What made Dostoevsky's work immortal

https://thoughts.wyounas.com/p/what-made-dostoevsky-immortal

by simplegeek • 2 years ago

167 104 2 years ago

thoughts.wyounas.com

a writer's financial situation does not make art immortal.

it cites faulkner, too, and he famously wrote "as i lay dying" while he was broke and working at the university electric plant.

brodouevencode2• 2 years ago

a writer's financial situation does not make art immortal.

That was not the point of the article. The point was that the narrowness of circumstance - living between riches and poverty and what type of person can handle that (not to mention the unique problems that might come up with that) - requires someone that can balance that sort of situation.

greenie_beans4• 2 years ago

how is that not "a writer's financial situation"?

kristjankalm• 2 years ago

“Non-Russian readers do not realize two things: that not all Russians love Dostoevsky as much as Americans do, and that most of those Russians who do, venerate him as a mystic and not as an artist. He was a prophet, a claptrap journalist and a slapdash comedian. I admit that some of his scenes, some of his tremendous farcical rows are extraordinarily amusing. But his sensitive murderers and soulful prostitutes are not to be endured for one moment—by this reader anyway.” V. Nabokov, [0]

I really recommend Nabokov's full lecture on Dostoyevsky [1], plus obvs all the of the lectures in the series are brilliant.

[0] https://lithub.com/on-dostoevskys-199th-birthday-heres-nabok...

[1] Lectures on Russian Literature, Vladimir Nabokov, https://www.londonreviewbookshop.co.uk/stock/lectures-on-rus...

agys• 2 years ago

A dissing with two of my favourite authors as protagonists, thank you!

A small extract of “Transparent Things" by Nabokov that I love so much: how a Caran d’Ache pencil is built. An incredible travel through space and time!

https://thenabokovian.org/node/53398

twelve40• 2 years ago

slapdash comedian
extraordinarily amusing

Nabokov is a genius but not once did i get this vibe ever, much darker, almost hopeless.

usrnm• 2 years ago

Dostoevsky is funny, but his humour is very subtle and can be easily lost in translation. And being funny and dark are not mutually exclusive things, there is a whole genre of tragicomedies, after all

instagib• 2 years ago

All the “Amazon classics” have audible included which can make it go quickly. The dinner table conversation with a host which had consumption was quite amusing. Agree on darkness.

GeoAtreides• 2 years ago

Nabokov is the proof that being a genius writer doesn't always imply having good taste. For example, see his opinion on Henry James, Faulkner or Camus.

The man wrote what he wanted to read and hated everything else.

PsylentKnight• 2 years ago

I think that in general some artists are this way and that makes what they produce different from anyone else. Jonathan Blow for example is snobby and hates a lot of stuff, but his intense and specific ideas about the way games should be has led to some very interesting and thoughtful work

bmacho2• 2 years ago

Non-Russian readers do not realize two things: that not all Russians love Dostoevsky as much as Americans do,

This is probably true. But Russians' opinion shouldn't matter the slightest about him for the rest of us.

yatopifo2• 2 years ago

Of course. But it’s worth recognizing that you like a translation of D, not his original works.

yatopifo2• 2 years ago

Dostoyevsky wrote the most boring unpalatable stuff i had the misfortunate to read in school. Nabokov’s assessment was 100% correct.

zdragnar• 2 years ago

Not by a long shot. War and peace is the classic long read, but outside of Russian literature you also get authors like Victor Hugo and Les Miserables.

Also, depending on your tastes, Charlotte Bronte and other similar period writers were equally bland or significant.

whythre• 2 years ago

I read Crime and Punishment as a teenager and I enjoyed it quite a bit. Raskolnikov’s misadventures are not ‘fun’ but as a psychological exploration of guilt (or lack thereof), it was very interesting.

I like Notes from the Underground and his other short stories (like the Double) even more.

greenie_beans4• 2 years ago

i disagree. i'm reading the brothers karamazov right now and i find it so entertaining. such rich drama and conflict.

beoberha• 2 years ago

My favorite course I took in college was a Russian Literature elective my first semester. I fell in love with Dostoevsky when we read Crime and Punishment and I ended up writing my 25 page term paper on him and his role in the proto-existentialist vs nihilism movement in Russia in the 1860s. There will always be a part of me that wishes I had taken my career in that direction instead of computers :)

mdp2021• 2 years ago

Please consider an advice: try using some of your spare time on that interest. You never know.

jffhn• 2 years ago

Reminds me of an interview with Fields Medalist Laurent Lafforgue, where he mentioned that at one point, he had only been interested in literature, particularly Dostoevsky, and couldn't understand how anyone could bother with mathematics, but that he later realized that mathematics could also convey profound truths.

UncleOxidant2• 2 years ago

There will always be a part of me that wishes I had taken my career in that direction instead of computers :)

Well, it's not like there's money in that direction, so the computer work can provide money for the Russian literature/philosophy interest.

SeattleAltruist• 2 years ago

@kristjankaim is correct - this sure isn't Nabokov. Example: "Immortality of Dostoevsky’s art is unquestionable; his art will likely continue to live on."

Wait... which is it?

fumeux_fume• 2 years ago

Sounds good but doesn't add up. I think his writing's legacy is due more to the time it was published, it's translations into other languages and boosters like Freud who thought BK what the greatest novel ever written. That opinion gets echoed a lot, but thinking about literature in a ordinal sense is a little absurd. For me, the ruble ammouts in BK were almost meaningless. I just assumed 3,000 or 5,000 rubles was a shit ton of money, but def less than a million dollars today.

totaldude87• 2 years ago

His works will live on regardless of the culture or the time it was written. As long as there is Poverty, Guilt consciousness, Morality his works would be relevent.

I did not bow down to you, I bowed down to all the suffering of humanity.

This cannot be put an expiry at..

ruthmarx2• 2 years ago

I think his idea in Crime and Punishment of there being a class of 'special' humans is pretty interesting and enduring.

UncleOxidant2• 2 years ago

Isn't Dostoevsky's idea in Crime and Punishment that there are humans who feel like they are 'special' (and thus can become monsters when they act on that belief) as opposed to the idea that a 'special' class of humans exists?

ruthmarx2• 2 years ago

I think that is the idea, yes, but it's open to interpretation as all art is. It could be they exist but Rodion wasn't one of them.

jaredhallen• 2 years ago

It's been a long time since I read it, but my takeaway was that he was depicting the true nature of humanity. Specifically, that people are neither fundamentally good or evil, but are fallible beings that react to their circumstances.

rrherr• 2 years ago

This Substack post is a summary of an essay by Joseph Brodsky about Dostoevsky — but the post does not link or name the essay.

The essay is named "The Power of the Elements" and it can be read here on Google Books:

https://www.google.com/books/edition/Less_Than_One/N5Nzm2uih...

nsatirini• 2 years ago

The author mentioned the name of the book in the very first paragraph.

Yes, it seems the essay inspired the post and it quotes excerpts from the essay but also has also some nice additional commentary.

scandox• 2 years ago

The book in which they read the essay but not it seems the essay itself.

alangou4• 2 years ago

Dostoyevsky was truly great and could see the true and important things about the world, while Nabokov's contribution to literature will not be remembered past this century. One foresaw what the death of absolute good would do to the world—the casual mass murders of millions in places such as Germany, Cambodia, Stalinist Russia. The other is famous for Lolita.

“Don’t be afraid of anything, ever. And do not grieve. As long as your repentance does not weaken, God will forgive everything. There is not—there cannot be—a sin on earth that God will not forgive the truly repentant. Why, a man cannot commit a sin so great as to exhaust the infinite love of God. How could there be a sin that would surpass the love of God?

Think only of repentance, all the time, and drive away all fear. Have faith that God loves you more than you can ever imagine. He loves you, sinful as you are and, indeed, because of your sin. It was said long ago that there is more joy in heaven over one repentant sinner than over ten righteous men. Go now, and fear nothing. Do not be offended if people treat you badly. Do not hold it against them. And forgive your departed husband all the harm he did you. Become truly reconciled with him. For if you repent, you love, and if you love, you are with God. Love redeems and saves everything.

If I, a sinner like yourself, am moved and feel compassion for you, how infinitely much more will God! Love is such an infinite treasure it can buy the whole world and can redeem not only your sins, but the sins of all people. So go and fear no more.”

Dostoevsky, Fyodor. The Brothers Karamazov (pp. 64-65). Random House Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

bowsamic4• 2 years ago

If you think the point of your work is what you end up being famous for, then you have no moral ground to stand on

alangou4• 2 years ago

How should one decide what to read?

nkmskdmfodf2• 2 years ago

Huh?

If you're going to write a book, for other people to read, you ultimately want people to understand and recognize your ideas/the point of your work. It has nothing to do with morality.

jibbers• 2 years ago

Wow. Your quote was the first time I’ve read any Dostoyevsky and it had tears welling in my eyes. I will absolutely find more to read. Thank you.

giraffe_lady3• 2 years ago

It's a good quote for orthodox christians, I'm not sure it would make anyone else want to read dostoevsky though. I'm a dostoevsky liker and orthodox christian myself so this isn't an issue for me but in this venue I feel like you could have made a better choice for representing him.

alangou4• 2 years ago

What would you have chosen to represent him?

I think it's important you choose what affects you most. I was deeply moved reading this when I was atheist, so who am I to say what will and will not move others?

boothby• 2 years ago

It's interesting what people take from this passage. I was primed by alangau's statement that Dostoevsky predicted the death of absolute good, and the mass slaughter of millions, when I read

There is not—there cannot be—a sin on earth that God will not forgive the truly repentant.

To me, this sends a horrifying message. A self-righteous individual can kill millions, wake up to the terrible reality of their act, repent, and be bathed in the joy of a loving god's forgiveness. They need suffer only a moment's guilt, before proceeding fearlessly back into the world.

And yet, according to alangau's sibling comment, the passage was deeply moving to him. Perhaps my horrified response is a deep motion of sorts, but that isn't a typical usage of the phrase "deeply moved."

neffy• 2 years ago

There was no shortage of casual mass murder before the 20th century, not infrequently perpetrated by religious orders. The Mongol invasions in the 13th century, An Lushan rebellion in China in 750, Albigensian Crusade in the 12th century... it´s a long list I´m afraid - we are not a tame species.

drdaeman2• 2 years ago

The quote is truly the quintessence of Dostoevsky's works. A classic orthodox christian hodgepodge base, served with heaviest spicing of obligatory suffering of all kinds - both physical and mental, all perversely portrayed as a virtue.

It's kinda like alcohol, and if we go with this comparison - Dostoevsky promotes drowning in it as a salvation. Put bluntly, that shit ruins lives, not mends them. But Dostoevsky does not just write about it, he carefully designs the whole narrative to make it look like the only logical choice and wholeheartedly promotes it. And that's why I just can't stand his works, despite all their psychological, artistic and linguistic/literary merits. This insane cultural gap is simply too big to cross for me.

It all makes sense in historical and cultural context, of course, but that's exactly what puts an expiration date on Dostoevsky's works. They're a product or a very specific culture, and thus will no longer be relevant when their parent culture will finally wither away (and, personally, I sincerely hope it naturally does, for I see it as way more harmful than positive).

There are literature works that would remain relevant for a long while, but Dostoevsky is not one of those.

Just my own personal opinion.

matrix87• 2 years ago

suffering can reflect virtue if it's a reaction to guilt, it just shows that people have capacity for moral self reflection

NateEag• 2 years ago

In my experience, people often conflate forgiveness, reconciliation, and redemption. They are distinct things. People also often do not understand the role repentance plays (evangelical Christians are _especially_ prone to miss it entirely).

We can forgive someone for horrific things they've done, even when they are utterly unrepentant. Forgiving them is changing our attitude about the harms the offender did from anger and hatred to acceptance and peace. This does not mean saying "what they did was okay," but rather accepting that they chose to do something horrible, learning to make peace with their hurtful choices, and focusing on healing the damage to ourselves and others rather than seeking to injure the injurer.

Reconciliation is mending a damaged relationship between two (or more) people, as much as it can be. Unlike forgiveness, true reconciliation requires that all parties make an effort - the injured party must put in the work of forgiving the offender, and the offender must do the work of repenting.

"Repent" now means "make a show of acting sorry" in evangelical Christian circles, but genuine repentance is very different. It is recognizing the harmful choices you have made and truly regretting them, and as a natural outgrowth of that regret, choosing to do what you can to heal the damage you have done. It means accepting the consequences of your choices; a repentant offender expects to be distrusted and treated differently for their crimes, and does not resent it, realizing the shattered relationships (emotional, familial, civil, and otherwise) are part of what they chose. Without repentance, others may forgive an offender, but reconciliation is not possible - if the injured continue a relationship with the aggressor, it is necessarily a stilted, broken, fragmented one.

Redemption is rarer and harder to achieve than either forgiveness or reconciliation. It is when reconciliation succeeds and goes beyond success, giving birth to something fuller and more beautiful than what was first broken. Adapting the words of my lost-yet-beloved faith, "He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain. Behold, He is making all things new."

This is not, in my experience, how conservative Protestant evangelicals use these words. However, in the decades I practiced Christianity, I slowly found these ideas in the Bible, despite the ludicrously-wrong exegesis practiced in US churches, by reading the texts many, many times. I find a great deal of truth and wisdom in them, considered this way. I hope perhaps my explanation can help you understand why so many people resonate with the message recorded in the Gospels, and the one that Dostoevsky so loved.

gsf_emergency2• 2 years ago

I read the quote in Alyosha's voice, I don't remember if it's really him. I'm by no means a Dostoyevsky expert and I read the book, halfheartedly, a long time ago. So please do your own thinking when I say that Ivan, not Alyosha, is closest to the author's heart.. he wrote about the three brothers because he was trying to resolve the conflicts between (at least) 3 archetypes of the Russian soul! Too humble he was, to try to generalize that to the world, but the downside is, later readers can't help but put in their own interpretations, or selectively quote stuff that aligns with their lonely hearts..

bowsamic4• 2 years ago

I don't find his work to be immortal, in fact I find his writing full of all the worst late 19th century writing cliches, and thus extremely dated.

alivengineer2• 2 years ago

this tbh.

the only reason crime and punishment isnt a short story (which it was planned to be) is that dostoyevsky lost a lot of money drinking and gambling.

so he stretched it out every way he could conseivably do so, as he was paid by content length

sctb• 2 years ago

"[...] Reading him simply makes one realize that stream of consciousness springs not from consciousness but from a word which alters or redirects one’s consciousness."

This has a slight ring of Derrida and/but I find it a very interesting point. The "stream of consciousness" really does seem like a stream of the words themselves, each one in reflection of the previous and anticipation of the next. The flowing is not just in the writer's mind but the reader's as well.

drdaeman2• 2 years ago

Dostoevsky is one of those authors whose works absolutely require deconstructive double reading. :-)

vishkk3• 2 years ago

Nabokov's recommendations: http://wmjas.wikidot.com/nabokov-s-recommendations

I love Dostoevsky too much and am quite happy in my bias and echo chamber of that—he was one of the writers that I read in my early days, and to date, I feel that he changed a lot in me or resonated so much that I can't explain.

I believe Nietzche said this about him "the only psychologist from whom I had something to learn."

And one of my favorite quotes by him:

For, after all, you do grow up, you do outgrow your ideals, which turn to dust and ashes, which are shattered into fragments; and if you have no other life, you just have to build one up out of these fragments. And all the time your soul is craving and longing for something else. And in vain does the dreamer rummage about in his old dreams, raking them over as though they were a heap of cinders, looking in these cinders for some spark, however tiny, to fan it into a flame so as to warm his chilled blood by it and revive in it all that he held so dear before, all that touched his heart, that made his blood course through his veins, that drew tears from his eyes, and that so splendidly deceived him!”

readthenotes1• 2 years ago

And in song:

https://youtu.be/eKfvXBDSiU4?feature=shared

vishkk3• 2 years ago

hahah love it, thank you for sharing!

5-• 2 years ago

to point out what you probably intended, this is appropriately an english version of an early twentieth century russian song.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Those_Were_the_Days_%28song%29

tehnub• 2 years ago

Great song, thanks. I was also reminded of this one https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V2kWUJkRvVs

0xdeadbeefbabe• 2 years ago

So he was a computer enthusiast?

bell-cot• 2 years ago

Obviously a Hemingway fan.

truculent• 2 years ago

Nabokov would have been an incredible online poster. What an incredible list. Thank you for sharing!

billfruit• 2 years ago

Someone should have A list for Gore Vidal, that would be interesting too.

addaon• 2 years ago

This deserves its own post!

vishkk3• 2 years ago

Let me do that!

analog31• 2 years ago

Oddly, many of his favorites for young people were my favorites when I was young.

Rant423• 2 years ago

Amazing list by Nabokov, and "strong opinions" indeed

sexyman482• 2 years ago

[flagged]

EVa5I7bHFq9mnYK2• 2 years ago

Not only English translations :) And the man was a real nazi. Hated Poles, Jews, French, Germans - anyone not Russian. This is where Dugin, Putin and other modern vampires draw inspiration from.

aguaviva2• 2 years ago

Hated Poles, Jews, French, Germans - anyone not Russian.

But that does not make one a Nazi.

Thinking that it does dilutes the discussion.

shkurski_• 2 years ago

I perceive this thread in the same way as the praise of Hanns Johst.

With the perceived potential of separating work from its author being inversely proportional to the amount of attention devoted to both (Raskolnikov attitude towards Poles as something on the surface, though it's infiltrated with Russian chauvinism at a much deeper level).

With overlooking the fact that it is being used as a weapon (together with the unified Russian language created by Pushkin) for erasure of entire cultures. I'd stress this out: this is not a weapon in a museum. We are talking active phase. And the more obscure the relations above are, the higher the penetration rate.

Disappointing.

ConanRus• 2 years ago

As a Russian I can tell you: don't go there. You won't understand Dostoevsky fully without growing up in the Russian culture, full of depression, fatalism and похуизм (I don't give a damn attitude). Reading classic Russian literature is the right way to depression and craziness. Just don't do that.

Dracophoenix• 2 years ago

I've read my fair share of Russian literature, and I never felt depressed from it. If anything works like the Notes from the Underground or the Overcoat reassured me of my sanity in the face of an irrational society and have often confirmed long held yet elusive suspicions I had on how people actually think or behave.

danbolt• 2 years ago

If you’re a young man in your twenties looking for structure and morality in a setting of first-world postmodernity, TBK is an incredible opiate. Much better than alcohol or Call of Duty.

That said, I’m skeptical its wisdom will help us carve out a new future that’s better for everyone. I think Cloud Strife’s journey in the original release of Final Fantasy VII is better-suited to that.

bitcoinmoney• 2 years ago

What’s TBK?

MurizS• 2 years ago

Most likely "The Brothers Karamazov".

hi41• 2 years ago

The Brothers Karamazov

serbuvlad• 2 years ago

I love The Brothers Karamazov so much. I don't think there has ever been a story told that made a better case for being a good person.

I think the most important lesson we have to learn in our modern world is that there aren't good or bad sides.

Most stories told follow the path of the hero's journey, in which the hero obtains some great power and learns to use it for good, generally by destroying some great villain.

In reality, there are no villains and there are no heros. There are only good and bad actions. And every person does bad actions everyday, out of ignorance, out of convenience, out of ego, out if ideological allegiance. There is also very little in the way of greatness in every day life.

And there is no other cure than to do what Alyosha does. Try to do good. Alyosha does not judge anyone, he has genuine compassion even for the worst of men. Alyosha has no great skill, is not endowed with any great intelligence and is sometimes socially awkward. He sometimes gets his affairs out of order and makes mistakes. He is not an island: he relies on the moral support of his mentor (the famous monk) for a good part of the book, and is devastated when he dies. And he never does anything which could not have been done by anyone else.

But he, at every point, chooses to do the good, as well as he can. At one point, during a time when one of his brothers was wanted for murder and his whole family drama is in full force, while going around town trying to do things to help, he sees a kid which is being bullied by other kids which are throwing stones at him. Alyosha shoos away the other kids, and inquires into this lone kid's drama. He then spends the rest of the day helping the kid, with his problems, instead of rushing to fix his own. It never even occurs to him not to act in this way.

And it not only helps the community for him to act in this way. But it also, as it were, helps his own "soul". While other characters go insane, or have manic episodes, Alyosha can bear the tragedies because of his own conduct.

HDThoreaun• 2 years ago

I dont know, I came away basically agreeing with Ivan's ideology. Was a pretty depressing experience personally just to further confirm my ideas of society fracturing without religion without really offering a realistic replacement.

hnthrowaway0328• 2 years ago

For whoever appreciates Dostoevsky, I recommend reading Lev Shestov.

begueradj2• 2 years ago

Personally I believe that Kahlil Gibran's work is also immortal.

lr0• 2 years ago

I got the privilege to read some of his original Arabic works (being Arabic speaker). Although he used to write directly in English, his works in Arabic are definitely immortal.

begueradj2• 2 years ago

Indeed, reading him in Arabic is a different and better world.

darepublic• 2 years ago

Was introduced to Dostoyevsky by my girlfriend in high school. Read Crime and Punishment and was enraptured by it. Happy memories

alivengineer2• 2 years ago

Signed up to write this comment. Hi folks.

It appals me how much praise dostoyevsky and such still get, without any attention to a lot of the context around it.

The prime reason his (and of most other russian writers) legacy and importance to world culture is the fact that they were backed by an empire. Try and think, for once, why you tend to know about Dostoevsky and Tolstoy, but (usually) don't know about literally everyone else from east europe?

The answer is simple. While russian culture was supported, promoted, encouraged. The culture of their colonies was suppressed, imprisoned, executed.

It's about time Dostoevsky and Gorky and so many other russian writers get the same treatment Kipling did.

Dostoevsky was a horrible person, a staunch chauvinist who denied the basic existence of other nations and cultures on then russian territory, stating they're just an obstacle on russia's imperial path.

And not only were many of them plain bad during their life, their art was (and is) weaponized, to manufacture an image of russia that lifts it from the evil things they did (and are doing) into being something interesting, something positive. To erase cultures of those russia enslaved from the map of the world.

It's "Crime and punishment" scaled up -- fuck the victim, they're not interesting. Just look at the murderer though -- fuck the fact he axed a granny, look how deep his soul is!

Joseph Brodsky, who is so complimented in the article, also wrote one of the most filthy and nauseating poems i ever read (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Independence_of_Ukraine). Before the author continues with their adorement of both Brodsky and Dostoevsky, i highly recommend they read that one. And Dostoevsky's statements regarding Poles, Ukrainians and Serbs.

Such ignorance to the reality of who these people were is disgusting.

suggestion• 2 years ago

I feel the same way about Marx

throaway250• 2 years ago

It's always the martyr-complex guys who love Dostoyevsky.

What made Dostoevsky's work immortal

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