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The Idiot (Paperback, Reissue)
Fyodor Dostoevsky; Translated by Constance Garnett; Introduction by Agnes Cardinal; Notes by Agnes Cardinal; Series edited by Keith Carabine
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R143
R110
Discovery Miles 1 100
Save R33 (23%)
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Ships in 9 - 15 working days
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Translated by Constance Garnett, with an Introduction and Notes by
Agnes Cardinal, Honorary Senior Lecturer in Comparative Literature
at the University of Kent. Prince Myshkin returns to Russia from an
asylum in Switzerland. As he becomes embroiled in the frantic
amatory and financial intrigues which centre around a cast of
brilliantly realised characters and which ultimately lead to
tragedy, he emerges as a unique combination of the Christian ideal
of perfection and Dostoevsky's own views, afflictions and manners.
His serene selflessness is contrasted with the worldly qualities of
every other character in the novel. Dostoevsky supplies a harsh
indictment of the Russian ruling class of his day who have created
a world which cannot accomodate the goodness of this idiot.
Poverty-stricken and cut off from society, former law student
Rodion Romanovich Raskolnikov leads a desolate life in a dreary
little room in St Petersburg. Having abandoned all hopes of
sustaining himself through work, he now obsesses over the idea of
changing his fortunes through an extreme act of violence: the
killing of an elderly pawnbroker. His mind baulks at the horror of
his plan, but when he hears that his sister Dunya is about to agree
to a loveless marriage in order to escape the advances of her
employer, his disgust for the world becomes unbounded, and his
feelings of rebellion and revenge push him closer and closer to the
edge of the precipice. A masterpiece of psychological insight,
Dostoevsky's 1866 novel features some of its author's most
memorable characters - from the temperamental protagonist
Raskolnikov to the amoral sensualist Svidrigailov and the immoral
lawyer Luzhin. Presented here in a sparkling new translation by
Roger Cockerell, Crime and Punishment is a towering work in Russian
nineteenth-century fiction and a landmark of world literature.
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The Idiot
Fyodor Dostoevsky
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R1,161
Discovery Miles 11 610
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Ships in 12 - 17 working days
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With an Introduction and Notes by David Rampton, Department of
English, University of Ottowa. Notes from Underground and Other
Stories is a comprehensive collection of Dostoevsky's short
fiction. Many of these stories, like his great novels, reveal his
special sympathy for the solitary and dispossessed, explore the
same complex psychological issues and subtly combine rich
characterization and philosophical meditations on the (often) dark
areas of the human psyche, all conveyed in an idiosyncratic blend
of deadly seriousness and wild humour. In Notes from Underground,
the Underground Man casually dismantles utilitarianism and
celebrates in its stead a perverse but vibrant masochism. A
Christmas Tree and a Wedding recounts the successful pursuit of a
young girl by a lecherous old man. In Bobok, one Ivan Ivanovitch
listens in on corpses gossiping in a cemetery and ends up deploring
their depravity. In A Gentle Spirit, the narrator describes his
dawning recognition that he is responsible for his wife's suicide.
In short, as a commentator on spiritual stagnation, Dostoevsky has
no equal.
"Mesmerizingly good ... the best, truest translation of
Dostoevsky's masterpiece into English. It's a magnificent, almost
terrifying achievement of translation, one that makes its
predecessors, however worthy, seem safe and polite."-STEVE
DONAGHUE, Open Letters Monthly
After spending several years in a sanatorium recovering from an
illness that caused him to lose his memory and ability to reason,
Prince Myshkin arrives in St Petersburg and is at once confronted
with the stark realities of life in the Russian capital - from
greed, murder and nihilism to passion, vanity and love. Mocked for
his childlike naivety yet valued for his openness and
understanding, Prince Myshkin finds himself entangled with two
women in a position he cannot bring himself to resolve. Dostoevsky,
who wrote that in the character of Prince Myshkin he hoped to
portray a "wholly virtuous man", shows the workings of the human
mind and our relationships with others in all their complex and
contradictory nature. Populated by an unforgettable cast of
characters, from the beautiful, self-destructive Nastasya
Filippovna to the dangerously obsessed Rogozhin and the radical
student Ippolit, The Idiot is one of Dostoevsky's most personal and
intense works of fiction.
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The Karamazov Brothers (Paperback)
Fyodor Dostoevsky; Translated by Constance Garnett; Introduction by A.D.P. Briggs; Series edited by Keith Carabine
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R157
R126
Discovery Miles 1 260
Save R31 (20%)
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Ships in 9 - 15 working days
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Translated by Constance Garnett, with an Introduction by A. D. P.
Briggs. As Fyodor Karamazov awaits an amorous encounter, he is
violently done to death. The three sons of the old debauchee are
forced to confront their own guilt or complicity. Who will own to
parricide? The reckless and passionate Dmitri? The corrosive
intellectual Ivan? Surely not the chaste novice monk Alyosha? The
search reveals the divisions which rack the brothers, yet
paradoxically unite them. Around the writhings of this one
dysfunctional family Dostoevsky weaves a dense network of social,
psychological and philosophical relationships. At the same time he
shows - from the opening 'scandal' scene in the monastery to a
personal appearance by an eccentric Devil - that his dramatic
skills have lost nothing of their edge. The Karamazov Brothers,
completed a few months before Dostoevsky's death in 1881, remains
for many the high point of his genius as novelist and chronicler of
the modern malaise. It cast a long shadow over D. H. Lawrence,
Thomas Mann, Albert Camus, and other giants of twentieth-century
European literature.
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Notes from Underground (Paperback)
Fyodor Dostoevsky; Translated by Kyril Zinovieff, Jenny Hughes
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R210
R156
Discovery Miles 1 560
Save R54 (26%)
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Ships in 9 - 15 working days
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The unnamed narrator of the novel, a former government official,
has decided to retire from the world and lead a life of inactivity
and contemplation. His fiercely bitter, cynical and witty monologue
ranges from general observations and philosophical musings to
memorable scenes from his own life, including his obsessive plans
to exact revenge on an officer who has shown him disrespect and a
dramatic encounter with a prostitute. Seen by many as the first
existentialist novel and showcasing the best of Dostoevsky's dry
humour, Notes from Underground was a pivotal moment in the
development of modern literature and has inspired countless
novelists, thinkers and film-makers.
A seemingly well-reasoned justification of murder comes to pieces
as the murderer is forced to confront the true nature of his crime.
After much thought Rodion Raskolnikov determines that certain
special people deserve the right to step outside of normal law and
order to accomplish difficult deeds for the good of others and even
humanity as a whole. Trapped in desperate poverty, he justifies his
plan to rob and kill a rich, unpopular pawnbroker, reasoning that
he will take the money, survive and go on to do good things for
others. The terrible act of murder, and the unstoppable cascade of
events that follow, throw Raskolnikov into a nightmare of mental
unbalance and moral torment. One situation after another arises
that drives home his guilt and shows how his brutal act has
resulted in nothing but destruction and pain. A surprise visit from
family and a policeman who seems teasingly, sardonically aware of
his guilt thrust Raskolnikov into a position where he can't tell if
even confession will supply meaningful redemption. First published
in 1866, Crime and Punishment stands as one of the most acclaimed
novels of all time and remains unsurpassed in its penetrating
psychology and raw glimpses of a mind wracked by moral confusion
and fundamental questions of how to do the right thing. With an
eye-catching new cover, and professionally typeset manuscript, this
edition of Crime and Punishment is both modern and readable.
"It may seem paradoxical to speak of such insights as liberating,
or to find in the Underground Man's impassioned rejection of
rational humanitarianism a call to arms. Yet each age we live
through as individuals demands a certain kind of book- just as each
era thieves the last with a magpie's lust for the gewgaws of
thought. Oddly enough, now I come to look at Notes again- and
examine it in the round- I discover that my revised impression of
it as a text at once jejune and cynical, callow as well as wise, is
not, perhaps, too far from reality." -Will Self ""(Dostoevsky)...
is the man more than any other who has created modern prose, and
intensified it to its present-day pitch." -James Joyce Notes from
the Underground is Fyodor Dostoevsky's ninth novel, and considered
to be one of the first examples of the existential novel. In this
radically inventive work, an alienated former minor administrator
in nineteenth-century Russia has broken away from society and
withdrawn into an underground identity. With its piercing insight
into political, social, and moral issues, this classic is one of
the most provocative work of literature ever written. In the first
half of the novel, the unnamed narrator, a cynical recluse in
1860's St. Petersburg, attacks the ideologies of inherent laws of
self-interest; he is crippled with self-loathing, and bound by his
contempt of certain political attitudes of his day. He welcomes any
psychic or physical pain in his life as he believe it rails against
the complacency of modern society. The second half, entitled
"Apropos of the Wet Snow", the narrator relates his alienated
relationships he experiences with others, including old school
chums and a prostitute named Liza, who is only demeaned in his
misanthropic mind. A singular document of the depravity of human
consciousness, this is one of the most powerful pieces of
literature ever written. With an eye-catching new cover, and
professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of Notes from the
Underground is both modern and readable.
The best translation of Crime and Punishment currently available...
An especially faithful re-creation...with a coiled-spring kinetic
energy... Don't miss it' Washington Post Consumed by the idea of
his own special destiny, immured in poverty and deprivation,
Rashkolnikov is drawn to commit a terrible crime. In the aftermath,
Rashkolnikov is dogged by madness, guilt and a calculating
detective, and a feverish cat-and-mouse game unfolds. The only hope
for redemption, if Rashkolnikov can but recognise it, lies in the
virtuous and faithful Sonya. TRANSLATED BY RICHARD PEVEAR AND
LARISSA VOLOKHONSKY VINTAGE CLASSICS RUSSIAN SERIES - sumptuous
editions of the greatest books to come out of Russia during the
most tumultuous period in its history.
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