How does /lit/ feel about Brothers Karamazov, or Dostoevsky more

>>9550516
I'd say his acclaim more so comes from his ability to explore the "human condition" through his characters. Though religious, cultural, and political subject matter are present in spades, when Dosto gets on about something such as love or anguish is usually where the true beauty comes in his work

>>9550516
Given the western countries are heavily influenced by Christianity it is one reason. On the other hand his works show the fragility of the human mind and deep psychological writing within dialogues and characterizations are the other reasons. Even Freud praised the works of Dostoyevsky.

If you would've read from the start - meaning with his first grand novel - then you wouldn't even start this thread. How can you see the beauty of The Brothers Karamazov if you never saw his development throughout his previous novels.

Reading through Dostoyevsky's Wiki-page would help you to see how borderline-biographical some characters of his are too.

>>9550540
I was just gonna say this, Dostoevsky's characters are very often manifestations of his own faults and the exploration of them in different societies, for example the lower class college dropout, hanging around with prostitutes and people in tenement housing in Crime & Punishment, and the upper class idle society of The Idiot.

I think it's a pretty accepted thing to follow Dostoevsky chronologocially if you want a fuller and better understanding of him as an author and his progression throughout his work.

But aside from all that, yeah he's a bit mad on Christianity. Dostoevsky was even put up to a firing squad before being saved at the last minute and sent only to exile instead as a result of his protesting censorship, so he's a bit of a sensation alright

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>>9550516
>Is D respected because he vindicates Christianity in his work?
No.

>>9550559
To be honest, if you escaped a firing squad like that, you'd probably believe in some divine intervention. I know I wouldn't be immune to that kind of thinking if I survived something like that.

>>9550516
I find dostoyevsky incredibly boring. I think it might have something to do with it being a translation and from a culture completely alien to me, sort of like how I can't get into Jane Austin novels. That said, after reading the gulag archipelago I feel compelled to try again because of how Solzhenitsyn refers to dostoyevsky and tolstoy.

Also, I hate how Russian writers seem to always use a characters full name.

>>9551184
>Russian writers
You mean Russians?

>>9551184
Dostoevsky actually uses a lot of Russian nicknames for his characters, especially in Crime & Punishment. It seems to throw people off who are new to Dostoevsky but some editions will include notes showing which character has which nicknames.

>>9551184
Dostoevsky wrote hurriedly, and among the major Russian writers, I'd say that he put the least style in his prose (Nabokov criticized him for this). It gives his work a sort of bumpy, unrefined quality, which might have been what put you off.

>>9551534
Ok thank god you said this

I'm reading C&P and everybody is called like 3 different things and their names are all so similar and long. I thought I was just being stupid and couldn't keep track of all the characters

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>>9551720
In the Brothers Karamazov, Dostoyevsky actually does something nifty with the nicknames.
Aleksej is called by his nickname Alyosha by nearly everyone, because he's on friendly terms with everyone.
Dmitri is sometimes addressed withhis given name, sometimes with his nickname, which suits Mitja's personality. He has a desire to get along, but a tendency to steer every interaction towards disaster, which results in the people of the city being unsure how to talk with him.
Ivan is rarely addressed by anything other than Ivan, because he distances himself from ither people. Everyone respects him, which isn't something that can be said of Dmitri, but because of the detachment he has imposed upon himself he has very few intimate relationships.
It's a tidy method of elucidating each of the brothers' personality, but it doesn't come across very well because of the cultural barrier.

>>9551876
ah, I see.

I wish I could be knowledgeable enough about every culture to detect these subtexts. Nothing I can do other than read more, I suppose.

I've just stumbled upon a particularly difficult passage in C&P where Razumihin is trying to explain why Nikolay is innocent of a murder but there are all these quotations within quotations and I don't get what's going on

>>9552037
What chapter is that? It has been a while since I've read C&P.

>>9551534
I guess it's like having a character named William and people call him will, Bill, and Bob, just in crylic