background that it gives me other works by this author. One of the most striking things of note is the value placed on freedom, seen through the lens of its denial. I was hoping for more story, as much as I liked this. I find myself thinking there is a difference to me between 3- and 4-stars and I can't quite bring myself to give this the smaller number. ...more

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Mar 27, 2018 P.E. rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: russian-literature, testimony

A noteworthy account of the prison system in tsarist Russia. The foreword delves on the punitive methods in use in the tsarist regime and the soviet regime.

'Dostoevsky's Russia is already that of Stalin, Beria, Vychinski, of the great trials when the accused rivaled in contrition and confessions before their prosecutors'

Gnossienne n°3, Lent de Erik Satie - played by Noriko Ogawa

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Une visite mémorable de l'univers carcéral de la Russie tsariste. La préface fait un point intéressant sur les ...more

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Oct 05, 2016 Linous rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: owned, favorites, classics, fyodor

**
Whenever I hear the name Fyodor, the first thought that comes in my mind is "Man of True Emotions". An expert in picturizing the detailed mind of his characters.His writing is thought provoking ,not for a moment but for later pondering as well. Without addressing the reader directly, the reader acknowledges their deeper nakedness hidden behind the clothes of sophistication, this uniqueness of his style is marvelous.

This is an easy read compared to his other works even though its not any less ...more

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May 30, 2008 Cecily rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: classics, russia

"Novel" (but reads like memoirs) based on his experiences in a Siberian hard labour camp.

Also shades of Robinson Crusoe: self-assurance of his own superiority and the pragmatic and ingenious approach to making the best of things, coupled with earnest self improvement and positive spin (eg "I also particularly enjoyed shovelling snow" - really!?).

Although the conditions were dire, there were some unexpected (to me) freedoms and comforts, and some wry humour, so it's brighter than Kafka in many ...more

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Nov 06, 2017 Jim rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: russia, fiction, 19th-century-lit

This is the third time I have read The House of the Dead by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. I not only love Dostoyevsky, but I am also fond of Russian and Soviet prison literature, including such works as Alexander Solzhenitsyn's and Varlam Shalamov's.

Dostoyevsky belonged to a political group known as the Petrashevsky Circle, whose members were rounded up, imprisoned, and sentenced to death by firing squad. Except that the firing squad was a fake, and the members of the Circle were packed off to Siberia. Do ...more

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Dec 21, 2015 Ali rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: russia, pre-19th-century, dostoevsky

Lately I have been wondering about the reason that made me start reading Dostoevsky's "Crime and punishment"; it was my first book, and also my first literal work ever. This book was what motivated me to read more of his writings, and more literal work, basically it's the main reason why I love literature. Although I had forgotten what made me read it in the first place, it wasn't until I read a verse again of an Arabic poet on Facebook that says "While waiting for you, I can't wait for you ... Lately I have been wondering about the reason that made me start reading Dostoevsky's "Crime and punishment"; it was my first book, and also my first literal work ever. This book was what motivated me to read more of his writings, and more literal work, basically it's the main reason why I love literature. Although I had forgotten what made me read it in the first place, it wasn't until I read a verse again of an Arabic poet on Facebook that says "While waiting for you, I can't wait for you ... I can't read Dostoevsky or listen to Maria Callas or... (translated)" but wait.. It occurred to be that the verse wasn't my main reason to start reading, its the person who posted the verse.

It all happened year and a half ago , when I had this crush over a girl, we are both the same major and so once day I told her about my feelings, then we took a one week vacation off college, so she told that she would give me an answer when we see each other face to face (it was a mistake to tell her over a text on what's app, but i had my reasons). I remember being completely lost that week trying to figure out whether she might have the same feelings or not, and so on for the rest of the week. And well, during that week she posted that verse, which meant for me, in my own interpretation, that she's desperately waiting to see me. I remember that I read it thousand times just because she wrote it, but now after the incident I honestly don't know if it was addressed to me or not, because when I saw her, she told me that I'm a true friend and she doesn't think that our friendship would work out being something more than that. Of course it wasn't easy for me back then, but well, she's probably the reason that I started reading, she's the reason why I started reading classics. That verse meant that Dostoevsky is so important for the poet, it made me curios about him, which led me to do a little research about him and found out that "crime and punishment" is his most popular novel, so I downloaded it as free PDF and started reading it, and ever since then I've been hooked. The other good thing is that I found out few months later that she loves Paulo Coehlo, and I thank God that she didn't tell me about it before, because I think it would've been a disaster. ...more

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Jun 26, 2011 Jan-Maat added it · review of another edition

Shelves: 19th-century, russia-and-soviet-union, read-in-translation, dostoevsky, autobiography-memoir

Memoirs from the time that Dostoevsky spent in prison. To which he was sent in commutation of his death sentence for being part of the Petrashevsky circle. The press of prisoners forced together in a small bath house strikes him as a vision of hell. A Jewish prisoner impresses everyone by the intensity of his prayer. A man tells a story of how a robber lets a peasant go because he only had an onion on him only to be berated by his chief - 'you fool, you should have murdered him and taken the oni ...more

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Jan 29, 2010 MJ Nicholls rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction, borscht-and-kvass, tortured-artists, pre-1900s, oxford-classics

Poor bastard.

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Jan 16, 2021 Pinkyivan rated it really liked it · review of another edition

I haven't read Dostoevsky in maybe 5-6 years and the memory of his works has somewhat faded by now and I am quite pleased by the fact that he's as good as the impressions I remember. ...more

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Nov 22, 2020 Alan Allis rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: dostoyevsky, hall-of-fame-novels

Dostoyevsky, the best writer of all time. Let's see if that sentence resonates properly through this book.

- - -

Wow. This was amazing, I enjoyed every word of it. I felt that The House of the Dead was partly the author's autobiographical memoir. Dostoyevsky wrote about the prison because he knew it so well. Been there, done that. Also, from all Dostoyevsky's works that I have read (and I have read quite a few), this was the most modern one. I even stumbled across some I-guess-you-can-call-it stre ...more

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Aug 10, 2010 Erik Graff rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Recommends it for: everyone

Recommended to Erik by: Janny Marie Willis

Shelves: literature

This may well be the Dostoevsky book I most enjoyed reading. Although a kind of novel, it is based on the author's own four years of experiences in Siberian exile and has the ring of authenticity to it.

Dostoevsky had been exiled for his participation in the liberal Petrashevsky circle, a period during which he wrote his realistic Poor People. A young man, he had been, as we now say, scared shitless by the intentionally misleading prospect of execution and had himself undergone a spiritual conve ...more

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Nov 14, 2016 Michael Finocchiaro rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: read-in-french, novels, russian-19th-c, classics

This is such an extraordinary first-hand account of the 19th C Russian gulags in Siberia. Dostoyevsky transports his own experiences into this fictionalised account which shows the violence of the situation but the humanity that the prisoners hang on to despite everything. I felt that despite all the horrors, it was still uplifting at the end. Perhaps one to balance with reading The Orphan Master's Son which is sort of a 21st C interpretation in some ways (albeit not from first-hand experience i ...more

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Apr 02, 2017 Dimitri rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: classics, russia, fiction-in-translation

I love this story ever since I read a YA version of it. In its original form, I also get to immerse myself in the grim realities of tsarist Russia, with self-evident details for the contemporary reader that you need to learn about from scratch anno 2017 in order to get everything out of it. While it's not impossible to recount a prison sentence in diary form without descending into the mind-numbing repetitiveness that is the bane of the bars (see Paul Modrowski's defunct blog on the inside) , it I love this story ever since I read a YA version of it. In its original form, I also get to immerse myself in the grim realities of tsarist Russia, with self-evident details for the contemporary reader that you need to learn about from scratch anno 2017 in order to get everything out of it. While it's not impossible to recount a prison sentence in diary form without descending into the mind-numbing repetitiveness that is the bane of the bars (see Paul Modrowski's defunct blog on the inside) , it was a wise decision by Dtostoyevsky to use a thematic approach once the overwhelming impression of his first days had worn off. He openly admits his wish to avoid the tedious repetition which has already faded from memory.

It's undoubtedly popular fare with advocates of prison reform, but Dostojevski's humane view on the 'scum of the Earth' incarcerated in Siberia feels overdone on a few points: where are the truly callous criminals of the Vorovskoy Mir ? Where there none in his prison or are they simply left in the background as those prisoners who never accepted an aristocrat in their midst ? Where is the prison rape ? Did he have to leave that out not to offend 1862 sensibilities ?

While some of Dostojevski's autobiographical observations of prison life are only comprehensible to those knowledgeable about customs of Tsarist Russia, others resonate through the gulags down to the present day, as you can tell a lot about a society by observing its prisoners. I am no crusader for prison reform at heart, but one of his closing statements tugs a string: "And how much youth lay uselessly buried within those walls, what mighty powers were wasted here in vain! After all, one must tell the whole truth; these men were exceptional men...but their mighty energies were vainly wasted, wasted abnormally, unjustly, hopelessly. And who was to blame ?"

Some people deserve to have the key thrown away. Most can find contentment in the security of a regular life, even if they need to learn it behind bars first. ...more

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Apr 28, 2020 booklady rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: 2020, classic, political, historical-fiction

Excellent fictionalized account of Dostoyevsky's years in a Siberian prison camp. Listening to this while quarantined during the Lent of COVID-19 added to the ambiance. ...more

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Jan 30, 2014 Chrissie rated it liked it · review of another edition

Recommended to Chrissie by: dely

Shelves: 2014-read, audible, classics, bio, hf, soviet-union

ETA: For clarity’s sake – this is not a novel (with a plot you start and follow to the end), it is a very interesting report. See it as non-fiction.

****************************

Read this if you are interested in hearing a detailed account of life in a Siberian labor camp during the mid-1800s. After Dostoyevsky's mock execution in 1849, he instead was sent to a Siberian labor camp for four years. This book is written as fiction, but it is based on his real life experiences. It is detailed; it is ETA: For clarity’s sake – this is not a novel (with a plot you start and follow to the end), it is a very interesting report. See it as non-fiction.

****************************

Read this if you are interested in hearing a detailed account of life in a Siberian labor camp during the mid-1800s. After Dostoyevsky's mock execution in 1849, he instead was sent to a Siberian labor camp for four years. This book is written as fiction, but it is based on his real life experiences. It is detailed; it is factual; it is amazingly enough written with utter detachment. It is an exposé of what happened there in the camp: the food, the sleeping arrangements, the different classes of people, escape attempts, holiday celebrations, jobs allotted and the people -peasant convicts and upper-class prisoners, political dissidents and murders. The crime of the convicts varied largely but the punishment was the same although for different lengths of time. Incarceration, loss of freedom and unbelievably hard conditions is what they all faced. It was the House of the Dead!

Dostoyevsky makes up a story where a fictitious man's notes, a prisoner accused of killing his wife, are edited and presented to us in this document, the document which is this book. Occasionally the editor leaves comments in the notes we are reading. Keep in mind the notes themselves are supposedly written by the fictitious prisoner, while what they really are is Dostoyevsky's own experiences. Kind of a complicated set-up, wouldn't you say?!

There is a lot of discussion about the different classes of people in the camp. This is because D himself felt discriminated against due to his own high class when he was imprisoned. He was always lonely, he was never accepted as being one of the other convicts; he never was accepted as a comrade. There were far fewer of the upper-class gentlemen incarcerated. Dostoyevsky was imprisoned for political reasons, for being a member of the Petrashevsky Circle. One result of this loneliness was his appreciation of the animals in the camp? No, they were not allowed but they were there: a few dogs, a goat, an eagle. One dog, well he became lining for a pair of shoes....... What is going on in prisoners' heads is analyzed and analyzed and analyzed. I am warning you. Some people may go nuts with all the analysis, but the facts are interesting.

Besides what each prisoner is assigned to do in the day, to mentally survive, each must find an occupation for their free time at night when locked in the barracks. Remember they are all fettered, and cramped, and hungry and dirty and crawling with bugs. You might forge passports, or make shoes or whatever, but you needed to make money and keep busy. With money you could buy food or even someone to cook it for you. Or a mistress in town. And Vodka! Of course your money was usually stolen, but then it was only to earn some more. A jingle of coins in your pocket meant choices, the choice of where to spend your money. All of this and more is discussed, not really in chronological order - there are repetitions and backtracks and sometimes the thought sequences are confusing and abruptly change direction.

I am trying to give you an idea of what you will read about.

At the end I thought parts were too repetitive, parts too unclear and jumpy and I could never feel I really KNEW any of the people, only one man’s opinion of them. I felt no empathy for them. And how reliable were his opinions?! I am glad I read the book. It was interesting and it details thoroughly D's (and others’) labor camp experiences.

The narration by Walter Covell didn’t blow me over. The production of the audiobook was poor; the volume jumped around; I heard background noises. Covell just plain read the text in a rather stilted voice. No inflection whatsoever.
...more

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About Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Fyodor Dostoyevsky

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Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky was born in Moscow in 1821. His debut, the epistolary novella Poor Folk (1846), made his name. In 1849 he was arrested for involvement with the politically subversive 'Petrashevsky circle' and until 1854 he lived in a convict prison in Omsk, Siberia. From this experience came The House of the Dead (1860-2). In 1860 he began the journal Vremya (Time). Already married, ...more

Books by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Notes from Underground, White Nights, The Dream of a Ridiculous Man, and Selections from The House of the Dead

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“Man is a creature that can get accustomed to anything, and I think that is the best definition of him.” — 133 likes

“Whoever has experienced the power and the unrestrained ability to humiliate another human being automatically loses his own sensations. Tyranny is a habit, it has its own organic life, it develops finally into a disease. The habit can kill and coarsen the very best man or woman to the level of a beast. Blood and power intoxicate ... the return of the human dignity, repentance and regeneration becomes almost impossible.” — 116 likes

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