Translated by Constance Garnett with an introduction by Anthony
Briggs. Dostoevsky's fascination for mental breakdown and violence
(20 murders in his four main novels) was based on his own life, and
these two unmistakably autobiographical works bear this out. The
House of the Dead is fiction, but based on his four years in a
Siberian prison. An educated upper-class man is condemned to live
among criminals and brutal guards, with arbitrary punishments,
lousy food, disgusting living conditions, hard toil and many
floggings. Somehow he avoids bitterness and recrimination; faith in
humanity survives. With its breadth of characterisation, acute
sense of detail and strong narrative interest, this work can still
shock, entertain and inspire. In The Gambler we see the Russian
community in a German spa town. Drawn to the casino, Alexey becomes
obsessed with roulette. In a gripping story, full of psychological
interest, his growing mania eclipses even his interest in Polina, a
heroine of demonic and vibrant sexuality. Dostoevsky himself was
rescued from a similar gambling obsession by the young stenographer
who took down this work at his dictation and married him soon
afterwards.
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