Book Review: Crime and Punishment, by Fyodor Dostoevsky
Rodion Raskolnikov, an impoverished ex-student living in St. Petersburg, methodically sets out to kill a money-lender. As if that isn’t bad enough, the cold-blooded murder goes terribly wrong, and – being a man of principle – he endures a multitude of agonies associated with his crime. Erstwhile, his mother and sister are moving to the city in preparation for his sister’s just-announced engagement to an ambitious cad.
All in all, it’s not a good time to be Rodya Raskolnikov, or for that matter, to live in St. Petersburg during the late 1800’s.
Crime and Punishment, completed in 1866, is a brooder of a book. It looks unsparingly at the lives of the desperate and destitute – comprising most of its central characters – and sends them in circles around a very lonely and philosophically distraught young man who makes a terrible decision: murder. It isn’t made in haste, but meticulously planned and carried out until the act itself is within his grasp, at which point it explodes in his face. Rather than empowerment, to be “a man and not a louse” in Raskolnikov’s words, he comes face to face with reality: his less-empowered and certainly more human inadequacies.
The problem, however, is that the police aren’t after him…or are they? He tries several times early in the novel to expose his crime, but barely arouses suspicion – if anything, people around him grow more and more concerned for his health. The irony is that it’s after Raskolnikov’s crime when everyone around him starts paying him visits and taking care of him – even though half the time he’s flirting with madness and fever. It is during this purgatorial reprieve from justice – with the police as close as his friends – that he is drawn into the lives of those around him and takes pains to emancipate the weak from their burdens.
Characters sad and corrupt walk into his life, often literally, and draw him into their own. Vacillating between pity, outrage, and spiritual agony, Raskolnikov takes great pains to make amends with those around him, sensing that the payment for his earlier crime is hanging inevitably in front of him, whatever turn he takes. After all, if the noose is in the mind, there are no lands you can escape to.
Crime and Punishment has many strengths, chief among them some of the best dialogue in literature. Surprisingly, there are great swaths of humour too, most notably Raskolnikov’s friend, Razumikhin – who becomes smitten with Rodya’s sister, the ravishing Avdotya. Dostoevsky, who spent four years as a political prisoner prior to writing C&P, writes honestly about the souls of those who are defeated by the circumstances of life. The city to which the book is seemingly dedicated – albeit in a poison pen fashion – St. Petersburg, comes across as a Gothic cesspool of poverty and corruption.
If there are drawbacks to Crime and Punishment it is the bleak hues in which the story is rendered. Although it is ultimately a book about the greatest aspect of humanity – fiery perseverance – there a number of parts that move at a snail’s pace. In particular, I found the fourth chapter (of six) to be burdensome. I say this in case anyone would take me for a masochist.
Still, I recommend Crime and Punishment to those wanting to pick up the classics, particularly written from Eastern Europe. In Rodion Raskolnikov, Dostoevsky has created a template of the tortured idealist that stands as tall now as it did in 1866.
Crime and Punishment, by Fyodor Dostoevsky (ISBN: 019 281549 0) is available at a friendly independent bookstore near you. Or online at any number of vendors
Bandcroft Rides Again!
A Vote For Uncertainty
ag·nos·ti·cism [ag-nos-tuh-siz-uhm] –noun
- An intellectual doctrine or attitude affirming the uncertainty of all claims to ultimate knowledge.
- The doctrine that certainty about first principles or absolute truth is unattainable and that only perceptual phenomena are objects of exact knowledge.
- The belief that there can be no proof either that God exists or that God does not exist.
[Origin: 1870–75; agnostic + -ism]
I don’t want to wade into the current (or latest, if you look at this historically) spat between atheists and theists, but I find it tragic that – and I don’t know why I’m surprised – there is no middle ground of perspective in the discussion. It’s not much of a “discussion” to begin with, is it?
I don’t particularly care about Richard Dawkins, his followers/imitators, fundamentalist zealotry of any sort, and atheism in general. I think atheism, while legitimate, is about as interesting and constructive as a “zero” on a chalkboard. Of theoretical curiosity, but not much else. Yet lately there have been many books published – the latest of note being Christopher Hitchens’ – throwing down the atheist gauntlet against organized religion.
I have a healthy wariness toward organized religion and I understand, in light of the recent alignments in many parts of the world between fundamentalists and political/military activity, why the gauntlets are hitting the ground on either side of the theist atheist debate.
Or at least I think I understand – I’m just a layman.
Yet agnosticism is never mentioned. Atheists joke that agnostics are just vacillating fools and leave it at that. The problem is this: history proves that certainty has a best-before date. Anyone remember the Age of Reason, when classical physics had reached such austere heights that it became referred to as the Age of Certainty? And then those crazy guys, like Neils Bohr and Albert Einstein, had to go and blow the head off of it – essentially showing that presumptions about time and space (as well as lot of other things) were not as they had been presumed to be. And yet, perplexedly, many pro-atheism websites contain quotes from Einstein proudly questioning the limits of God.
You can be certain that the sun will rise every morning (even if obscured by clouds), yet, technically speaking it’s in the process of burning out (when it reaches thermal equilibrium with that cold “space” stuff). So, not even that is certain.
I argue that our need for certainty is an ancient one, and whether it be expressed in theistic or nihilistic terms, it is always coupled by Thoth’s ape: the spectre of an annoying footnote which clearly states “You know this could all change at any minute.”.
What’s wrong with embracing uncertainty – does it not open more doors, feed more thoughts, raise more questions? Is it not more analogous to the inherently uncertain and complex world around us? Allowing for uncertainty is being honest with the way life works; it is neither cynical nor pessimistic. In fact, I consider it more spiritually genuine (although agnosticsm itself does not need to be used only in those terms) than holding a fixed idea of what “lies beyond”, whether it be God or maggots.
I just wanted to put this out there, as I’m tired of only hearing two sides to an argument which cannot be limited to such a static form.
Changes (part two)
I went to a naturopath because I’ve had a nasty ongoing bout of eczema. I was tired with visits to my GP that always ended up with me getting medication that neither necessarily works well nor is without long-term side effects (like, say, cancer). Say what you will about Canadian health care – and the fact that we *have* health care is something to say – I just don’t see how a GP can give anyone any sort of personalized care when they “see” you for all of 10 minutes, sometimes with as many as 30 other patients booked after you. So, with the retirement of my long-term doctor and her replacement with a replicant from Blade Runner, I took the opportunity to check out just what exactly naturopathy could do.
There were two sessions: the first, a consultation, with the second being a post-diagnostic set of recommendations. It went very well, going over my medical history etc., and resulted in her suggesting I start with a detox/reduction diet under the suspicion that my eczema was part of an allergic reaction.
So, a few weeks ago I cut out caffeine, sugar, alcohol, gluten (bread, white rice, etc.), milk, eggs, red meat…and anything else on the list she provided. Most vegans don’t even have a diet this strict. I was to do it for a week (at least) and then slowly add things back to see if my skin flared up.
The process was pretty incredible – in the sense that you don’t realise how many of these things are part and parcel of our everyday (and sometimes every meal) diet. Try going into a restaurant – try a vegetarian restaurant even – and count how many dishes don’t have gluten. You cannot believe how frustrating it is to go out on a lunch break only to find that there’s nothing out there outside of a salad that isn’t going to have bread attached.
The first couple of days were tough, but surprisingly I didn’t miss coffee that much. It was days three and four. No energy, no concentration. I could only focus on a couple of tasks at any given time without being totally useless.
Things are better now. As it turns out, gluten seems to be the bad guy, however I have yet to find out if beer can be ruled out (I pray), since it has yeast. But the process itself was the valuable thing – you pay attention to your body when you detox. You pay attention to what goes in your body and the pace of your metabolism. Particularly when you rule out gluten, you realise how much of a filler it truly is. You value fruits and vegetables, and my water consumption has certainly skyrocketed.
I think a detox/reduction diet is something everyone should try, if just once. However, I do also strongly believe that it should be partially supervised by a health professional.
[if you’re on Facebook, you can check out my Detox Diaries – at least the first five days]
[UPDATE]: I found the solution (for me, at least). It was cutting out (or at least down) processed sugars. I drink a fair amount of coffee and since I always have a teaspoon of sugar, I found this to be the main culprit. After searching long and hard (stevia, maple syrup, etc.) I found agave nectar – yes, the very same plant that produces tequila also produces a sugar-like nectar. In short, not only does it taste like sugar, but it has eliminated my need for sugar or other substitutes. For your reference here is one brand, and another. I recommend either.
I’m extremely pleased to have found a way to combat eczema that doesn’t involve medication, tinctures, or cremes. It may not work for some (or many), but the ideal way to solve the issue to deal with it through your diet, and not through a supplemental ointment.
Photo: Dundas & Palmerston #1
Changes (part one)
Today marks the one-month anniversary since my wife and I moved to a new apartment. Normally not something to crow about, it’s a night/day change for us. Our previous place was convenient, if slightly pricey, with a number of condo-like amenities.
But, from our first day there, there was something about it which bugged the hell out of me – I just couldn’t pin it down. It was nice enough, sure – recently renovated with new fixtures, free microwave, gas stove, storage, etc.. But I couldn’t write there; I can count on one hand the number of times I did substantial work in that place – and it was probably in the dead of winter, on a Sunday. Otherwise, I preferred to leave the place and go to a nearby bar.
In the summer months, when I’d be on my way home from work, I’d call my wife and we’d make plans to have a drink. Away from the apartment. When we had parties, or simply a few friends over, we found ourselves hyper-focused on what kind of cheese we were serving, rather than, say, having a good time and enjoying the company. I hated that. I didn’t like what we were turning into, and I was afraid that it was us. Us getting older, us giving up on the fact that we were actually artists and not…well…people who worried about what kind of cheese we were serving at parties.
It was mid-way into our second year there that I called it. My wife had brought up some things about the place she had trouble reconciling: the fact that it was stone cold in the winter (this, with two heaters provided by the landlord and radiators that were “timed” to kick-in), that the only significant sun shone through a single window in the kitchen, that we inexplicably couldn’t jell with the other tenants, and that, finally, we felt like outsiders in our own home. I told her the ugly truth: it was a suburban apartment. A bland hole with aspirations about as sickeningly bourgeois as the new bathroom fixtures. On a street increasingly being poached by real estate jackals, flipping postage stamp bungalows for $450,000. And this was Queen and Bathurst!
We made the best decision since getting married: we got the hell out of there.
Fast-forward to now. We ended up finding a new apartment: smaller, not-inclusive, electric stove, a dripping roof, an Alpine-esque staircase, traffic that makes our building rumble, and no storage. Perfect. We have skylights (sun!). We have a patio with a magnificent view of Toronto. We pay less rent. It may sound strange, but we couldn’t believe the difference it made to our outlook. I write at home now. Both my wife and I finally feel that we’re in our element. We regularly have friends over, cheese or no cheese. I’ve traded a few words with my downstairs neighbour, more than I did in two years at the previous place, and he seems like a nice guy. The neighbourhood – on Ossington Avenue – while “up-and-coming” is not in a rush to be at home to Starbucks any time soon. I should hope it never happens.
Comments on Media Bias
I don’t like to mention American news channels, for the very basic reason that I’m not American and that I don’t live in the U.S.. As a Canadian, however, I have an advantage in that I have easy access to American news programming. It’s easy to get swept up in what happens down there and you forget that it doesn’t even concern you (or if it does, it’s by example, not by fact).
Tony Burman, of the CBC, posted an interesting comment on a current controversy over something CNN personality (anchor? those days are gone, sorry) Lou Dobbs said. Something about attributing a studied increase in leprosy to a less-than studied association with increased immigration from Mexico. Oh my. You understand why it’s important not to get swept up in another country’s news now?
I like Tony. He’s not a bullshitter, and as a result, doesn’t have the sheen or explicit eye-grabbing “savvy” of more recent newsmen. He makes some interesting observations (which, as a Canadian, we are experts at providing to a world which doesn’t listen):
News anchors — at least in the U.S. — are increasingly revealing their own personal opinions in an effort to ‘connect’ with audiences in this very competitive media environment.
[…]
As I wrote in a column last September, the line between ‘news’ and ‘opinion’ is gradually becoming blurred, and in many newsrooms this is challenging conventional journalistic views about ‘objectivity,’ ‘bias’ and ‘opinion.’
If the patterns in the U.S. take hold, there seems to be a greater desire on the part of audiences to ‘relate’ to news and current affairs anchors whose views and perspective are known to them. The mask of journalistic ‘objectivity’ can seem forced and false to growing numbers of people who revel in the wide-open environment of the Internet.
However, what really struck me were some of the comments to Tony’s article. In particular are two:
Joe Chip from Saskatoon [responding to *yet another* accusation from a previous poster that the CBC is some sort of liberal star chamber, and should be ashamed of casting aspersions on the likes of Mr. Dobbs]
[…]As someone who actually follows media sources from around the world, I can assure you that they are an (relatively) objective news source. As living beings, we cannot avoid bias – we need to interpret the world around us in a meaningful way. The CBC reports in almost as professional a manner as the BBC, which is, despite what you and others may think, the gold standard for broadcast news. Have you noticed how their “At Issue” panel has one person on almost every week from the National Post and one from the Toronto Star? That’s not an accident, it’s about balance, and Andrew and Chantel accomplish that nicely.
Finally, I suggest that you do a comparison of how the three national leaders (Martin, Harper and Layton) were covered in the past election. You will find that Harper got the most positive coverage, while Martin was largely panned, and Layton often ignored. This was consistent throughout most major Canadian media, with more positive portrayals of the Conservatives in right wing papers and media (i.e. the National Post, etc.), and more flattering coverage of left wingers in media such as the Toronto Star. The CBC remained fairly balanced, though I thought they were a bit hard on poor Martin.
and…
Charles Barrett in Florida
Both of these comments are very insightful. I didn’t want to waste your time regurgitating what they said into some sort of personalized polemic, but rather show that there *are* thinking people out there who show just how complex our seemingly left vs. right society truly is. And I absolutely LOVE the line that “media sources are just production houses” – zing!
As a Canadian citizen living in the US, I have perspective from both sides.
The question being dealt with here isn’t so much about Lou Dobbs [whom I do like and agree with on a lot of the points he discusses on his program].
Traditional media sources have long ago lost their way. In paying attention to a broadcast or the written story most times I’m struck by either the wrong question being asked or the answer given is either inadequate or no answer at all. The reporter/interviewer doesn’t follow-up to hold the respondant [sic] to task about their evasive answer.
It’s seems that the truth/answers are just commodities and any response to a posed question will do. Media sources, particularly television media, are just production houses.
We, the public, need start thinking of what is not asked and also hear what is not said, in a response to a question/interview.
I thought it was the media/journalists job to obtain the truth whereever [sic] it was rooted. Not just report answers.
As for Lou Dobbs and his cohorts, opinion is just that, opinion. You don’t have agree with what anybody/everybody says/believes. It’s his opinion not yours.
That is what makes it GREAT to live in the part of the world that we do, we have the FREEDOM to disagree and NOT pay with our lives.
I think my previous posters would all AGREE with this.