Next reading group meeting Wednesday 9 December

The next meeting of the Crime and Punishment reading group will be Wednesday 9 December at 16:00 in SR10, Emmanuel Centre, Woodhouse Lane, Leeds.

This week we will focus on the police investigation and Raskolnikov’s interaction with Porfiry Petrovich.

If you missed the first week, you can still join, in person, on the blog or on Twitter! It’s recommended to read at least up to the end of Part III of the novel for this week.

Thoughts on Part I of Crime and Punishment: Raskolnikov’s responsibility

I remember when I first read Crime and Punishment, as a student in the early 1990s. The novel seemed to take over my life: I immersed myself in reading it almost to the exclusion of my other studies, because it felt like I couldn’t argue with it, it left me no choice. Whenever I left my room, I felt hunted and kept looking over my shoulder, and the world around me seemed bleak and ugly.

Raskolnikov too finds his world bleak and ugly, and as he moves towards committing his crime, he feels increasingly like he has no choice. Events, like the urgency of his sister’s impending marriage, the fortuitous discovery of when the pawnbroker will be home alone, arrange themselves to suggest he is fated to carry out his murder, until he feels as if his clothes have got caught in the flywheel of a machine and he is being pulled inexorably into it (Chapter 6).

But though he is keenly aware of signs which seem to impel him towards murder, he is less aware of the alternatives that present themselves to him. Without thinking, almost without noticing, he commits two acts of charity: firstly towards the Marmeladov family (Chapter 2) , and secondly towards the vulnerable girl on the street (Chapter 4). He has a choice of how to respond to the ugly, fragmenting society, involving compassion rather than violence. Raskolnikov dismisses these moments as taking the wrong, indeed an irrational, decision – but at least he recognizes his freedom of choice in these moments. On the other hand, he justifies his impending crime as a removal of his free will.

Many critics and commentators discuss why it is important to read Dostoevsky today. For me personally, perhaps his value is to remind us that we cannot say we do not have a choice.

Save the date! Leeds Dostoevsky Day 19 February 2016

We look forward to inviting you to our Dostoevsky Day on Friday 19 February 2016 at the University of Leeds, featuring discussion, films, games and more.

Confirmed speaker: Dr Oliver Ready, St Antony’s College, Oxford, translator of a new edition of Crime and Punishment (Penguin, 2014).

More details to follow soon.

Open to all!

Crime and Punishment reading group

Klodt_Michail_Petrovich_-_Raskolnikov_and_Marmeladov2016 will be the 150th anniversary of the first publication of Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment. To celebrate this milestone, we are hosting a reading group on the novel. The group is open to anyone, and we hope it will be a friendly space where people can share their impressions of this wonderful book.

You can find Crime and Punishment for free in downloadable format or to read online here:
https://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/d/dostoyevsky/d72c/index.html

There will be three meetings in person at the University of Leeds:
Where: Seminar room 10 in the Emmanuel Centre on Woodhouse Lane
Dates: Wednesday 18th November, Wednesday 9 December, Wednesday 27 January
Time: 4.00pm-5.00pm

In between these meetings, the discussion will continue via the Dostoevsky Now blog and on Twitter.

Please join us, in person, online, or both!