Dostoyevsky isn't difficult

I was blown away by Crime and Punishment. I truly felt like I was the main character, and I read it with feverish sweat and dread for my impending doom. I cringed and felt terrible sadness at the poor little lives of certain individuals. So much woe and tragedy. I was glad to see how it turned out though.

I'm currently reading Karamazov and it's good to have something a bit more jovial and dry witted.

The main difficulty is the names. The names make it so hard.

I love the Space Trilogy by Lewis but I lose my place when he describes a place. Dostoevsky is better at describing people (and bringing them to life in your mind) than Lewis is at describing a landscape.

As a Russian native speaker who graduated from the high school in Russia many years ago, one thing that I don't really understand is why these great works of Russian literature are included in the school must read list. An average teenager, myself included, always has some better things to do than reading a huge novel, barely understanding characters' motivations, because neither of these books were ever intended for teens.

Those who find time later in their adult life will re-read the classics and appreciate it, but many will not, and that's probably a result of forcing the kids to deal with something most of them are not ready for.

Vennira Iravugal (White Nights) translated in Tamil by R. Krishnaiyya was my first read from Dostoyevsky's works. I came to a realisation that the dynamics of formative romance, anguish of unrequitedness, dithering nature of one's mind towards commitment have long been fundamental characteristics of a human being from the time immemorial (at least from when this book was published in 1848) after the read. Dostoyevsky has this acumen of rightly pointing out primal nature of a human in various settings through his stories. Crime and Punishment, which I read in English, entrenched this view in my mind undisputedly.

Tamil translators have done astonishing efforts in presenting the worlds and sentiments of Dostoyevsky, yet I cannot compare it with OG Russian versions as I do not know Russian. I might one day be in a position to read his classics in native versions (I want to learn Russian for this).

I (precocious, pretentious me) read Anna Karenina in 7th grade. It was long but not difficult. Keeping track of the characters was the hardest part.

I’d like to say the story stayed with me, but alas it was the reaction of adults to my reading matter that I remember.

Part of growing up was realizing that being precocious really isn’t a thing anymore at some point.

I also stumbled onto Crime and Punishment at 18 and expected it to be difficult and was blown away with how Dostoyevsky wrote one of the greatest novels of all time, to be sure, but as the author here says, also how engaging he made it.

The scene where he commits the crime is an absolute stunner, edge-of-your-seat, thriller. Who does that? Who can pull that off? Dostoyevsky

Lol, remember being in my early 20s on a train and trying to read Crime and Punishhment, and just kept skipping random 5 pages here and there, before going back to playing Durak with some random Tajiks (who got kicked off the train in some random place...). The huge pages of French didn't help.

Prefered Demons, personally. Probably becuase I read it when more mature.

I am genuinely curious why Russian literature is so popular in non-Russian speaking world. How do you wake up one day and decide to read Crime and Punishment? How do you find out about Russian literature in the first place? Recommendation from a friend, marketing in your favorite book store, school? Could somebody shed some light

I thoroughly enjoyed Crime and Punishment, The Idiot, and White Nights, but I'm finding myself slogging through Karamazov. I'm about 600 pages in and its picking up at least. Banking on it all being worth it in the end. Normally I subscribe to the quote "life's too short to read a bad book", but making an exception for Dostoyevsky.

Funny, I'm just reading War and Peace myself (the Anthony Briggs translation) and having the same reaction, gushing occasionally to people I know how approachable it is, and how darkly funny and modern it feels. Well, at least after passing through the first ~200 pages which are a slog. I didn't find even Tolstoy's historical musings boring, although he tends to repeat himself. And I usually suck at names, but the main characters are done so well I find them easy to remember. There aren't that many important ones despite how it seems at the start. It also serves as a fascinating peek into the daily lives of Russians of all stripes in the early 1800s.

I also had the same reaction to Crime and Punishment as the OP did.

The Pevear and Volohonsky "translations" are an affront to english prose, russian literature, and the craft of translation in general. A heavily quantized LLM with an aneurism would provide the reader with a better translation than that trash.

(I used to be a professional translator for the relevant languages, so I have opinions™)

One thing is a lot of common television/movie tropes are instantly recognizable in one form or another in there, the murder in Crime and Punishment is a series of coincidences and lucky timing for him to initially get away with it that would not be out of place in modern thriller or comedy. I had the same issue with the names so I took notes and bookmarked the Wikipedia page for the books to refresh my memory of whom was whom until it stuck. Audiobooks (most of the russian classics are free from my local library)help a lot with the pronunciation if one is like the writer and pattern matches names - hearing them a few times initially is very helpful. Side note - not a sea person but only from audiobooks learned i didn’t know how to pronounce English words boatswain, gunwale and forecastle.

> I discovered that I don’t actually read names, I just pattern match, and I have sometimes gotten hundreds of pages into a novel before I realize that I have no clear sense of the the middle syllables of the protagonist’s name.

Same. TIL this is not just me being lazy.

He isn't difficult but I always thought Nabokov (in his fairly incendiary reviews http://wmjas.wikidot.com/nabokov-s-recommendations) was on point that he was sentimental, preachy and mediocre as an artist.

I found Dostoyevsky a slog to get through and it might have been made worse because he was sold to me as this 'great psychologist' when psychological realism is often missing from his stories and characters become page-long megaphones for some version of Orthodox Russian nationalism or Christianity.

When raising children, introduce Dostoyevsky to Sophomores not Seniors. The Landlady and some short stories, like White Nights. Leave Notes from Underground lying around at-hand. Watch Love and Death on family movie night. Chekov is nice at about this time, too, but again, short stories are best. Developing the skills to read Russian literature take a little time, and when you pick up Crime and Punishment, Anna Karenina, War and Peace, The Brothers Karamazov, or Dead Souls, it's nice to feel at home in the genre so the glories of the work can shine without caveat.

I became motivated to read Russian literature after Norm Macdonald died, knowing how much influence it had on him and chasing more of his voice. Reading Brothers Karamazov in Norm's voice made it so much more entertaining. Ironically, Norm viewed Dostoyevsky as one of the inferior Russian writers.

Here's some of Norm's thoughts about Russian literature and how to read it:

    Norm Macdonald  @normmacdonald · Feb 9, 2016
    Tolstoy is the best writer who has ever lived. Some people are intimidated
    by that fact.

    Norm Macdonald  @normmacdonald · Feb 9, 2016
    Read, in chronological order if possible, everything Tolstoy has ever
    written.
    
    Norm Macdonald  @normmacdonald · Feb 9, 2016
    People think Tolstoy would be too difficult to understand since he is the
    greatest writer to ever have drawn breath.
    
    Norm Macdonald  @normmacdonald · Feb 9, 2016
    Since I am asked about Tolstoy I will suggest all read him. Read all he has
    written. Here's the thing about Tolstoy.
    
    Norm Macdonald  @normmacdonald · Feb 9, 2016
    Tolstoy could write a massive book like War & Peace and have every word be
    necessary.
    
    Norm Macdonald  @normmacdonald · Feb 9, 2016
    Dosto is a fine writer. Better are Tolstoy, Chekhov, Gogol, Turgenev and
    Pushkin.
    
    Norm Macdonald  @normmacdonald · Feb 9, 2016
    To be a great writer you must be able to communicate with the reader.
    Tolstoy communicates better than anyone else ever.
    
    Norm Macdonald  @normmacdonald · Feb 9, 2016
    Dostoevsky was far the inferior to Tolstoy, he was inferior to most of the
    great Russians.
    
    Norm Macdonald  @normmacdonald · Feb 9, 2016
    Agree completely. Should read both actually. and P&V have not translated
    most Tolstoy, so then go to Constance.
    
    Norm Macdonald  @normmacdonald · Feb 7, 2018
    Well, Jocelyn, I don't know of what other authors you refer to, but Tolstoy
    isn't a nihilist. X.com/FLEURdian_slip...
    
    T.L. States  @epmornsesh · Dec 21, 2018
    @normmacdonald Any authors you would recommend that are writing killer
    comedic fiction?
    
    Norm Macdonald  @normmacdonald · Dec 21, 2018
    Tolstoy, Chekhov, Philip Roth, Salinger, me.
    
    Norm Macdonald  @normmacdonald · Jan 21, 2019
    @GaryGulman Read great works of Literature out loud. If you do not
    understand what you are reading, stop, figure out what it means, then
    repeat the exercise. Do this an hour a day and in time, your own voice,
    your own thoughts will become the same as Tolstoy, Faulkner, Twain.

Dostoevsky is surprisingly great to read. I first started with "Notes from Underground (1864)" and I found it a profound book. Then I read Brothers Karamazov, and it is one of those "great" books. I wrote my reflections here: https://ritogh.substack.com/p/reflections-on-brothers-karama....

From the circles I am exposed to Pevear and Volokhonsky's translations are not seen as the most natural ones (although they are the only ones I have read because of the cool abstract paperback covers). I have heard they miss anecdotes and humor in favor of word accuracy. Characters are always "twisting their mouth" and similar. I'm looking forward to re-reading Demons in some other translation. He might have been well served by Garnett.

I see a lot of praise for Dostoevsky in here, personally, my attempt to read Crime and Punishment resulted in me giving up after a couple hundred pages, it read kind of like a crime novel if it was mostly slice of life and random characters rambling about the goings on of their personal lives, which I did not have interest in and so I dropped it. Maybe I am too stupid for it, but I can't say it is my cup of tea.

Sometime in the 90s we started getting really good Dostoyevsky translations, and they make a huge difference.

I have never read a book I hated more than The Brothers Karamazov. I never read a book that depressed me more than Crime and Punishment. No more Dostoevsky for me.

I'd much prefer people just stay away from reading it altogether if they find it difficult... If it's difficult, then it probably isn't for you. At least I wouldn't bother wasting my time, unless I treat it as some kind of exercise.

I read his writings because they read like my own thoughts from the very start and I never had any trouble finishing. He is the only writer who's works I've read countless times (never thought about counting, but Idiot, Karamazov at least 20 times). That would make him what would normally be called my "favorite writer", although I do not say that either. On the other hand, I have difficultly reading most other writers.

For people who read literature, yes.

But the average person in the US atm can't even read a children's book, and this includes recent college students:

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2024/11/the-eli...

https://futurism.com/future-society/college-students-losing-...

We're becoming an oral and pictorial society.

I read Crime and Punishment, and thoroughly enjoyed it. I then thought I'd move right over to War and Peace and could not get through the first 5% of the book. I'm sure with diligent effort, you can get over the very lengthy and plotless character interactions to the point where it's engaging, but I just felt like there were other books to read.

Now I'm back reading The Brothers Karamazov and it's instantly captivating! The author of this article describes the same thing... could it be that Tolstoy is just much more of a slog than Dostoyevsky?

Crime and Punishment is basically the modern Ur-novel for “your rational plans for success seem logical to you, but will not work out in the way you imagine.”

Pretty relevant for the contemporary tech world, if you ask me.

Unpopular opionion - Dostoyevsky is just russian Kipling. Empire apologist who pretended to write about deep stuff but in the end always got the convenient result.

I liked The Possessed by Elif Batuman. I had read The Idiot in high school, a death march for a term paper. But I liked Batuman's reading of it better than mine (but not enough to re-read it).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elif_Batuman

People here have trouble with names, but for a Slavic language speaker like myself, the names are one of the best parts. Even if I don't speak Russian, names like "Razkolnikov" ooze his indecisiveness. And the characters the author doesn't like, he shows contempt for them by not even giving them a proper name, calling them Mr. C. or something like that.

My problem with Dostoyevsky is that I simply don't like his style.. despite being a voracious reader it was pure torture getting through The Idiot and I gave up 1/3 of the way during Crime and Punishment. Had to re-read parts out loud again to help my son who had to read it for high school and begged me to help him somehow (we share the dislike it seems). He's one of the authors I would really love to like, but it's just not happening

If you liked "The Idiot", there's a wonderfully bizzare adaptation: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0255958/

Looks like there are English subtitles that are quite decent.

I'm reading Crime and Punishment now. I've previously read Karamazov. I agree that it's not particularly hard reading other than the names. And also, maybe, the characters tend to go on long tirades. And I guess you need to know a little bit of Russian history, too. But they're not that difficult. Otherwise his books wouldn't have been that popular. They sold phenomenally well in his lifetime and continue to do so.

For a change of pace in Russian authors, I would recommend the newer "Jamila" by Chingiz Aitmatov, 1958.

Not difficult, just boring.

As someone who only gets time to read when tired at the end of the day: I can't get past the first 50 pages of any Dostoyevsky work.

Why are the classics classic? I doubt being a great read is sufficient or necessary; I struggle to read most classics, Dickens being the only exception.

I'm not reading to study, I want to be entertained! I want engagement, I want clarity, I want suspense! I don't want to wrestle with the author's intentions, I want to be gripped by the character and their situation.

Dostoevsky published many of his novels in installments in journals. Being easy to read and hooking the reader in was a basic requirement for his writing to be successful.

This rings a bell, because I decided to tackle Don Quixote (English translation). At 200 pages in (of around 1000, I think), it’s funny and entertaining and feels fresh.

Delved into Russian literature during the "pandemic years". Reading "Crime and Punishment" was definitely the latter but used a study guide to assist (read guide after reading the book chapter). Then the "Brothers..." followed by other authors Turgenev "Fathers and Sons" and Tolstoy's "The Resurrection". Many lessons to learn by these brilliant writers.

The death of Ivan Ilyich by Tolstoy is bleak, humane and fairly short. I enjoyed it like a good Charles Dickens

IMO The Russians were always more of a joy to read than English and Americans

Will Poulter (yes, him) has a very good Crime & Punishment audiobook.

As I've said at least once before: come back, pvg!

If ever we needed you...