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What made Dostoevsky's work immortal

by simplegeek on 11/22/24, 2:59 PM with 159 comments

• by vishkk on 11/22/24, 4:30 PM

  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!”

• by rrherr on 11/22/24, 4:01 PM

  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...

• by beoberha on 11/22/24, 3:40 PM

  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 :)

• by danbolt on 11/22/24, 10:15 PM

  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.

• by alivengineer on 11/23/24, 6:15 PM

  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.

• by ruthmarx on 11/22/24, 3:55 PM

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

• by sctb on 11/22/24, 4:18 PM

  > "[...] 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.

• by ConanRus on 11/22/24, 9:41 PM

  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.

• by shkurski_ on 11/22/24, 6:56 PM

  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.

• by fumeux_fume on 11/22/24, 3:43 PM

  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.

• by begueradj on 11/23/24, 6:21 AM

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

• by darepublic on 11/23/24, 5:56 PM

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

• by hnthrowaway0328 on 11/23/24, 3:48 AM

  For whoever appreciates Dostoevsky, I recommend reading Lev Shestov.

• by kristjankalm on 11/22/24, 3:25 PM

  “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...

• by totaldude87 on 11/22/24, 3:48 PM

  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..

• by bowsamic on 11/22/24, 4:10 PM

  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.

• by alangou on 11/22/24, 4:09 PM

  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.

• by greenie_beans on 11/22/24, 3:17 PM

  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.

• by SeattleAltruist on 11/22/24, 3:43 PM

  @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?

• by sexyman48 on 11/22/24, 6:37 PM

  [flagged]