Books are often accused these days of being “over-written”, but rarely, if ever, “under-written”. Brevity and concision, even to the point of sparseness, seem to be valued for their own sake, and, if my forays around the net are anything to go by, “could have done with an editor” is a frequent criticism – as [...]
Posts Tagged ‘Dostoyevsky’
7 Aug
Dostoyevsky’s “Demons”
My rediscovery of Dostoyevsky continues. I first read this novel as a teenager, well over thirty years ago now, in David Magarshack’s translation. He had translated the title as The Devils (Ian Katz, whose translation is currently published by Oxford World Classics, also translates the title as The Devils), while the most recent translators, Robert [...]
7 Jul
People don’t do such things!
At the end of Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler, when it is revealed what Hedda has done, Judge Brack says: “But people don’t do such things!” And on that note of incredulity, the curtain descends. It is very daring to end the play on that note – especially a play such as this, which, despite its various [...]
28 May
Looking back on “The Brothers Karamazov”
It is now about six months since I finished The Brothers Karamazov, and, although I have read some top drawer stuff since, it continues to haunt my mind. And yet, if someone were to ask me if I liked it, I really wouldn’t know what to answer. Looking back over the posts I put up here [...]
26 Mar
What should children read?
Education secretary Michael Gove thinks children should read 50 books a year. What a strange thing to say! The obvious points have mostly all been made. Alan Garner, quite rightly, questions the advisability of “turning books into numbers”. Also, many can’t help wondering why this minister who wants children to read more is part of [...]
8 Jan
A Karamazov Diary: 12 – Retrospect
I finished this over the Christmas break, and I now find myself, somewhat to my surprise, missing it: I had become quite accustomed to entering that curious fictional world Dostoyevsky presented, a world so unlike any other I have encountered, whether in fiction or in real life. Not that Dostoyevsky’s fictional world is completely unrelated [...]
20 Dec
A Karamazov Diary: 11 – Presences
The 19th century is usually regarded as the high-water mark of the realist novel, but I don’t know that it makes much sense to regard The Brothers Karamazov from such a perspective. One can do so, of course, but viewed from a strictly realist perspective, the novel is bound to emerge, I think, as deeply [...]
19 Dec
A Karamazov Diary: 10 – Ivan
The Brothers Karamazov is, on one level, a thriller with many unexpected twists and turns in the plot. But it is not possible to discuss the character of Ivan without giving away some of these twists and turns. So if you haven’t yet read the book, but plan to, and don’t want the twists of [...]
18 Dec
A Karamazov Diary: 9 – Alyosha
Dostoyevsky states quite clearly at the very start that Alyosha is the hero, the principal protagonist of the novel, but I doubt too many readers can qute see it this way. It is not of course the first time that Dostoyevsky had attempted to depict a perfectly good, even saintly, person: there had been Prince [...]
17 Dec
A Karamazov Diary: 8 – Children
The subplot in The Brothers Karamazov concerning children seems to be tacked on almost as a sort of afterthought, so it’s a bit surprising to read that the entire novel was initially intended to be primarily about children. Obviously, Dostoyevsky’s conception changed radically, but the idea of writing about children, however imperfectly realised in the [...]
