Crime and Punishment, Part Three

No surprise: Razumihin is in love with Dounia. You could see this one coming a mile away. He escorted Dounia and her mother home, checked in (overly-solicitously) on Raskolnikov, and generally demonstrated his willingness to please. His regret the next morning when he sobered up was expected as well. His embarrassment at the start of Part Three was cute, and Dounia found it endearing. I think (hope) they’ll end up together.

The narrative became more traditional in the sense that we’ve moved outside the limited narrator of Raskolnikov’s mind and into third person omniscient. Dostoevsky seems satisfied to have established the frame of mind of his protagonist sufficiently so that he can now cause things to happen within that framework. I find it clever that all the characters are concerned about so many different things: the murder, Raskolnikov’s health, money, Luzhin, love, etc.. Their conversations and perspectives are engagingly complicated, especially Dounia and Raskolnikov. They share a particularly close relationship, and Dounia strikes me as very mature for her age. She’s, what, eighteen? Twenty? Speaking of her, she’s starting to fall for Razumihin, though she doesn’t want to admit it. She was dismayed when he spoke well (albeit somewhat ambiguously) about Luzhin. Whatever her initial reasons for accepting Luzhin’s proposal, she now feels honor-bound, in part, to stay the course. I found it telling, however, when she called Luzhin a “contemptible slanderer” to the dismay of her mother. She certainly was shaken when Raskolnikov critiqued Luzhin’s letter. I think that was the first indication that she was not entirely committed to her relationship with Luzhin. That relationship is doomed. Matter of time.

The mother, by the way, is weak and not the sharpest pencil in the box. Raskolnikov tortures her with his behavior: she does not have half the wit she needs to understand him. I liked his response to comment that “everything you do is good.” “Don’t be too sure,” he tells her. He’s just aching for a punishment.

I liked the fact that Sonia came to visit. Her awkwardness was so cute! Raskolnikov is attracted to that sort of needy girl, as evidenced by his betrothal to that troglodyte, the landlady’s daughter. Sonia will be his savior in the end.

I loved the conversation with Porfiry! And the presence of Zametov, though he hardly did anything more than snort, was a creative complication to the scene. But clearly, Porfiry did not know that Raskolnikov was going to be there at that time and thus could not have invited Zametov in order to “trap” Raskolnikov, so his (Raskolnikiov’s) worry about Zametov’s presence was unnecessary. It was purely a coincidence. I was sweating through the conversation, especially since Raskolnikov does not seem to want to get caught now and is much more lucid. (BTW, Raskolnikov is now much more calculating in his responses to people, and his thought process betrays a great deal of deliberation.) However, I think he’s really just interested in the challenge of it all. He seemed actually to enjoy the conversation about the nature of criminals with Porfiry, and he rose – admirably – to the challenge of Porfiry’s final question about the painters at the flat. (His response was awesome! I have so much more respect for Raskolnikov as a thinker after his response to Porfiry’s inquiry.) Also, he commits this heinous crime, receives virtually no personal gain as a result, drops a ton of hints as to his guilt left and right, but tries desperately to avoid detection. He is tortured by the crime immensely, yet he puts himself in the position of having to extricate himself from several self-inflicted implications. He’s either testing the system to see if he can get away with it – and by extension define himself as an “extraordinary” person – or he has a bizarre, masochistic tendency toward self-destruction.

This last observation interests me, as Razumihin’s comment about the social order contributing to, or being the cause of, crime. It seems to me that Razumihin is correct, although I’m starting to have a lower opinion of his intellect, as I’ll comment on later. A perfectly constructed social order will not eliminate crime. Human nature tends toward conflict. We need it in our lives. We crave it. For proof, one need only look at the popularity of films, especially violent ones. What we lack in our lives, we yearn to experience vicariously through story-telling (any kind: film, novel, poetry, drama, etc.), and one of the elements we crave is conflict. If the desire for conflict becomes too great and the vicarious satisfaction too empty, we act in apparently self-destructive ways to satisfy ourselves. In reality, we are adding excitement to our lives. Some people believe that to suffer is to live, and they strive toward suffering as a way to realize their humanity and experience the gamut of human sensibility. Raskolnikov strikes me as this manner of person. He suffers in his poverty, yes, but his suffering is merely physical. His takes the life of two people and now his suffering increases exponentially: It becomes intellectual, a suffering of the soul. Immensely gratifying, seductive, even addictive. His crime, although it weighs down his soul, has actually elevated him by adding another dimension to his person. People need conflict in their lives, and when they don’t have it, they create it. Some people just need more conflict and/or conflict of a greater degree. Raskolnikov is one of the latter.

Now, Razumihin, I predict, will be Raskolnikov’s downfall, if he (Raskolnikov) has not already caused his own destruction through his “delirious” comments. Their conversation at the end of Chapter Six is going to bring the ruin. Raskolnikov, in his distraction and exasperation, pretty much explained to Razumihin why he responded to Porfiry’s question as he did, and while the explanation was far from an admission of guilt, Razumihin seemed – in his innocent support of Raskolnikov –to become inflamed at Porfiry, enough so that he will return to him and excoriate him for suspecting Raskolnikov of the murder. He will relate their conversation, or at least the gist of it, to Porfiry which will provide the latter with sufficient information to suspect Raskolnikov even further. Razumihin wasn’t sharp enough to pick up on the subtleties of Raskolnikov’s comments (e.g., why did he have to think through his answer to minimize the appearance of his guilt rather than just give an honest response? Isn’t his explanation an admission of guilt itself?). He’ll take them at face value rather than see that, in explaining his thought process to Razumihin, Raskolnikov was almost admitting that he needed to out-think Porfiry in order to respond properly and “safely” without implicating himself. He came dangerously close to telling Razumihin that he couldn’t rely on the truth and so had to actively fabricate a response to avoid the trap Porfiry had set for him. Razumihin didn’t interpret Raskolnikov’s response this way, but Porfiry certainly would.

Two surprises in the last chapter: The fat guy looking for Raskolnikov, and the young-looking old guy (Svidrigailov) who found him. I’m not going to address the whole dream thing (not another one!) except to say that Raskolnikov’s subconscious recognizes the irony and pointlessness of the murder. I was surprised about the fat guy, and if I were Raskolnikov, I’d have chased after that bastard, indignant as all hell. In fact, that’s probably the way I’d act, if I had killed someone. (Where’s Zametov when you need him?) I’d pretend that no one, not even eyewitnesses, has any idea it was me. Deny, deny, deny. Then I’d bury the loot under a big rock. If all the evidence is circumstantial – which it seems to be – then Raskolnikov’s conviction is virtually dependent upon his admission of guilt.

Svidrigailov followed Sonia, but I don’t know why. Then he found Raskolnikov, but again, I don’t know why. I remember his name was mentioned earlier in the novel – by Razumihin, I think – but I forget the significance. Does anyone remember where or when he was mentioned? I wonder what part he’ll play? Raskolnikov seems quite surprised that he showed up. I can’t wait to see who he is and what he wants.

How’s this for a low-brow conversation starter: How many shots of vodka will it take to put Razumihin under the table? Who will win in a slap-down fight: Dounia or Sonya? If Raskolnikov were alive today, would he be an Ayn Rand fan?