Great Russian Lit: Brothers Karamazov

[trautlein]

Where we should talk about great Russian Lit.


EG

I'm reading Crime and Punishment and Notes from Underground right now. Is Brothers Karamazov more similar in style to C&P or Underground?

 

[206PiruBlood]

I have read Crime and Punishment, and I am reading The Brothers Karamazov right now. I have not read Notes From Underground, but it is only about 100 pages and so your experience reading this will probably be quite unlike Dostoevsky's other novels; The brothers Karamazov is about 800 pages. As for the style of writing, Crime and Punishment and The Brothers Karamazov are similar. Dostoevsky consistently shows deep psychological insight with his long narratives and the characters come alive, along with city in which they live. The language is remarkably modern, yet you become fully immersed in 19th century Russian society. While Crime and Punishment is centered around an individual struggling with his conscience, The Brothers Karamazov is centered around a family of contrasting brothers and their sensualist creature of a father. As the characters might indicate, Dostoevsky explores different aspects of society with the two novels, although there is some overlap.

Hope this is helpful, I have never really reviewed a book so its kind of all over the place, but oh well!

Also, I recommend translations by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky for pretty much anything by Dostoevsky or Tolstoy. Larissa is a native born Russian, who, along with her American born, scholar of Russian literature, husband Richard, have collaborated to write translations as close to the original work of the author as possible and they have received a lot of recognition for their work.

 

[206PiruBlood]

How far are you into Crime and Punishment? I still have several sections bookmarked because I liked the writing so much for one reason or another.

 

[trautlein]

How far are you into Crime and Punishment? I still have several sections bookmarked because I liked the writing so much for one reason or another.

I'm like 200 page in so far - finished part 2 but haven't started part 3 yet (I'm reading it for a class and I don't want to go to far ahead, but oh boy do I want to).

Also, I recommend translations by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky for pretty much anything by Dostoevsky or Tolstoy. Larissa is a native born Russian, who, along with her American born, scholar of Russian literature, husband Richard, have collaborated to write translations as close to the original work of the author as possible and they have received a lot of recognition for their work.

These are the exact copies I got and I LOVE them.
But, I feel like I need learn Russian now. If just translations of his work are this good, then I can't even fathom how good the real thing must be.

 

[Kyleric]

Before coming to the initiation at the start of the major in physics we had to do a quiz measuring "how much of a physicist are you". For each question we'd answer yes or no and get points for each 'yes'. At the initiation we had to wear a name tag with our score on it. One of the questions was: "Do you like russian literature?". I don't remember my score but I know I answered yes to this question.

 

[trautlein]

Why do you like it Kyleric?

 

[Dickfore]

Landau Lifgarbagez

 

[206PiruBlood]

Landau Lifgarbagez

The most epic, ten part novel ever! The narratives and derivations are beautifully concise.

 

[206PiruBlood]

I got Notes from Underground for Christmas, it looks very unique and intriguing actually.

On another note, one of the books I got has pages 29-72 upside down and in reverse order. So I have to flip the book over and read backwards from page 29 to 72!

 

[Terrible Bohr]

Before coming to the initiation at the start of the major in physics we had to do a quiz measuring "how much of a physicist are you". For each question we'd answer yes or no and get points for each 'yes'. At the initiation we had to wear a name tag with our score on it. One of the questions was: "Do you like russian literature?". I don't remember my score but I know I answered yes to this question.

I don't understand this. What does enjoying Russian literature have to do with being a physicist? A psychologist, I could see. An existential philosopher, I could see. But I don't see an obvious connection between the big Russian authors and scientific observation.

It's strange, because over the past year I have been going back and forth between Russian authors and popular physics books, and have enjoyed reading both immensely. However, I thought it was just me doing this.