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DOSTOIEVSKY, FEODOR MIKHAILOVICH (182...

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Originally appearing in Volume V08, Page 439 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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DOSTOIEVSKY, FEODOR MIKHAILOVICH (182I-1881) , See also:Russian author, See also:born at See also:Moscow, on the 3oth of See also:October 1821, was the second son of a retired military surgeon of a decayed See also:noble See also:family. He was educated at Moscow an_datthe military See also:engineering See also:academy at St See also:Petersburg, which he See also:left in 1843 with the grade of sub-See also:lieutenant. Next See also:year his See also:father died, and he resigned his See also:commission in See also:order to devote himself to literature—thus commencing a See also:long struggle with See also:ill-See also:health and penury. In addition to the old Russian masters See also:Gogol and See also:Pushkin, See also:Balzac and See also:George See also:Sand supplied him with See also:literary ideals. He knew little of See also:Dickens, but his first See also:story is thoroughly Dickensian in See also:character. The See also:hero is a Russian " Tom Pinch," who entertains a pathetic, humble See also:adoration for a See also:fair See also:young girl, a solitary waif like himself. Characteristically the Russian story ends in " See also:tender gloom." The girl marries a See also:middle-aged See also:man of See also:property; the hero See also:dies of a broken See also:heart, and his funeral is described in lamentable detail. The germ of all Dostoievsky's imaginative See also:work may be discovered here. The story was submitted in See also:manuscript to the Russian critic, Bielinski, and excited his astonishment by its See also:power over the emotions. It appeared in the course of 1846 in the Recueil de See also:Saint-Petersbourg, under the See also:title of " Poor See also:People." An See also:English version, Poor Folk, with an introduction by Mr George See also:Moore, appeared in 1894. The successful author became a See also:regular contributor of See also:short tales to the See also:Annals of the See also:Country, a monthly periodical conducted by Kraevsky; but he was wretchedly paid, and his work, though revealing extraordinary power and intensity, commonly lacks both finish and proportion. Poverty and See also:physical suffering robbed him of the joy of See also:life and filled him with See also:bitter thoughts and morbid imaginings.

During 1847 he became an enthusiastic member of the revolutionary reunions of the See also:

political agitator, Petrachevski. Many of the students and younger members did little more than discuss the theories of See also:Fourier and other economists at these gatherings. Exaggerated reports were eventually carried to the See also:police, and on the 23rd of See also:April 1849 Dostoievsky and his See also:brother, with See also:thirty other suspected personages, were arrested. After a short examination by the See also:secret police they were lodged in the fortress of St See also:Peter and St See also:Paul at St Petersburg, in which confinement Feodor wrote his story A Little Hero. On the 22nd of See also:December 1849 the accused were all condemned to See also:death and conveyed in vans to a large See also:scaffold in the Simonovsky See also:Place. As the soldiers were preparing to carry out the See also:sentence, the prisoners were informed that their See also:penalty was commuted to See also:exile in See also:Siberia. The novelist's sentence was, four years in Siberia and enforced military service in the ranks for life. On See also:Christmas See also:eve 1849 he commenced the long See also:journey to See also:Omsk, and remained in Siberia, " like a man buried alive, nailed down in his See also:coffin," for four terrible years. His Siberian experiences are graphically narrated in a See also:volume to which he gave the name of Recollections of a Dead-See also:House (1858). It was known in an English See also:translation as Buried Alive in Siberia (1881; another version, s888). His See also:release only subjected him to fresh indignities as a See also:common soldier at See also:Semipalatinsk; but in 1858, through the intercession of an old schoolfellow, See also:General See also:Todleben, he was made an under-officer; and in 1859, upon the See also:accession of See also:Alexander II,, he was finally recalled from exile. In 1858 he had married a widow, Madame Isaiev, but she died at St Petersburg in 1867 after a somewhat stormy married life.

After herding for years with the worst criminals, Dostoievsky obtained an exceptional insight into the dark and seamy See also:

side of Russian life. He, formed new conceptions of human life, of the See also:balance of See also:good and evil in than, and of the Russian character. Psychological studies have seldom, if ever, found a more intense See also:form of expression than that embodied by Dostoievsky in his novel called See also:Crime and See also:Punishment. The hero Raskolnikov is a poor student, who is led on to commit a See also:murder partly by self-conceit, partly by the contemplation of the abject misery around him. Unsurpassed in poignancy in the whole of See also:modern literature is the sensation of compassion evoked by the See also:scene between the self-tormented Raskolnikov and the humble See also:street-See also:walker, Sonia, whom he loves, and from whom, having confessed his crime, he derives the See also:idea of expiation. Raskolnikov finally gives himself up to the police and is exiled to Siberia, whither Sonia follows him. The See also:hook gave currency to A number of ideas, not in any sense new, but specially characteristic of Dostoievsky: the theory, for instance, that in every life, however fallen and degraded, there are ecstatic moments of self-devotion; the See also:doctrine of See also:purification by suffering, and by suffering alone; and the ideal of a Russian people forming a social See also:state at some future See also:period See also:bound together by no See also:obligation See also:save mutual love and the magic of kindness. In this visionary prospect, as well as in his objection to the use of physical force, Dostoievsky anticipated in a remarkable manner some of the conspicuous tenets of his See also:great successor See also:Tolstoy. The See also:book electrified the See also:reading public in See also:Russia upon its See also:appearance in 1866, and its fame was confilimed when it appeared in See also:Paris in 1867. To his remarkable See also:faculty of awakening reverberations of See also:melancholy and compassion, as shown in his See also:early work, Dostoievsky had added, by the See also:admission of all, a rare mastery over the emotions of terror and pity. But such mastery was not long to remain unimpaired. Crime and Punishment was written when he was at the See also:zenith of his power.

His remaining See also:

works exhibit frequently a marvellous tragic and See also:analytic power, but they are unequal, and deficient in measure and in balance. The See also:chief of them are: The Injured and the Insulted, The Demons (1867), The Idiot(1869), The Adult (1875), The See also:Brothers Karamzov (1881). From 1865, when he settled in St Petersburg, Dostoievsky was absorbed in a See also:succession of journalistic enterprises, in the Slavophil See also:interest, and suffered severe pecuniary losses. He had to leave Russia, in order to See also:escape his creditors, and to seek See also:refuge in See also:Germany and See also:Italy. He was further harassed by troubles with his wife, and his work was interrupted by epileptic fits and other physical ailments. It was under such conditions as these that his most enduring works were created. He managed finally to return to Russia early in the seventies, and was for some See also:time director of The Russian See also:World. From 1876 he published a See also:kind of See also:review, entitled Carnet d'un ecrivain, to the pages of which he committed439 many See also:strange autobiographical facts and reflections. The last eight years of his life were spent in See also:comparative prosperity at St Petersburg, where he died on the 9th of See also:February 1881. His life had been irremediably seared by his Siberian experiences. He looked prematurely old; his See also:face See also:bore an expression of accumulated sorrow; in disposition he had become distrustful, taciturn, contemptuous—his favourite theme the superiority of the Russian See also:peasant over every other class; as an artist, though uncultured, he had ever been subtle and sympathetic, but latterly he was tortured by tragic visions and morbidly preoccupied by exceptional and perverted types. M. de See also:Vogue, in his admirable Ecrivains russes, has worked out with some success a parallel between the later years of Dostoievsky and those of See also:Jean Jacques See also:Rousseau.

Siberia effectually convinced the novelist of the See also:

impotence of See also:Nihilism in such a country as Russia; but though he was assailed by ardent Liberals for the reactionary trend of his later writings, Dostoievsky became, towards the end of his life, an extremely popular figure, and his funeral, on the 12th of February 1881, was the occasion of one of the most remarkable demonstrations of public feeling ever witnessed in the Russian See also:capital. The death of the Russian novelist was not mentioned in the See also:London See also:press; it is only since 1885, when Crime and Punishment first appeared in English, that his name has become at all See also:familiar in See also:England, mainly through See also:French See also:translations. A See also:complete edition of his novels was issued at St Petersburg in fourteen volumes (1882-1883). Two See also:critical studies by Tchij and Zelinskyappeared at Moscow in 1885,and a See also:German life by See also:Hoffmann at See also:Vienna in 1899. (T.

End of Article: DOSTOIEVSKY, FEODOR MIKHAILOVICH (182I-1881)

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