A few words about Dostoevsky himself may help the English reader to understand his work. Dostoevsky was the son of a doctor. His parents were very hardworking and deeply religious people, but so poor ...

On an exceptionally hot evening early in July a young man came out of the garret in which he lodged in S⁠⸺ Place and walked slowly, as though in hesitation, towards K⁠⸺ bridge. He had successfully avo...

On an exceptionally hot evening early in July a young man came out of the garret in which he lodged in S⁠⸺ Place and walked slowly, as though in hesitation, towards K⁠⸺ bridge. He had successfully avo...

Raskolnikov was not used to crowds, and, as we said before, he avoided society of every sort, more especially of late. But now all at once he felt a desire to be with other people. Something new seeme...

He waked up late next day after a broken sleep. But his sleep had not refreshed him; he waked up bilious, irritable, ill-tempered, and looked with hatred at his room. It was a tiny cupboard of a room ...

His mother’s letter had been a torture to him, but as regards the chief fact in it, he had felt not one moment’s hesitation, even whilst he was reading the letter. The essential question was settled, ...

“Of course, I’ve been meaning lately to go to Razumihin’s to ask for work, to ask him to get me lessons or something⁠ ⁠…” Raskolnikov thought, “but what help can he be to me now? Suppose he gets me le...

Later on Raskolnikov happened to find out why the huckster and his wife had invited Lizaveta. It was a very ordinary matter and there was nothing exceptional about it. A family who had come to the tow...

The door was as before opened a tiny crack, and again two sharp and suspicious eyes stared at him out of the darkness. Then Raskolnikov lost his head and nearly made a great mistake. Fearing the old w...

So he lay a very long while. Now and then he seemed to wake up, and at such moments he noticed that it was far into the night, but it did not occur to him to get up. At last he noticed that it was beg...

So he lay a very long while. Now and then he seemed to wake up, and at such moments he noticed that it was far into the night, but it did not occur to him to get up. At last he noticed that it was beg...

“And what if there has been a search already? What if I find them in my room?” But here was his room. Nothing and no one in it. No one had peeped in. Even Nastasya had not touched it. But heavens! how...

He was not completely unconscious, however, all the time he was ill; he was in a feverish state, sometimes delirious, sometimes half conscious. He remembered a great deal afterwards. Sometimes it seem...

Zossimov was a tall, fat man with a puffy, colourless, clean-shaven face and straight flaxen hair. He wore spectacles, and a big gold ring on his fat finger. He was twenty-seven. He had on a light gre...

This was a gentleman no longer young, of a stiff and portly appearance, and a cautious and sour countenance. He began by stopping short in the doorway, staring about him with offensive and undisguised...

But as soon as she went out, he got up, latched the door, undid the parcel which Razumihin had brought in that evening and had tied up again and began dressing. Strange to say, he seemed immediately t...

An elegant carriage stood in the middle of the road with a pair of spirited grey horses; there was no one in it, and the coachman had got off his box and stood by; the horses were being held by the br...

Raskolnikov got up, and sat down on the sofa. He waved his hand weakly to Razumihin to cut short the flow of warm and incoherent consolations he was addressing to his mother and sister, took them both...

Raskolnikov got up, and sat down on the sofa. He waved his hand weakly to Razumihin to cut short the flow of warm and incoherent consolations he was addressing to his mother and sister, took them both...

Razumihin waked up next morning at eight o’clock, troubled and serious. He found himself confronted with many new and unlooked-for perplexities. He had never expected that he would ever wake up feelin...

“He is well, quite well!” Zossimov cried cheerfully as they entered. He had come in ten minutes earlier and was sitting in the same place as before, on the sofa. Raskolnikov was sitting in the opposit...

At that moment the door was softly opened, and a young girl walked into the room, looking timidly about her. Everyone turned towards her with surprise and curiosity. At first sight, Raskolnikov did no...

Raskolnikov was already entering the room. He came in looking as though he had the utmost difficulty not to burst out laughing again. Behind him Razumihin strode in gawky and awkward, shamefaced and r...

“I don’t believe it, I can’t believe it!” repeated Razumihin, trying in perplexity to refute Raskolnikov’s arguments. They were by now approaching Bakaleyev’s lodgings, where Pulcheria Alexandrovna an...

“Can this be still a dream?” Raskolnikov thought once more. He looked carefully and suspiciously at the unexpected visitor. “Svidrigaïlov! What nonsense! It can’t be!” he said at last aloud in bewilde...

“Can this be still a dream?” Raskolnikov thought once more. He looked carefully and suspiciously at the unexpected visitor. “Svidrigaïlov! What nonsense! It can’t be!” he said at last aloud in bewilde...

It was nearly eight o’clock. The two young men hurried to Bakaleyev’s, to arrive before Luzhin. “Why, who was that?” asked Razumihin, as soon as they were in the street. “It was Svidrigaïlov, that lan...

The fact was that up to the last moment he had never expected such an ending; he had been overbearing to the last degree, never dreaming that two destitute and defenceless women could escape from his ...

Raskolnikov went straight to the house on the canal bank where Sonia lived. It was an old green house of three storeys. He found the porter and obtained from him vague directions as to the whereabouts...

When next morning at eleven o’clock punctually Raskolnikov went into the department of the investigation of criminal causes and sent his name in to Porfiry Petrovitch, he was surprised at being kept w...

When he remembered the scene afterwards, this is how Raskolnikov saw it. The noise behind the door increased, and suddenly the door was opened a little. “What is it?” cried Porfiry Petrovitch, annoyed...

The morning that followed the fateful interview with Dounia and her mother brought sobering influences to bear on Pyotr Petrovitch. Intensely unpleasant as it was, he was forced little by little to ac...

The morning that followed the fateful interview with Dounia and her mother brought sobering influences to bear on Pyotr Petrovitch. Intensely unpleasant as it was, he was forced little by little to ac...

It would be difficult to explain exactly what could have originated the idea of that senseless dinner in Katerina Ivanovna’s disordered brain. Nearly ten of the twenty roubles, given by Raskolnikov fo...

“Pyotr Petrovitch,” she cried, “protect me⁠ ⁠… you at least! Make this foolish woman understand that she can’t behave like this to a lady in misfortune⁠ ⁠… that there is a law for such things.⁠ ⁠… I’l...

Raskolnikov had been a vigorous and active champion of Sonia against Luzhin, although he had such a load of horror and anguish in his own heart. But having gone through so much in the morning, he foun...

Lebeziatnikov looked perturbed. “I’ve come to you, Sofya Semyonovna,” he began. “Excuse me⁠ ⁠… I thought I should find you,” he said, addressing Raskolnikov suddenly, “that is, I didn’t mean anything⁠...

A strange period began for Raskolnikov: it was as though a fog had fallen upon him and wrapped him in a dreary solitude from which there was no escape. Recalling that period long after, he believed th...

A strange period began for Raskolnikov: it was as though a fog had fallen upon him and wrapped him in a dreary solitude from which there was no escape. Recalling that period long after, he believed th...

“Ah these cigarettes!” Porfiry Petrovitch ejaculated at last, having lighted one. “They are pernicious, positively pernicious, and yet I can’t give them up! I cough, I begin to have tickling in my thr...

He hurried to Svidrigaïlov’s. What he had to hope from that man he did not know. But that man had some hidden power over him. Having once recognised this, he could not rest, and now the time had come....

“You know perhaps⁠—yes, I told you myself,” began Svidrigaïlov, “that I was in the debtors’ prison here, for an immense sum, and had not any expectation of being able to pay it. There’s no need to go ...

Raskolnikov walked after him. “What’s this?” cried Svidrigaïlov turning round, “I thought I said⁠ ⁠…” “It means that I am not going to lose sight of you now.” “What?” Both stood still and gazed at one...

He spent that evening till ten o’clock going from one low haunt to another. Katia too turned up and sang another gutter song, how a certain “villain and tyrant” “began kissing Katia.” Svidrigaïlov tre...

The same day, about seven o’clock in the evening, Raskolnikov was on his way to his mother’s and sister’s lodging⁠—the lodging in Bakaleyev’s house which Razumihin had found for them. The stairs went ...

When he went into Sonia’s room, it was already getting dark. All day Sonia had been waiting for him in terrible anxiety. Dounia had been waiting with her. She had come to her that morning, remembering...

Siberia. On the banks of a broad solitary river stands a town, one of the administrative centres of Russia; in the town there is a fortress, in the fortress there is a prison. In the prison the second...

Siberia. On the banks of a broad solitary river stands a town, one of the administrative centres of Russia; in the town there is a fortress, in the fortress there is a prison. In the prison the second...

He was ill a long time. But it was not the horrors of prison life, not the hard labour, the bad food, the shaven head, or the patched clothes that crushed him. What did he care for all those trials an...

The emancipation of the serfs in 1861 is meant. ↩ A religious sect. ↩ Dostoevsky appears to have forgotten that it is after sunset, and that the last time Raskolnikov visited the police office at two ...