Fyodor Dostoyevsky: The Classics Novels Collection

by Fyodor Dostoevsky

After all, one drinks tea largely to please one's fellow men, Barbara, and to give oneself tone and an air of gentility (though, of myself, I care little about such things, for I am not a man of the finicking sort). Yet

Today I went hopping and skipping to the office, for my heart was under your influence, and my soul was keeping holiday, as it were. Yes,

As to the exact motive why she had asked us to come and share her house with her I am still in the dark. At first she was not altogether unkind to us but, later, she revealed to us her real character—as soon, that is to say, as she saw that we were at her mercy, and had nowhere else to go.

in time, he became so inured to blows and neglect, that he ceased to complain.

I kept weeping about trifles, yet could not say why I was grieved. The truth is that I am unwell—so much so, that I look at everything from the gloomy point of view.

Even if I be likened to a rat, I do not care, provided that that particular rat be wanted by you,

it is wonderful to think that one may live and yet be ignorant of the fact that under one's very nose there may be a book in which one's whole life is described as in a picture.