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My Belated Book Report on The Brothers Karamazov
The Brothers Karamazov is Fyodor Dostoevsky’s final masterpiece. It offers superb characterization, psychological depth and insight; intrigue, murder, and suspense; great daubs of humor, both madcap broadsides and satirical with a capital slice; that never-ending, cyclonical struggle between faith and reason; a sublimely Slavic melange of love, lust, deception, betrayal, violence, flight, revenge, apostasy, and redemption—capped off by a court trial scene that overrules Perry Mason and, in the renowned chapter The Grand Inquisitor, a full-court press by an impassioned Hierarch against Jesus’ abandonment of mankind to a terrifying freedom and overwhelming spiritual responsibility it neither wanted nor could manage that alone is worth the price of the book.
All right, I didn’t write the paragraph above (stole it from here), but it’s similar to what I would have cribbed from my CliffsNotes had I spent high school reading classics instead of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and the D&D Monster Manual. A few years back I decided to make up for my literature deficit by reading at least one classic a year. Liked Moby Dick, loved The Kalevala, and 2016 was the year I’d finally read the book that smart people have told me to read for decades, The Brothers Karamazov. So what did I think of this, the greatest Russian novel ever written?
Eh. It was a bit of slog.
Fifty-three pages on a philosophical discussion in a monastery. Seventy-five pages on a trial’s closing arguments. Entire chapters written as a single paragraph. Referring to main characters with a blizzard of interchangeable and often unpronounceable names (Alexei Fyodorovich Karamazov, aka, Alyosha, Alyoshka, Alyoshenka, Alyoshechka, Alxeichick, Lyosha, Lyoshenka). Hey, I get the Russkie tendency toward verbosity and depression, but throw me a bone here, Fyodor. Couldn’t you reward your long-suffering reader with a fun ending instead of a sick child’s funeral? At least have Alyosha/Alyoshka/Alyoshenka making out with a buxom Gypsy girl during the wake.
Look, I’m glad I read it. “The Grand Inquisitor” section was impressive. I liked the interplay of faith and reason at the dawn of the scientific age. But the main reason I’m glad I finished The Brothers Karamazov is that I get to brag to people that I read The Brothers Karamazov. I’m dropping this new fact into unrelated conversations. I preface statements about football and pizza with “As Dostoevsky said.” When others admit they never read the book, I give them a sympathetic look and say, “you really must.” And then I soak in their shame at not being a Learned Man of Letters like myself.
But, let’s face it — the book is still a slog. By page 876, Ayn Rand was mumbling, “yo, Fyodor, wrap it up already.” So I have a few suggestions for a Karamazov reboot that will make it a lot more exciting to the modern reader:
- Explosions.
- When the drunken Dmitri walks into the sunlight, he turns into a Sparkly Vampire.
- Drag race through downtown Skotoprigonyevsk.
- At least eight chapters with a “50 Shades of Grushenka” vibe.
- Have a dragon tear through the town market halfway through. Or a spaceship.
- A Quidditch match.
Let me know what you think of the most recent Great Book that you’ve read, or The Brothers Karamazov itself. And if you haven’t read it yet … you really must.
Published in Humor, Literature
I must put a plug in for Gogol’s Dead Souls. Funny book without that dreary philosopy stuff (not that there’s anything wrong). It’s about a guy who goes around the countryside working a scam. Or just read Gogol’s short stories like The Nose, The Overcoat, or Diary of a Madman.
Spillane. You say you’re working your way through the masters, and you don’t mention Mickey Spillane…
Years ago when I had a new baby and two other preschoolers – plus a 2nd grader – I was determined to NOT let my brain turn to mush and decided to read some of the classics. Nursing a newborn gave me lots of sitting time so I decided to tackle Crime and Punishment. I made it through the whole book and am not proud to admit that the only thing I remember is that one guy lived in a garret and there was a character named Alexander Victorovich and another named Victor Alexanderovich (or something like that) and I had to keep flipping back pages to remind myself which was which and wondering if there was a shortage of Russian names for boys.
I’ve read some long books; Bleak House, Gone with the Wind, the Bible, but they had the advantage of at least being interesting
Did you read out loud? That way the li’l nipper can say truthfully, at some point in the future, “Nah, I knocked out TBK years ago…”
You read the brothers karamazov and have not yet read Crime and Punishment??
hmm…
I see you included a shot from the movie. I’ve read the book but never seen the movie. Can anyone tell me if it’s worth watching? I love that Shatner is in it. That alone almost makes it worth my while.
I was a German lit major in college (I know, I know). My favorite German professor was a hardcore Thomas Mann junkie; I’ve read (in German) almost everything Mann ever wrote. I enjoyed The Magic Mountain; it’s a bit like Fellini on downers.
Buddenbrooks, on the other hand …
*** spoiler alert ***
… is about a north German merchant family that starts out wealthy and influential. Within a thirty-year period, most of them behave like complete scumbags and die richly-deserved wretched deaths, miserable and unloved. The ones who are left lose both their money and their social position, and end up (gasp!) living like ordinary non-rich people (the horror!).
I had several European friends who thought of Buddenbrooks as a heart-rending epic tragedy; one friend told me she cried at the scene where the family is forced to sell their mahogany furniture and treasured antiques in order to pay their debts. The heart-rending part (apparently) is that the remaining family members have to work for a living like the lower-class people they’ve always looked down on.
I finished Buddenbrooks and thought, “That’s it? They have to work for a living now? That’s the tragedy?!”
It’s a really, really wordy Horatio Alger novel in reverse. [shudder]
No, it was the digression on manufacturing imitation jet jewelry! Also, possibly buttons.
Good stuff, and plenty more where it came from, if I’m remembering rightly.
Nursing leaves me sitting plenty, but not with enough free handage to read a novel the way I’m used to doing it. Poems, though, taking up only a page or so, are easier. So yes, I’ve already inflicted recitals of Tennyson, Yeats, and Stevens on the tyke. Not because he gets anything out of it, I bet, but because I’m supposed to read something aloud to him, doesn’t really matter what, so might as well pick something I enjoy.
Crime and Punishment is bleak but enjoyable, in the same way that gritty US crime shows like the wire are. I’ve only read the first few pages of Bros K.
If you want your Slavic lit with abit of humour then I suggest you try Mikhael Bulgakov, but don’t take on Master and Magerita first up, instead look at A Dogs Heart which runs at an easy 100 pages or so. Then you can tell your friends that you’re swallowing Russian novels like nobody’s business!
as for Moby Dick, good start and finish, horrible middle. Needs to be shortened by about 500 pages.
Art of War. That’s a book that speaks to me.
@jongabriel
Having read the book, the movie version is a must see. Shatner as a humble young man of faith, Yul Brenner’s scenery chewing, and they gave the brothers a happy ending.
The ending of the book was such a downer.
Recently read HG Wells “The Time Machine”. The 1960 movie was surprisingly faithful. although the Time Traveler was a bit of a putz. I can’t forgive his ineptitude getting Weena killed. I refuse to spoiler tag works over a century old.
Also read “Dune” finally. Quite the slog, I only finished it by forcing myself to read a chapter a day. I don’t really get what others see in it.
I’d make a similar case for Madame Bovary. It might seem like a thin plot (although not spread over nearly as many pages), but behind that are actually some really thought-provoking things about expectations, reality, and what can happen when those two don’t meet. That and I love the style of Flaubert’s writing.
The first & best Strategy guide–which everyone still ignores. A must for War, Career, and *looks over shoulder for wife* Marriage.
Yeah, stupid old Dostoevsky! Thanks, Jon, for the review. I’m sure your last line will inspire countless new readers.
I read Crime and Punishment last year, Cancer Ward and A Year in the Life the year before, The Underground the year before, and Anna Karenina this month. I have enjoyed them all and am looking forward to The Brothers Karamazov which I plan to read in October. I agree with @freesmith that the best part of AK is the stories of the minor characters, I think Levin and Kitty are the center of the book.
Gone with the Wind? ugh, worst book in the English language. The New York Times loved it, of course. ’nuff said.
Wait a sec. How could GwtW beat out DH Lawrence’s scintillating prose? I am not even sure the DHL I was forced to read was even the worst of it – was pretty bad, though.
Never read it, but had always assumed the two-line summary of that novel would be
Madame Bovary
had an ovary.
If it’s not, please don’t tell me. I think I’d rather live in a world in which it was.
All I remember about reading Crime and Punishment in high school was that it was both. I’m going to have to take another run at it now that I’m no longer a callow youth.
Oh, I think I’ve read a few that were worse. I should be able to quit a book that turns out bad, but I’m trying to prove my mother’s “you never finish what you start” complaints wrong and usually slog on to the bitter end. I’m not saying Gone With the Wind is great literature. Just making a comment on length.
Wuthering Heights taught me to avoid anything by the Brontes. Return of the Native taught me the same re Thomas Hardy.
@midge
Four word summary of “The Brothers Karamazov:”
The butler did it.
I’ve read much of Dostoevsky save The Adolescent. I greatly appreciate his work, though I do recognize it’s pretty weighty. I’ve heard of people who claim to have read through The Brothers Karamazov on a Saturday. I think they are filthy liars.
Though “if there is no God, then everything is permissable” is a major theme of the novel, I always took the Elder’s conclusion from his autobiographical narrative “life is meant to be a joy” to be the greatest takeaway for me.
I never recommend Karamazov to new Dostoevsky readers. I started with Notes from Underground. I highly recommend reader The Gambler first. That’s probably the best novel for a new Dostoevsky reader to start reading.
@exjon you did the literary equivalent of going to the gym and trying to bench press three hundred pounds your first day.
GwtW takes the prize not for its prose, which is good, but for the evil of its ideas – one long apology for slavery, Andersonville, the KKK, etc, all gussied up in a romance between a racist murderer and a vacuous airhead.
If bad prose was the standard, no list would be complete without Beckett’s Worstward Ho, which title at least gives fair warning of what the reader is in for.
Gone with the Wind is not one long apology for slavery. I have never seen that.
Length isn’t bad. Seth’s A Suitable Boy is nearly 1500 pages, which makes C&P, TBK and AK all seem like pikers, and I think the longest book I’ve read in a single volume, the Bible excepted, but is simply brilliant. On the other hand, Beckett’s Worstward Ho, less than 50 small pages double spaced with wide margins, is at least mercifully short.
The only book I can think of off the top of my head that compares in badness to GwtW is The English Patient.
:-)
At least he didn’t start with Proust, he could have hurt himself.
Apology in which sense?
Of course it is. There are countless references to how well the slaves are treated and how helpless and childlike they are without the benevolence of their masters. To be more precise, it is a proponent of The Lost Cause ideology; the rest of it is the slime inside that beribboned package.