The Idiot (AmazonClassics Edition)

by Fyodor Dostoevsky

I am not blushing, for I don’t think I need blush about it, need I? but I see that I am not wanted in society—society is better without me. It’s not vanity on my heart, I assure you. I have thought over it all these last three days and I have made up my mind that I ought to unbosom myself candidly before you at the first opportunity. There are certain things, certain exalted ideas which I must not so much as approach as Prince S. has just reminded me, or I shall make you all laugh. I have no sense of proportion, I know; no appreciation of the proper; my words do not express my ideas fairly—they are a humiliation and abasement of the ideas, and therefore, I have no right—and I am—Still, I believe I am beloved in this household, and esteemed far more than I deserve. I can’t help knowing that after twenty years of illness there must be something left behind; so that it is impossible for people to refrain from laughing at me sometimes, don’t you think so?”