Product Description

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #153117 in Books
• Published on: 1998-03-05
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 576 pages

Synopsis
Crime and Punishment is the story of a murder committed on principle, of a killer who wishes by his action to set himself outside and above society. A novel of fearful tension, physical, and psychological, it is pervaded by Dostoevsky's sinister evocation of St Petersburg, yet in the life of its gloomy tenements and drink-shops provides moments of wild humour. Crime and Punishment was marked by Dostoevsky's own harrowing experiences. He had himself undergone interrogation and trial, and was condemned to death, a sentence commuted to penal servitude. In prison he was particularly impressed by one hardened murderer who seemed to have attained a spiritual equilibrium beyond good and evil: yet witnessing the misery of other convicts also engendered in Dostoevsky a belief in the Christian idea of salvation through suffering.

About the Author
Richard Peace is Emeritus Professor of Russian at Bristol University. He is the author of Dostoevsky: An Examination of his Major Novels.

Customer Reviews

Deep and relevant
Crime and Punishment beautifully captures moods and moments to guide the reader through the book as though we were truly looking through Roskolnikov's eyes. Dostoyevsky understands the danger that lurks in all of us, and the mind's ability to twist and justify actions and thoughts with the greatest of ease if we are thrown off the righteous path. This is reflected beautifully in the most extreme of scenarios that Roskolnikov finds himself in. It would be a challenge to pick this book up and not finish reading it.

Somewhat lacking...
Basically a story about guilt and redemption written with absolutely compelling characters and depth. The start is tremendously gripping though it starts to lose pace around the last quarter and meanders somewhat. The reason why I score this lowly is because the ideas placed out are a bit thin on the ground when you look at it objectively (I've read shorter books which have a much wider theme), you can't help but think that it could've been written in half the pages and for all the great character's in place, they fail to live up to there potential, that the story doesn't make enough use of them. It would be great if more actually happened as I felt a lot of what did happen was largely (and ironically) inconsequential. It's a little bit tragic that the main protagonist is a bit, to use the modern term, emo.

An unenjoyable read
I found this book to be unenjoyable. I could appreciate that it is very well written and would have been very ahead of it's time but also found it to be unnecessarily drawn out and convoluted.

It's claimed that, "The genius of the book is the commentary on many aspects of life" but I think it would be far better if the author could have intertwinned this with an interesting plot.