![]() ![]() Widespread disillusion with liberalism emerged in France during the July Monarchy (1830-48) of Louis Philippe, for whom liberalism meant the rule of the self-made rich. Raskolnikov is shown to be a confused hybrid, both reflecting liberal thought and rebelling against it. It reflected a wave of reaction against economic liberalism, not unlike that which has occurred during 2016. One of the first psychological novels, Crime and Punishment is also deeply political. ![]() His split personality inspired Stevenson’s story of Jekyll and Hyde. Raskolnikov’s name means “split in two” or “schismatic”. ![]() The reader sees how Raskonikov has become desensitised and how his ideas (influenced by his reading of Hegel and Bentham) have unintended consequences. Raskolnikov kills her, too, without a second thought. But during the murder, the victim’s kind and vulnerable sister walks in. Besides, to him the pawnbroker is a “louse” whose murder will be a net benefit to society. He does it partly to prove an idea that he has written about: that exceptional people, like Napoleon, can be above the law. The plot hinges on how, one summer’s day in St Petersurg, a penniless student, Rodion Raskolnikov, murders an old woman pawnbroker. ![]() An incredibly influential novel, Crime and Punishment also has a particularly contemporary political significance. It is now 150 years since the publication of Fyodor Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment. ![]()
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