Crime and punishment analysis in one quote would start with this:
“To go wrong in your own way is better than to go right in someone
else’s.”
– Fyodor Dostoevsky
One of the biggest Cognitive Dissonance
(mental conflict) of life was taking someone’s life for your own
self-defence is legally justified and apt? If yes, then why is killing someone
for revenge or for a better purpose of the world or the society illegal?
It would not be right to say that I
had murder on my mind. But what’s the drawback in getting answers to a somewhat
disturbing and rather absurd dilemmatic problem.
Fyodor Dostoevsky, a highly impressive
Russian author who is held in high positions amongst Leo Tolstoy and George B.
Shaw (to name a few). At first glimpsed upon Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky was a beautifully written
manuscript about a tormented (not mentally ill) Russian student, Dostoevsky
explores the mental wars that waged every moment inside Rodion Romanovich
Raskolnikov. Through this analysis, he tries to explain the psychological
makeup of what he believes to be ‘Extraordinary Men’.
The Plot
Rodion Romanovich Raskolnikov, a
brilliant yet conflicted student lives in a rented room of a run-down apartment
in St. Petersburg. Extremely handsome, proud, and intelligent, Raskolnikov devises a particular theory about
‘intelligent’ men being above law. Rodion’s constant alienation from society caused him pain. To execute
this theory, he contemplates committing a crime. He murders a cynical
and unscrupulous pawnbroker named Alyona Ivanovna and her sister Lizaveta. The
act compels Raskolnikov to negotiate and reconcile with his own moral dilemmas.
An incisive psychological analysis of his protagonist goes beyond Raskolnikov’s
criminal act and covers his journey from suffering to redemption. The story
focuses on psychological realms.
The main struggle that Rodion
Romanovich Raskolnikov—the protagonist of the story—faces, is his inability to
relate to people. He appears to loathe human nature and sees human struggles as
pitiful and repugnant. Though he displays rare generosity and pity towards
certain individuals throughout the story, he does so from an alienated and
derisive stance. Rodion’s constant alienation from society caused him pain, and
at the same time makes the readers think about their own form of alienation, by
denouncing their own feelings on a regular basis. Tired of feeling dejected,
lonely, unlucky, and tormented by fate, Rodion makes an important decision to
kill his pawnbroker. He does this not for monetary benefits but only to silence
the mental tornadoes in his mind. And that was to confirm whether or not,
committing a crime for a higher purpose is justified or not.
The Night of the Murder
One deserted night, Raskolnikov
succeeds in committing his crime when he kills a pawnbroker and her sister
simultaneously with an axe. He runs away from the crime scene with all the
valuables of the pawnbroker but remains in cognitive dissonance whether or not
to keep the stolen goods with him. It is at this point where Fyodor through his
inexplicable writing style makes his readers realize that Rodion never killed
for money or other valuable possessions. He committed a heinous crime just to
testify the fact that committing a crime for a higher purpose is justified in
the eyes of (his own created) ‘Extraordinary Men’. At some point in the novel,
Raskolnikov actually expresses the idea that humans are separated into two
categories: the “ordinary” and the “extraordinary”. According to that theory,
when an individual such as Napoleon (a prime example of “extraordinary” person)
is working towards a higher cause, laws that apply to other people, do not
apply to him/her.
A League of
‘extraordinary’ men?
As the story progresses it becomes
clear that the real reason behind Raskolnikov’s violent crime is to verify that
he belongs to the “extraordinary” category. If he manages
to stay composed and avoid punishment for his crime, it will suggest that the
standard laws do not apply to him, and thus, he is of the “extraordinary” kind.
But one has to suffer the repercussions of his actions. And this is when
Rodion’s instincts begin to betray him. Raskolnikov however, does not manage to
stay composed following his crime. Intense anguish and an overwhelming feeling
of guilt slowly catch up with him, to the point where he is forced to confess.
He confesses in order to relieve himself from the torment that is afflicted on
him by his own conscience.
Therefore, he falls a victim of what
he has been struggling to distance himself from; his own emotions. Initially,
his failure to establish himself in the same category as Napoleon shatters his
confidence, and he seems completely resigned from his life.
Crime and Punishment Analysis: Our
desire to be understood
Raskolnikov’s suffering was quite
simple: he merely wanted to be noticed and to be understood. But the opposition
that stood against him (invisibility, poverty, ridicule, etc.) projected this
simple, human need into something that posed as a question to every reader. Was
Raskolnikov mad? Perhaps to a certain degree, but also because everyone around
him was simply blind. Were they so unwilling to break with the laws of society
and God that they either committed themselves to a life of futile servitude or
ended it all together?
Raskolnikov, unlike nearly everyone
else in the book who suffered (besides maybe Svidrigailov), was willing to
shatter the chains of society and religion that restrain the individual impulse
to rebel. The irony in this is that despite his rebellious nature in a
Christian society, it was he who assumed a Christ-like role. He expected others
to see him as the murderer and sickened at the thought of their naivety, their
lack of understanding. Most people did see him like that. But some,
particularly his mother and Sonya (his lover), acknowledged his suffering and
met it with pity. This was the ultimate force that subdued his torment and
redefined his identity, his self.
Transformation
In the end Raskolnikov goes through a
crucial transformation. He embraces his human nature and allows himself to
accept and experience his own feelings. Despite the dark nature of the novel,
Dostoevsky leaves us at last with an optimistic outlook. The tormented
Raskolnikov finally reaches some sort of internal serenity.
Dostoevsky does an excellent job of
manipulating the reader into caring for the main character and even identifying
with him. This is despite of his mental instability and the dreadful nature of
his crime. Therefore, the novel Crime and
Punishment highlights the
importance of accepting and understanding our feelings and underlines the
danger of trying to walk away from them. Raskolnikov projected his anguish onto
the society around him, spreading fear, concern, rage, and confusion among
those he encountered. But through this anguish, we can glimpse the spark of
individuality within.
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