1. The novel "Crime and Punishment"- first published in the journal "Russian Bulletin" (1866. N 1, 2, 4, 6–8, 11, 12) with the signature: F. Dostoevsky.
The following year, a separate edition of the novel was published, in which the division into parts and chapters was changed (in the magazine version, the novel was divided into three parts, not six), some episodes were somewhat reduced and a number of stylistic corrections were made.
The idea of ​​the novel was hatched by Dostoevsky for many years. The fact that one of his central ideas had already taken shape by 1863 is evidenced by the entry of September 17, 1863 in the diary of A.P. Suslova, who was at that time with Dostoevsky in Italy: “When we were having dinner (in Turin, in the hotel, behind a table d "hote" ohm.), he (Dostoevsky), looking at the girl who was taking lessons, said: "Well, imagine, such a girl with an old man, and suddenly whatever Napoleon says:" Exterminate the whole city". It has always been this way in the world. ”1 But Dostoevsky turned to creative work on the novel, pondering its characters, individual scenes and situations only in 1865–1866. An important preparatory role for the emergence of the characters of Raskolnikov and Sonya was played by Notes from the Underground (1864; see vol. 4 of the present edition) The tragedy of a thinking individualist hero, his proud rapture with his "idea" and defeat in the face of "living life", which is embodied in the "Notes" by the direct predecessor of Sonya Marmeladova, a girl from a brothel , - these basic general outlines of the "Notes" directly prepare "Crime and Punishment."

Episodes from the novel "Crime and Punishment"

3. Part 3, ch. Vi.
Both cautiously left and closed the door. Another half hour passed. Raskolnikov opened his eyes and threw himself up on his back again, clasping his hands behind his head ... [...]

He forgot himself; it seemed strange to him that he did not remember how he could find himself on the street. It was already late evening. Twilight deepened, the full moon brightened brighter and brighter; but the air was somehow especially stuffy. People walked in droves along the streets; artisans and busy people went home, others walked; smelled of lime, dust, stagnant water. Raskolnikov walked sad and worried: he remembered very well that he had left the house with some intention, that he had to do something and hurry, but what exactly he had forgotten. Suddenly he stopped and saw that on the other side of the street, on the sidewalk, a man was standing and waving at him. He walked across the street towards him, but suddenly the man turned and walked as if nothing had happened, bowing his head, not turning around and not pretending to call him. "Oh full, did he call?" - Raskolnikov thought, but he began to catch up. Before reaching ten paces, he suddenly recognized him and - was frightened; it was a former tradesman, in the same dressing gown and also hunched over. Raskolnikov walked from afar; his heart beat; turned into an alley - it still did not turn around. "Does he know that I'm going after him?" thought Raskolnikov. The bourgeois entered the gates of a large house. Raskolnikov hurried up to the gate and began to look: wouldn't he look around and call him? Indeed, having passed the entire gateway and already leaving into the courtyard, he suddenly turned around and again seemed to wave to him. Raskolnikov immediately passed the gateway, but the tradesman was no longer in the courtyard. Therefore, he entered the first staircase here now. Raskolnikov rushed after him. In fact, two stairs higher still someone's measured, unhurried steps could be heard. Strange, the stairs seemed familiar! There is a window on the first floor; the moonlight passed sadly and mysteriously through the glass; here is the second floor. Bah! This is the same apartment in which the workers smeared ... How could he not immediately recognize? The footsteps of the man walking in front died down: "therefore, he stopped or hid somewhere." Here is the third floor; whether to go further? And what a silence there, even scary ... But he went. The noise of his own footsteps frightened and disturbed him. God, how dark! The bourgeois must have lurked somewhere in the corner. A! the apartment is wide open onto the stairs; he thought about it and entered. In the hall it was very dark and empty, not a soul, as if everything had been taken out; quietly, on tiptoe, he walked into the living room: the whole room was brightly bathed in moonlight; everything is the same here: chairs, a mirror, a yellow sofa and framed pictures. A huge, round, copper-red moon looked straight into the windows. "This is such a silence from the month," thought Raskolnikov, "he must be asking a riddle now." He stood and waited, waited a long time, and the quieter the month was, the harder his heart beat, it even hurt. And all is silence. Suddenly an instant dry crack was heard, as if a splinter had been broken, and everything froze again. The awakened fly suddenly hit the glass from the raid and whirred plaintively. At that very moment, and in the corner, between the small cabinet and the window, he made out, as it were, a cloak hanging on the wall. “Why is there a cloak? - he thought, - after all, he was not there before ... ”He approached on the sly and guessed that it was as if someone was hiding behind the cloak. He carefully pulled his cloak away with his hand and saw that there was a chair, and an old woman was sitting on a chair in the corner, all hunched over and bowing her head so that he could not make out the face, but it was her. He stood over her: "afraid!" - he thought, quietly freed the ax from the loop and hit the old woman on the crown, once and again. But it’s strange: she didn’t even move from the blows, as if it were made of wood. He was frightened, bent down closer and began to examine her; but she bent her head even lower. Then he bent down completely to the floor and looked into her face from below, looked in and died: the old woman sat and laughed, and burst into a quiet, inaudible laugh, trying hard so that he would not hear her. Suddenly it seemed to him that the door from the bedroom opened a little and that there, too, seemed to be laughing and whispering. Fury overcame him: with all his might he began to beat the old woman on the head, but with each blow of the ax, laughter and whispering from the bedroom were heard more and more loudly, and the old woman was still swaying with laughter. He rushed to run, but the whole hallway was already full of people, the doors on the stairs were wide open, and on the landing, on the stairs and down there - all people, head to head, everyone was looking - but everyone was hiding and waiting, silent ... His heart he was embarrassed, his legs did not move, they grew rooted ... He wanted to cry out and - woke up.

He took a deep breath, but strangely, the dream seemed to be still going on: his door was wide open, and a completely unfamiliar man stood on the threshold and looked at him intently.

Raskolnikov had not yet completely opened his eyes and instantly closed them again. He lay supine and did not move. "Is this a dream or not," he thought, and slightly, imperceptibly raised his eyelashes again to look: the stranger stood in the same place and continued to peer at him.

(Raskolnikov's third dream includes the mechanism of repentance. Raskolnikov Between the third and fourth sleep (a dream in the epilogue of the novel) Raskolnikov looks in the mirror of his "doubles": Luzhin and Svidrigailov.) (

Raskolnikov's dreams are the semantic and plot pillars of Dostoevsky's entire novel. Raskolnikov's first dream comes to him before a crime, precisely when he hesitates most of all in making a decision: whether to kill him or not to kill the old woman-pawnbroker. This dream is about Raskolnikov's childhood. She and her father walk through their hometown small town after visiting their grandmother's grave. There is a church next to the cemetery. Raskolnikov-child with his father pass by the pub.

We immediately see two spatial points where the hero of Russian literature rushes about: the church and the tavern. More precisely, these two poles of Dostoevsky's novel are holiness and sin. Raskolnikov will also begin to rush throughout the entire novel between these two points: he will fall deeper and deeper into the abyss of sin, then suddenly he will surprise everyone with the miracles of self-sacrifice and kindness.

The drunken coachman Mikolka brutally slaughters his inferior, old and emaciated horse only because it cannot pull the cart, where a dozen drunken people from the tavern have sat down to laugh. Mikolka hits his horse in the eyes with a whip, and then finishes off the shaft, going into a rage and thirsting for blood.

Little Raskolnikov throws himself at Mikolka's feet to protect the unfortunate, downtrodden creature - the "horse". He stands up to defend the weak, against violence and evil.

“- Sit down, I'll take everyone! - Mikolka shouts again, jumping first into the cart, takes the reins and stands on the front end at full height. “The bay dave with Matvey left,” he shouts from the cart, “but the little mare, brothers, only breaks my heart: it would seem that he killed her, she eats bread for nothing. I say sit down! Jump comin! Jump will go! - And he takes the whip in his hands, with pleasure preparing to whip the savraska. (...)

Everyone climbs into Mikolka's cart with laughter and witticisms. Six people climbed, and you can still plant. They take with them one woman, fat and ruddy. She is wearing red calico, in a kitsch with beads, cats on her legs, snaps nuts and chuckles. All around in the crowd they are also laughing, and indeed, how can one not laugh: it’s such a dashing filly and such a burden to ride at a gallop! The two guys in the cart immediately take a whip to help Mikolka. You hear: "Well!" The laughter in the cart and in the crowd doubles, but Mikolka gets angry and in a rage whips the filly with frequent blows, as if she really thinks that she will go at a gallop.

- Let me go, brothers! - shouts one guy from the crowd who has burst into tears.

- Sit down! Everybody sit down! - shouts Mikolka, - everyone will be lucky. I'll spot!

- And it whips, whips, and no longer knows what to beat from the frenzy.

“Daddy, daddy,” he shouts to his father, “daddy, what are they doing? Daddy, the poor horse is being beaten!

- Let's go, let's go! - says the father, - drunk, playing naughty, fools: let's go, don't look! - and wants to take him away, but he breaks out of his hands and, does not

remembering himself, runs to the horse. But the poor horse is bad. She gasps, stops, twitches again, almost falls.

- Seki to death! - shouts Mikolka, - for that matter. I'll spot!

- Why is there a cross on you, or what, no, devil! - shouts one old man

out of the crowd.

“You've seen such a horse carrying such a load,” adds another.

- Freeze! Shouts a third.

- Don't touch! My goodness! I do what I want. Sit down again! Everybody sit down! I want you to gallop without fail! ..

Suddenly laughter bursts out in one gulp and covers everything: the mare could not bear the frequent blows and began to kick in powerlessness. Even the old man could not resist and grinned. And indeed: that kind of a dashing mare, and still kicking!

Two guys from the crowd get another whip and run to the horse to whip it from the sides. Everyone runs from their side.

- In the face of her, whip in the eyes, in the eyes! - shouts Mikolka.

- Song, brothers! - shouts someone from the cart, and everyone in the cart picks up. A riotous song is heard, a tambourine rattles, a whistle in the refrains. Babenka snaps nuts and chuckles.

... He runs beside the horse, he runs ahead, he sees how it is flogged in the eyes, in the very eyes! He is crying. The heart in him rises, tears flow. One of the secants touches him in the face; he does not feel, he breaks his hands, shouts, rushes to the gray-haired old man with a gray beard, who shakes his head and condemns all that. One woman takes him by the hand and wants to take him away; but he breaks free and again runs to the horse. She already with the last effort, but once again begins to kick.

- And so that those devil! - exclaims Mikolka in rage. He throws the whip, bends down and pulls out a long and thick shaft from the bottom of the cart, takes it by the end in both hands and swings it with effort over the Savrask.

- Will pique! - they shout around.

- My good! - shouts Mikolka and lowers the shaft with all his might. A heavy blow is heard.

And Mikolka swings another time, and another blow with all its might falls on the back of the unfortunate nag. She sinks all backwards, but jumps up and jerks, pulls with all her last strength in different directions in order to take out; but from all sides they take it in six whips, and the shaft again rises and falls a third time, then a fourth, measuredly, with a swing. Mikolka is furious that he cannot kill with one blow.

- Hardy! - they shout around.

- Now it will certainly fall, brothers, here it will end! One amateur shouts from the crowd.

- With her ax, what! End her at once, ”the third shouts. - Eh, eat those mosquitoes! Make way! - Mikolka cries out furiously, throws the shaft, bends down into the cart again and pulls out an iron crowbar. - Watch out!

- he shouts, and with all his might he stuns his poor horse. The blow collapsed; the mare staggered, settled down, was about to jerk, but the crowbar again falls with all its might on her back, and she falls to the ground, as if all four of her legs had been hit at once.

- Finish off! - Mikolka shouts and jumps up, as if he doesn’t remember himself, from the cart. Several guys, also red and drunk, grab whatever they find - whips, sticks, a shaft, and run to the dying filly. Mikolka stands to the side and starts hitting the back with a crowbar in vain. The nag stretches out its muzzle, sighs heavily and dies.

- Finished! - shout in the crowd.

- Why didn’t she ride!

- My good! - shouts Mikolka, with a crowbar in his hands and with bloodshot eyes. He stands as if regretting that there is no one else to beat.

- Well, really, to know, there is no cross on you! - many voices are already shouting from the crowd.

But the poor boy no longer remembers himself. With a cry he makes his way through the crowd to Savraska, grabs her dead, bloody muzzle and kisses her, kisses her in the eyes, on the lips ... Then he suddenly jumps up and in a frenzy rushes with his fists at Mikolka. At that moment, his father, who had been chasing him for a long time, grabs him at last and carries him out of the crowd. "

Why is this horse being slaughtered by a man named Mikolka? This is not accidental at all. Already after the murder of the old woman-pawnbroker and Lizaveta, suspicion falls on the painter Mikolka, who picked up the box of jewels dropped by Raskolnikov, pledged from the chest of the old woman-pawnbroker, and drank the find in the tavern. This Mikolka was one of the schismatics. Before he came to Petersburg, he was under the command of the holy elder and followed the path of faith. However, St. Petersburg "whirled" Mikolka, he forgot the old man's precepts and fell into sin. And, in the opinion of the schismatics, it is better to suffer for a great sin of others, in order to fully atone for your own - a small sin. And now Mikolka takes the blame for a crime that he did not commit. While Raskolnikov, at the time of the murder, appears in the role of that coachman Mikolka, who brutally kills the horse. The roles in reality, in contrast to the dream, are reversed.

So what, then, is the meaning of Raskolnikov's first dream? The dream shows that Raskolnikov is initially kind, that murder is alien to his nature, that he is ready to stop, even if even a minute before the crime. At the very last minute, he can still choose good. Moral responsibility remains entirely in the hands of a person. It is as if God gives man a choice of action until the very last second. But Raskolnikov chooses evil and commits a crime against himself, against his human nature. That is why, even before the murder, his conscience stops Raskolnikov, paints him in a dream terrible pictures of a bloody murder, so that the hero abandons his crazy thought.

Raskolnikov's name acquires symbolic meaning: split means bifurcation. Even in the surname itself, we see the beating of modernity: people are no longer united, they are split into two halves, they constantly oscillate between good and evil, not knowing what to choose. The meaning of Raskolnikov's image also “doubles”, splits in the eyes of the characters around him. All the heroes of the novel are attracted to him, make biased assessments of him. According to Svidrigailov, "Rodion Romanovich has two roads: either a bullet in the forehead, or along Vladimirka."

Later, remorse after the murder and painful doubts about his own theory had a detrimental effect on his initially good-looking appearance: “Raskolnikov (...) was very pale, absent-minded and gloomy. Outside, he looked like a wounded person or enduring some severe physical pain: his eyebrows were pulled together, his lips were compressed, his eyes were inflamed. "

Around Raskolnikov's first dream, Dostoevsky has a number of contradictory events that are somehow associated with Raskolnikov's dream.

The first event is "trial". So Raskolnikov calls his trip to the old woman-money-giver Alena Ivanovna. He pawns her father's silver watch, but not because he needs money so much so as not to starve to death, but in order to check whether he can “cross” blood or not, that is, whether he is capable of murder. Having laid his father's watch, Raskolnikov symbolically renounces his kind: the father would hardly have approved the idea of ​​his son to commit murder (it is no coincidence that Raskolnikov's name is Rodion; he seems to betray this name at the time of the murder and "trial"), and having committed a crime, he is like " scissors cuts himself off from people, especially from his mother and sister. In a word, during the "test" the soul of Raskolnikov is inclined in favor of evil.

Then he meets in a tavern with Marmeladov, who tells him about his daughter Sonya. She goes to the panel so that three young children of Marmeladov do not starve to death. And Marmeladov, meanwhile, is drinking all the money and even asks Sonya for forty kopecks to get drunk. Immediately after this event, Raskolnikov receives a letter from his mother. In it, the mother tells about Raskolnikov's sister Duna, who wants to marry Luzhin, saving her beloved brother Rodya. And Raskolnikov unexpectedly brings Sonya and Dunya closer together. After all, Dunya also sacrifices herself. In essence, she, like Sonya, sells her body for her brother. Raskolnikov does not want to accept such a sacrifice. He sees the murder of the old woman-pawnbroker as a way out of the current situation: "... eternal Sonechka, while the world stands!"; “Oh yes Sonya! What a well, however, they managed to dig! and enjoy (...) Wept, and got used to it. A scoundrel man gets used to everything! "

Raskolnikov rejects compassion, humility and sacrifice, opting for rebellion. At the same time, the motives for his crime are deeply self-deceiving: to free mankind from a harmful old woman, to give the stolen money to his sister and mother, thereby saving Dunya from the voluptuous Luzins and Svidrigailovs. Raskolnikov convinces himself of simple "arithmetic" that with the death of one "ugly old woman" one can make humanity happy.

Finally, just before the dream about Mikolka, Raskolnikov himself saves a fifteen-year-old drunk girl from a respectable gentleman who wanted to take advantage of the fact that she did not understand anything. Raskolnikov asks the policeman to protect the girl, and shouts to the gentleman angrily: "Hey, you, Svidrigailov!" Why Svidrigailov? Because from a letter to his mother he learns about the landowner Svidrigailov, in whose house Dunya served as a governess, and the voluptuous Svidrigailov encroached on his sister's honor. Having protected the girl from the depraved old man, Raskolnikov symbolically protects his sister. This means that he is doing good again. The pendulum in his soul again rushed in the opposite direction - for good. Raskolnikov himself assesses his "trial" as an ugly, disgusting mistake: "Oh my God, how disgusting it all ... And really such horror could have entered my head ..." -Enough! - he said resolutely and solemnly, - away from mirages, away from feigned fears ... There is life! ... - But I have already agreed to live on an arshin of space! "

Raskolnikov's second dream, rather, is not even a dream, but a dream in a state of light and short oblivion. This dream appears to him a few minutes before he goes to the crime. In many ways, Raskolnikov's dream is mysterious and strange: This is an oasis in the African desert of Egypt: “The caravan is resting, the camels are lying at ease; all around the palm trees grow in a whole circle; everyone is having dinner. He still drinks water, right from the stream, which flows and murmurs right there, at the side. And so cool, and wonderful, wonderful, such blue water, cold, runs over multi-colored stones and on such pure sand with golden sparkles ... "

Why does Raskolnikov dream of a desert, an oasis, clean clear water, to the source of which he fell and drinks greedily? This source is exactly the water of faith. Raskolnikov, and a second before the crime, can stop and fall to the source of pure water, to holiness, to restore the lost harmony to the soul. But he does not do this, but, on the contrary, as soon as six o'clock strikes, jumps up and, like an automatic machine, goes to kill.

This dream about a desert and an oasis is reminiscent of a poem by M.Yu. Lermontov's "Three Palms". It also spoke of an oasis, clear water, three flowering palms. However, nomads drive up to this oasis and chop down three palm trees with an ax, destroying the oasis in the desert. Immediately after the second sleep, Raskolnikov steals an ax in the janitor's room, puts it in a loop under the arm of his summer coat, and goes on a crime. Evil conquers good. The pendulum in Raskolnikov's soul again rushed to the opposite pole. In Raskolnikov, there are, as it were, two people: a humanist and an individualist.

Contrary to the aesthetic appearance of his theory, Raskolnikov's crime is monstrously ugly. At the time of the murder, he acts as an individualist. He kills Alena Ivanovna with the butt of an ax (as if rock itself pushes Raskolnikov's lifeless hand); smeared with blood, the hero cuts the lace on the old woman's chest with two crosses, an icon and a wallet with an ax, wipes his bloody hands on a red set. The merciless logic of murder forces Raskolnikov, who claims to be aesthetic in his theory, to hack to death Lizaveta, who returned to the apartment with the edge of an ax, so that he split her skull to the very neck. Raskolnikov definitely gets into the taste of bloody carnage. But Lizaveta is pregnant. This means that Raskolnikov kills a third, not yet born, but also a person. (Recall that Svidrigailov also kills three people: he poisons his wife, Marfa Petrovna, a fourteen-year-old girl and his servant who have corrupted him commit suicide.) a pawnbroker, closed from the inside with one hook, then Raskolnikov would have killed Koch as well. Raskolnikov kept an ax ready, hiding on the other side of the door. There would be four corpses. In fact, theory is very far from practice, it does not at all resemble the aesthetically beautiful theory of Raskolnikov, created by him in his imagination.

Raskolnikov hides the loot under a stone. He laments that he did not “step over the blood”, did not turn out to be a “superman”, but appeared as an “aesthetic louse” (“Did I kill an old woman? "Forgets the army in Egypt (...) spends half a million people in the Moscow campaign." Raskolnikov does not realize the dead end of his theory, which rejects an unshakable moral law. The hero violated the moral law and fell, because he possessed a conscience, and she takes revenge on him for violating the moral law.

On the other hand, Raskolnikov is magnanimous, noble, responsive, helps a sick comrade from the last means; risking himself, he saves children from the fire, gives maternal money to the Marmeladov family, protects Sonya from Luzhin's slander; he has the makings of a thinker, a scientist. Porfiry Petrovich tells Raskolnikov that he has a "great heart", compares him with the "sun", with Christian martyrs going to execution for their idea: "Become the sun, everyone will see you."

In the theory of Raskolnikov, as a focus, all the conflicting moral and spiritual properties of the hero are concentrated. First of all, according to Raskolnikov's plan, his theory proves that every person is a "scoundrel", and social injustice is in the order of things.

Life itself confronts Raskolnikov's casuistry. The hero's illness after the murder shows the equality of people before conscience, it is a consequence of conscience, so to speak, a physiological manifestation of the spiritual nature of a person. Through the lips of the servant Nastasya ("This is the blood in you screams"), the people judge Raskolnikov's crime.

Raskolnikov's third dream is dreamed by him after the crime. Raskolnikov's third dream is directly related to Raskolnikov's torment after the murder. This dream is also preceded by a number of events. Dostoevsky in the novel exactly follows the well-known psychological observation that "the criminal is always drawn to the scene of the crime." Indeed, Raskolnikov comes to the pawnbroker's apartment after the murder. The apartment is renovated, the door is open. Raskolnikov, as if for no reason at all, begins to pull the bell and listen. One of the workers looks suspiciously at Raskolnikov and calls him "burned out". The bourgeois Kryukov pursues Raskolnikov, walking from the house of the old woman-pawnbroker, and shouts to him: "Murderer!"

Here is Raskolnikov's dream: “He was forgotten; it seemed strange to him that he did not remember how he could find himself on the street. It was already late evening. Twilight deepened, the full moon brightened brighter and brighter; but the air was somehow especially stuffy. People walked in droves along the streets; artisans and busy people went home, others walked; smelled of lime, dust, stagnant water. Raskolnikov walked sad and worried: he remembered very well that he had left the house with some intention, that he had to do something and hurry, but what exactly he had forgotten. Suddenly he stopped and saw that on the other side of the street, on the sidewalk, a man was standing and waving at him. He walked across the street towards him, but suddenly the man turned and walked as if nothing had happened, bowing his head, not turning around and not pretending to call him. "Oh full, did he call?" - Raskolnikov thought, but he began to catch up. Before reaching ten paces, he suddenly recognized him and - was frightened; it was a former tradesman, in the same dressing gown and also hunched over. Raskolnikov walked from afar; his heart beat; turned into an alley - it still did not turn around. "Does he know that I'm going after him?" Thought Raskolnikov. The bourgeois entered the gates of a large house. Raskolnikov hurried up to the gate and began to look to see if he would look around and call him? Indeed, having passed the entire gateway and already leaving into the courtyard, he suddenly turned around and again seemed to wave to him. Raskolnikov immediately passed the gateway, but the tradesman was no longer in the courtyard. Therefore, he entered the first staircase here now. Raskolnikov rushed after him. In fact, two stairs higher still someone's measured, unhurried steps could be heard. Strange, the stairs seemed familiar! There is a window on the first floor; the moonlight passed sadly and mysteriously through the glass; here is the second floor. Bah! This is the very apartment in which the workers smeared ... How could he not immediately recognize? The footsteps of the man walking in front died down: "therefore, he stopped or hid somewhere." Here is the third floor; whether to go further? And what a silence there, even scary ... But he went. The noise of his own footsteps frightened and disturbed him. God, how dark! The bourgeois must have lurked somewhere in the corner. A! the apartment was wide open on the stairs, he thought about it and went in. In the hall it was very dark and empty, not a soul, as if everything had been taken out; quietly, on tiptoe, he walked into the living room: the whole room was brightly bathed in moonlight; everything is the same here: chairs, a mirror, a yellow sofa and framed pictures. A huge, round, copper-red moon looked straight into the windows. "This is such a silence from the month," thought Raskolnikov, "he must be asking a riddle now." He stood and waited, waited a long time, and the quieter the month was, the harder his heart beat, it even hurt. And all is silence. Suddenly an instant dry crack was heard, as if a splinter had been broken, and everything froze again. The awakened fly suddenly hit the glass from the raid and whirred plaintively. At that very moment, in the corner, between the small cupboard and the window, he made out, as it were, a cloak hanging on the wall. “Why is there a cloak? - he thought, - after all, he was not there before ... ”He approached on the sly and guessed that it was as if someone was hiding behind the cloak. He carefully pulled his cloak away with his hand and saw that there was a chair, and an old woman was sitting on a chair in the corner, all hunched over and bowing her head so that he could not make out the face, but it was her. He stood over her: "afraid!" - he thought, quietly freed the ax from the loop and hit the old woman on the crown, once and again. But it’s strange: she didn’t even move from the blows, as if it were made of wood. He was frightened, bent down closer and began to examine her; but she bent her head even lower. Then he bent down completely to the floor and looked into her face from below, looked in and died: the old woman sat and laughed, and burst into a quiet, inaudible laugh, trying hard so that he would not hear her. Suddenly it seemed to him that the door from the bedroom opened a little and that there, too, seemed to be laughing and whispering. Fury overcame him: with all his might he began to beat the old woman on the head, but with each blow of the ax, laughter and whispers from the bedroom were heard more and more loudly, and the old woman was still swaying with laughter. He rushed to run, but the whole hallway was already full of people, the doors on the stairs were wide open, and on the landing, on the stairs and down there - all people, head to head, everyone was looking - but everyone was hiding and waiting, silent ... His heart was shy, the legs do not move, they have grown ... He wanted to cry out and woke up. "

Porfiry Petrovich, having learned about Raskolnikov's arrival at the scene of the murder, will hide the bourgeois Kryukov behind the door of the next room, so that during the interrogation of Raskolnikov the bourgeoisie will suddenly be released and Raskolnikov exposed. Only an unexpected combination of circumstances prevented Porfiry Petrovich: Mikolka took upon himself Raskolnikov's crime - and Porfiry Petrovich was forced to release Raskolnikov. The bourgeois Kryukov, who was sitting outside the door of the investigator's room and heard everything, comes to Raskolnikov, falls on his knees in front of him. He wants to repent before Raskolnikov that he accused him of murder unjustly, believing after Mikolka's voluntary confession that Raskolnikov did not commit any crime.

But this will be later, but for now Raskolnikov is dreaming of this bourgeois Kryukov, who threw this formidable word "murderer" in his face. So, Raskolnikov runs after him to the apartment of the old woman-pawnbroker. He dreams of an old woman hiding from him under a cloak. Raskolnikov beats her with an ax with all his might, but she just laughs. And suddenly in the room, on the threshold, there are a lot of people, and everyone looks at Raskolnikov and laughs. Why is this motive of laughter so important to Dostoevsky? Why is Raskolnikov insanely afraid of this public laugh? The thing is that he is more than anything in the world afraid of being funny. If his theory is ridiculous, then it isn't worth a penny. And Raskolnikov himself in this case, together with his theory, turns out to be not a superman, but an "aesthetic louse," as he declares this to Sonya Marmeladova, confessing to the murder.

Raskolnikov's third dream includes the mechanism of repentance. Raskolnikov Between the third and fourth sleep, Raskolnikov looks in the mirror of his "doubles": Luzhin and Svidrigailov. As we said, Svidrigailov kills, like Raskolnikov, three people. In that case, why is Svidrigailov worse than Raskolnikov ?! It is no coincidence, after overhearing the secret of Raskolnikov, Svidrigailov, mocking, tells Raskolnikov that they are "the same berry field", considers him as if his brother in sin, distorts the hero's tragic confessions "with the air of some kind of winking, cheerful trickery."

Luzhin and Svidrigailov, distorting and mimicking his seemingly aesthetic theory, force the hero to reconsider his view of the world and man. Raskolnikov's "double" theories judge Raskolnikov himself. Luzhin's theory of “reasonable egoism”, according to Raskolnikov, is fraught with the following:

Finally, the dispute between Porfiry and Raskolnikov (cf. Porfiry's mockery of how to distinguish the “extraordinary” from the “ordinary”: “Couldn't there be some clothes here, for example, special, to wear something, there are some brands there ?. . ") And Sonya's words immediately cross out Raskolnikov's cunning dialectics, forcing him to take the path of repentance:" I just killed a louse, Sonya, useless, disgusting, malicious. " - "This is a man vogi!" - exclaims Sonya.

Sonya reads the Gospel parable about the resurrection of Lazarus to Raskolnikov (like Lazarus, the hero of Crime and Punishment is in the "coffin" for four days - Dostoevsky compares Raskolnikov's closet to a "coffin"). Sonya gives Raskolnikov her cross, leaving on herself the cypress cross of Lizaveta, who was killed by him, with whom they exchanged crosses. Thus, Sonya makes it clear to Raskolnikov that he killed his sister, for all people are brothers and sisters in Christ. Raskolnikov is putting into practice Sonya's call to go out to the square, fall on his knees and repent before all the people: "Accept suffering and redeem yourself with it ..."

Raskolnikov's repentance on the square is tragically symbolic, reminiscent of the fate of the ancient prophets, as it is given over to popular ridicule. Raskolnikov's acquisition of the faith hoped for in his dreams of New Jerusalem is a long journey. The people do not want to believe in the sincerity of the hero's repentance: “Look, he's overwhelmed! (...) It is he who goes to Jerusalem, brothers, he says goodbye to his homeland, worships the whole world, the capital city of St. Petersburg and its soil kisses "(compare Porfiry's question:" So you still believe in New Jerusalem? ").

It is no coincidence that Raskolnikov dreamed of the last dream of "trichinas" on Easter days, on Holy Week. Raskolnikov's fourth dream Raskolnikov is ill, and in the hospital he has this dream: “He lay in the hospital for the entire end of Lent and the Holy One. Already recovering, he recalled his dreams when he was still lying in the heat and delirious. In his illness, he dreamed that the whole world was condemned as a sacrifice to some terrible, unheard-of and unprecedented pestilence that was spreading from the depths of Asia to Europe. All were to perish, except a few, very few, a select few. Some new trichines appeared, microscopic creatures that entered the bodies of people. But these creatures were spirits, gifted with intelligence and will. People who took them into themselves immediately became possessed and insane. But never, never did people consider themselves as smart and unshakable in the truth, as the infected thought. They have never considered their sentences, their scientific conclusions, their moral convictions and beliefs more unshakable. Whole villages, whole cities and peoples became infected and maddened. Everyone was in anxiety and did not understand each other, everyone thought that in one thing was the truth, and he suffered, looking at others, beat his chest, cried and wrung his hands. They did not know whom and how to judge, could not agree what to consider evil, what good. They did not know who to blame, whom to acquit. People killed each other in some senseless rage. Whole armies gathered against each other, but the armies, already on the march, suddenly began to torment themselves, the ranks were upset, the soldiers rushed at each other, injected and cut, bit and ate each other. In the cities, the alarm was sounded all day: everyone was called, but who was calling and why, no one knew, and everyone was in alarm. They abandoned the most common trades, because everyone offered their thoughts, their corrections, and could not agree; farming stopped. In some places people ran into heaps, agreed to do something together, vowed not to part, - but immediately they started something completely different than they themselves assumed, they began to accuse each other, fought and cut themselves. Fires started, famine began. Everything and everything perished. The ulcer grew and moved on and on. Only a few people could be saved all over the world, they were pure and chosen, destined to start a new kind of people and new life, to renew and cleanse the land, but no one has seen these people anywhere, no one has heard their words and voices. "

Raskolnikov in hard labor never fully repented of his crime. He believes that in vain he succumbed to the pressure of Porfiry Petrovich and confessed to the investigator. It would be better if he committed suicide, like Svidrigailov. He simply did not have the strength to dare to commit suicide. Sonya went to hard labor for Raskolnikov. But Raskolnikov cannot love her. He loves no one, as well as him. Convicts hate Raskolnikov and, on the contrary, love Sonya very much. One of the convicts rushed at Raskolnikov, wanting to kill him.

What is Raskolnikov's theory if not a "trichin" that has infiltrated his soul and made Raskolnikov think that in him alone and in his theory lies the truth ?! Truth cannot abide in a person. According to Dostoevsky, the truth lies in God alone, in Christ. If a person has decided that he is the measure of all things, he is able to go to the murder of another, like Raskolnikov. He gives himself the right to judge who is worthy to live and who to die, who is the “ugly old woman” who should be crushed, and who can continue to live. God alone decides these questions, according to Dostoevsky.

Raskolnikov's dream in the epilogue about "trichines", which shows dying humanity, imagining that truth is contained in man, shows that Raskolnikov is ripe to understand the fallacy and danger of his theory. He is ready to repent, and then the world around him changes: suddenly he sees in convicts not criminals and animals, but people with a human appearance. And the convicts, too, suddenly begin to be kinder to Raskolnikov. Moreover, until he repented of the crime, he was not able to love anyone at all, including Sonya. After dreaming about "trichinas", he falls on his knees in front of her, kisses her leg. He is already capable of love. Sonya gives him the Gospel, and he wants to open this book of faith, but he is still hesitating. However, this is already another story - the story of the resurrection of a "fallen man", as Dostoevsky writes in the finale.

Raskolnikov's dreams are also part of his punishment for the crime. It is a mechanism of conscience that is turned on and works independently of a person. Conscience broadcasts to Raskolnikov these terrible images of dreams and makes him repent of the crime, return to the image of a person who, of course, continues to live in Raskolnikov's soul. Dostoevsky, forcing the hero to take the Christian path of repentance and rebirth, considers this path to be the only true one for man.

Probably, in our days talking about the work of Dostoevsky will seem too old-fashioned to someone. Nevertheless, it is in the works of this Russian writer that one can find an explanation for many of today's social problems. In particular, I mean the psychological instability of the entire modern European culture. At the heart of this instability is an unbridled lust for power. It is precisely in this that the modern mass consciousness is absorbed. And the texts of the renowned classic only carefully preserve the artistic evidence of this human secret. Man himself has not changed at all over the past century.

But let's start in order. Let's try, for example, to find out what I would think about if I turned out to be a real person, one of the characters whom Dostoevsky brilliantly described in the novel Crime and Punishment. We are, of course, talking about Rodion Raskolnikov. In this case, we will be primarily interested in his dreams. We will subject them to psychological analysis. Such research will allow us to reconstruct the train of thought of our hero. Note that the work under discussion includes three such episodes.

A DREAM OF A HORSE

The first of them outlines the outline of a spiritual conflict, around which quite real events are then built. The beginning of the dream refers us to Rodion's childhood. "And now he is dreaming: they are walking with his father on the road to the cemetery and pass by the tavern; he holds his father's hand and looks back at the tavern with fear." Everyone understands the boy's anxiety: the "cemetery" reminds of the frailty of human life, the "drinking establishment" - of the thoughtless burning of the latter by some people. Then a real tragedy is played out: "Laughter in the cart and in the crowd doubles, but Mikolka gets angry and in a rage whips the filly with frequent blows, as if he really believes that she will gallop." The fate of the unfortunate animal is a foregone conclusion - it is slaughtered to death.

The image of an old and worthless horse seems to expand the semantic field associated with the gloomy cemetery landscape. This wordless character symbolizes the boundaries that nature itself has set for audacious human claims. And therefore, beating up a helpless creature means rebelling against such natural limitations. In the last century, such attitudes were called "theomachist". This implied that such a protest was directed against human destiny in general. Psychologically, this kind of views correspond to susceptibility to illusions, a secret feeling of one's own inferiority, envy of one's neighbor's successes.

A DREAM OF AN OLD WOMAN

What, after all, is Raskolnikov's main crime? In the fact that this degraded young man committed murder, or in his intention to assert himself in any way? The second dream, which he dreamed after the well-known event, shows that it is not so easy to carry out such plans. This is how Dostoevsky describes this situation: “But it’s strange: she didn’t even move from the blows, like a wooden one. ... Then he bent down completely to the floor and looked into her face from below, looked in and died: the old woman sat and laughed, - and so burst out into a quiet, inaudible laugh, trying hard to keep up so that he would not hear. " The reason for the failure is the presence on the site and the stairs of people who suddenly filled all the free space.

In this case, the old woman personifies the conscience through which Rodion Raskolnikov wants to step over. However, his inner nature resists this in every possible way. It is this problem that the scene with a crowd of people in the hallway demonstrates. From that moment on, a feeling of guilt arises in Rodion, which, in fact, makes people reasonable. Christian thinkers have called this experience "original sin." This is a kind of global feeling, a kind of universal human duty, which directly or indirectly makes each of us take responsibility for everything that happens in the world. Including for their physical imperfection. In other words, a person should always remain himself. He needs to constantly remember this and act in accordance with such knowledge.

THE VISION OF THE WORLD EPIDEMIC

At the end of the novel, we come across a third dream episode. More precisely, this is not even a dream, but a kind of clouding of mind experienced by Raskolnikov during a fever that struck him in hard labor. Then grandiose fantastic pictures unfolded before Rodion's eyes: "He dreamed in illness, as if the whole world was condemned as a sacrifice to some terrible, unheard of and unprecedented pestilence ... Some new trichinas appeared, microscopic creatures that infested the bodies of people. But these creatures were spirits endowed with intelligence and will. People who took them into themselves immediately became possessed and insane. But never, never did people consider themselves so smart and unshakable in truth, as the infected thought. "

A fragment describing this hallucination reveals to us the inner side of everything that happened to Raskolnikov. It is at this moment that we begin to understand the ugly nature of exorbitant human pride, the consequence of which is an unquenchable desire to subjugate everything around us - the bowels of the earth, animals and even our own kind. Hence - the struggle for power, aggressiveness, money-grubbing, promiscuity in the means that are used to achieve the goal. However, is our hero ready to accept such a simple truth revealed to him in a dream? Dostoevsky replies to this question: "That is one thing he admitted to committing his crime only in the fact that he could not bear it and made a confession." These are the results to which Raskolnikov comes.

To see the world as it is is certainly not an easy task and far from the most pleasant one. And few are capable of reconciling with their own imperfection, acting in accordance with such knowledge. But is it possible to move forward without reliable information about what you are and will you have enough strength for the rest of the road?

RASKOLNIKOV'S DREAMS

In his novels, Dostoevsky reveals the complex processes of the inner life of the characters, their feelings, emotions, secret desires and fears. In this aspect, the dreams of the characters seem to be especially important. However, Dostoevsky's dreams often have a plot-forming meaning.

Let's try to analyze the dreams and dreams of Raskolnikov in the novel "Crime and Punishment". The hero sees his first dream on Petrovsky Island. In this dream, Rodion's childhood comes to life again: together with his father on a holiday, he goes out of town. Here they see a terrible picture: a young man, Mikolka, leaving the tavern, with all his might whip his "skinny ... greedy nag" with all his might, which cannot be carried by an overwhelming cart, and then finishes her with an iron crowbar. Rodion's pure childish nature protests against violence: with a cry, he rushes to the downtrodden Savraska and kisses her dead bloody face. And then he jumps up and throws himself with fists at Mikolka. Raskolnikov experiences here a whole spectrum of the most varied feelings: horror, fear, pity for the unfortunate horse, anger and hatred for Mikolka. This dream shocks Rodion so much that, waking up, he renounces "his accursed dream." This is the meaning of sleep directly in the external action of the novel. However, the meaning of this dream is much deeper and more significant. First, this dream anticipates future events: the red shirts of drunken men; Mikolka's red, "carrot-like" face; woman "in kumach"; an ax that can put an end to the unfortunate nag at once - all this predetermines future murders, hinting that blood will be shed after all. Secondly, this dream reflects the painful duality of consciousness of the hero. If we remember that a dream is an expression of a person's subconscious desires and fears, then it turns out that Raskolnikov, fearing his own desires, still wanted to beat the unfortunate horse to death. It turns out that in this dream the hero feels himself to be both Mikolka and a child, whose pure, kind soul does not accept cruelty and violence. This duality, contradictory nature of Raskolnikov in the novel is subtly noted by Razumikhin. In a conversation with Pulcheria Alexandrovna, Razumikhin notes that Rodion is "gloomy, gloomy, arrogant and proud", "cold and insensitive to the point of inhumanity," and at the same time - "generous and kind." “Precisely in him, two opposite characters are alternately replaced,” exclaims Razumikhin. Raskolnikov's painful duality is also evidenced by two opposite images from his dream - a tavern and a church. The tavern is what destroys people, it is the center of debauchery, recklessness, evil, this is the place where a person often loses his human appearance. The tavern always made “the most unpleasant impression” on Rodion, there was always a crowd, “they shouted, laughed, swore… ugly and hoarsely they sang and fought; such drunken and terrible faces were always wandering around the tavern. " The tavern is a symbol of depravity and evil. The church in this dream personifies the best that is in human nature. It is characteristic that little Rodion loved church, twice a year he went with his father and mother to mass. He liked the old icons and the old priest, he knew that funeral services were served here for his deceased grandmother. The tavern and the church here, thus, metaphorically represent the main landmarks of a person in life. It is characteristic that in this dream Raskolnikov does not reach the church, does not get into it, which is also very significant. He is delayed by the scene near the pub.

Significant here is the image of a skinny peasant savraska, which cannot withstand an unbearable burden. This unhappy horse is a symbol of the unbearable suffering of all the "humiliated and insulted" in the novel, a symbol of Raskolnikov's hopelessness and dead end, a symbol of the disasters of the Marmeladov family, a symbol of Sonya's position. This episode from the hero's dream echoes the bitter exclamation of Katerina Ivanovna before her death: “We’ve gone to the nag! I tore it up! "

Significant in this dream is the image of the long-dead father of Raskolnikov. Father wants to take Rodion away from the tavern, does not tell him to look at the violence being committed. The father here seems to be trying to warn the hero against his fatal act. Recalling the grief that befell their family when Rodion's brother died, Raskolnikov's father takes him to the cemetery, to the grave of his deceased brother, towards the church. This, in our opinion, is precisely the function of Raskolnikov's father in this dream.

In addition, let us note the plot-forming role of this dream. It appears as “a kind of core of the whole novel, its central event. Having concentrated in itself the energy and power of all future events, the dream has a formative meaning for other plot lines, "predicts" them (the dream is in the present tense, talks about the past and predicts the future murder of the old woman). The most complete representation of the main roles and functions (“victim”, “tormentor” and “compassionate” in the terminology of Dostoevsky himself) sets the dream of killing a horse as a plot nucleus subject to textual development, ”note G, Amelin and IA Pilshchikov. Indeed, threads from this dream are drawn throughout the novel. Researchers distinguish character "threes" in the work, corresponding to the roles of "tormentor", "victim" and "compassionate". In the hero's dream it is "Mikolka - a horse - Raskolnikov-child", in real life it is "Raskolnikov - an old woman - Sonya". However, in the third "three" the hero himself acts as a victim. This "troika" is "Raskolnikov - Porfiry Petrovich - Mikolka Dementyev". In the development of all plot situations, the same motives sound here. Researchers note that in all three plots, the same textual formula begins to unfold - "to shock" and "with a butt on the crown of the head." So, in Raskolnikov's dream, Mikolka with a crowbar "shocks his poor horse on a grand scale." In about the same way, the hero kills Alena Ivanovna. "The blow hit the very crown ...", "Then he struck with all his might once and again, all with a butt and all on the crown." Porfiry uses the same expressions in conversation with Rodion. “Well, who, tell me, of all the defendants, even the most humble peasant, does not know that, for example, they will first start to lull him to sleep with extraneous questions (in your happy expression), and then suddenly they will stun him into the very crown of his head, with ... ", - the investigator notes. In another place we read: “On the contrary, I should have<…>distract, that way, in the opposite direction, but suddenly, like a butt on the crown (in your own expression), and dumbfounded: “And what, they say, sir, did you deign to do in the apartment of the murdered at ten o'clock in the evening, and almost not at eleven? "

In addition to dreams, the novel describes three visions of Raskolnikov, his three "dreams". Before committing a crime, he sees himself "in some kind of oasis." The caravan is resting, the camels are lying peacefully, and all around are magnificent palm trees. Nearby, a stream gurgles, and “wonderful, wonderful, such blue water, cold, runs over multi-colored stones and over such pure sand with golden sparkles ...” And in these dreams, the painful duality of the hero's consciousness is again indicated. As B.S. Kondratyev, the camel here is a symbol of humility (Raskolnikov resigned himself, renounced his "accursed dream" after the first dream), but the palm tree is "the main symbol of triumph and victory", Egypt is the place where Napoleon forgets the army. Having renounced his plans in reality, the hero returns to them in a dream, feeling himself the victorious Napoleon.

The second vision visits Raskolnikov after his crime. As if in reality, he hears how the quarter warden Ilya Petrovich terribly beats his (Raskolnikov's) landlady. This vision reveals Raskolnikov's latent desire to harm the landlady, the feeling of hatred, the hero's aggression towards her. It was thanks to the landlady that he ended up in the precinct, had to explain himself with the assistant to the quarterly overseer, experiencing a deadly feeling of fear and almost no control over himself. But Raskolnikov's vision also has a deeper, philosophical aspect. This is a reflection of the hero's agonizing state after the murder of the old woman and Lizaveta, a reflection of his feeling of alienation from his past, from "previous thoughts", "previous tasks", "previous impressions." The landlady is obviously a symbol here. past life Raskolnikov, a symbol of what he loved so much (the story of the hero's relationship with the daughter of the landlady). The quarterly overseer is a figure from his "new" life, the countdown of which was laid by his crime. In this “new” life, he “seemed to cut himself off from everyone with scissors,” and at the same time from his past. Raskolnikov is unbearably painful in his new position, that in his subconsciousness it is imprinted as damage, harm done to the hero's past by his present.

Raskolnikov's third vision occurs after his meeting with a tradesman who accuses him of murder. The hero fancies the faces of people from his childhood, the bell tower In the th church; "A billiard in one tavern and some officer at the billiard, the smell of cigars in some basement tobacco shop, a drinking house, a back staircase ... from somewhere you can hear Sunday bells ringing ...". The officer in this vision is a reflection of the real life impressions of the hero. Before his crime, Raskolnikov hears a conversation between a student and an officer in a tavern. The very images of this vision have something in common with the images from Rodion's first dream. There he saw a tavern and a church, here - the bell tower of the E-th church, the ringing of bells and a tavern, the smell of cigars, a drinking house. The symbolic meaning of these images is preserved here.

Raskolnikov sees his second dream after his crime. He dreams that he is again going to Alena Ivanovna's apartment and is trying to kill her, but the old woman, as if mocking, bursts into a quiet, inaudible laugh. Laughter and whispers are heard in the next room. Raskolnikov is suddenly surrounded by a multitude of people - in the hallway, on the landing, on the stairs - silently and expectingly, they look at him. Terrified, he cannot move and soon wakes up. This dream reflects the hero's subconscious desires. Raskolnikov is burdened by his position, wishing to reveal his "secret" to someone, it is hard for him to carry it within himself. He literally suffocates in his individualism, trying to overcome the state of painful alienation from others and himself. That is why in Raskolnikov's dream there are many people next to him. His soul longs for people, he wants community, unity with them. In this dream, the motive of laughter reappears, accompanying the hero throughout the entire novel. After committing the crime, Raskolnikov feels that "he killed himself, not the old woman." This truth is supposedly open to people surrounding the hero in a dream. An interesting interpretation of the hero's dream is offered by S. B. Kondratyev. The researcher notes that laughter in Raskolnikov's dream is "an attribute of Satan's invisible presence," demons laugh and tease the hero.

Raskolnikov sees his third dream already in hard labor. In this dream, he seems to rethink the events that have taken place, his theory. It seems to Raskolnikov that the whole world is condemned as a sacrifice to "a terrible ... pestilent plague." There are some new microscopic creatures, trichines, infecting people and making them possessed. The infected do not hear and do not understand others, considering only their opinion to be absolutely correct and the only correct one. Leaving their occupations, crafts and agriculture, people kill each other in some senseless rage. Fires start, hunger, everything around dies. All over the world, only a few people, “pure and chosen,” can be saved, but no one has ever seen them. " This dream is an extreme embodiment of Raskolnikov's individualistic theory, showing the threatening results of its harmful influence on the world and humanity. It is characteristic that individualism is now identified in Rodion's mind with demoniacal and madness. In fact, the hero's idea of ​​strong personalities, Napoleons, to whom “everything is permitted”, now seems to him a disease, insanity, a clouding of mind. Moreover, the spread of this theory around the world is what causes Raskolnikov's greatest fears. Now the hero realizes that his idea is contrary to human nature itself, reason, and the Divine world order. Having understood and accepted all this with his soul, Raskolnikov experiences moral enlightenment. It is not for nothing that it is after this dream that he begins to realize his love for Sonya, which reveals to him faith in life.

Thus, Raskolnikov's dreams and visions in the novel convey his inner states, feelings, innermost desires and secret fears. Compositionally, dreams often precede future events, become the causes of events, and move the plot. Dreams contribute to the mixing of real and mystical narrative plans: new characters seem to grow out of the hero's dreams. In addition, the plots in these visions resonate with the ideological concept of the work, with the author's assessment of Raskolnikov's ideas.

Analysis of the episode "Raskolnikov's Dream" based on the novel by F. Dostoevsky "Crime and Punishment"

The description of the dream of a literary hero is a technique often used by writers and poets for a deeper disclosure of the image of their character. In her dream, Pushkin leads Tatyana Larina to a strange hut standing in a mysterious forest, revealing to us the Russian soul of a girl who grew up on fairy tales and legends of the "common people". Goncharov grants Oblomov a return to childhood, to the serene paradise of Oblomovka, devoting an entire chapter to the hero's sleep. In the dreams of Vera Pavlovna, Chernyshevsky embodies his utopian dreams. Dreams of literary characters bring us closer to them, help us penetrate into their inner world, understand the root causes of certain actions. After reading the novel "Crime and Punishment" by FM Dostoevsky, I realized that comprehending the image of Raskolnikov, his restless soul, would be incomplete without comprehending the depths of his subconscious, reflected in the dreams of this hero.

In "Crime and Punishment" four dreams of Rodion Raskolnikov are described, but I want to consider and analyze the first dream that the hero had after he made the final decision to confirm his theory of "trembling creatures" and "having the right to" , that is, the decision to kill the old woman-interest-woman. Fearing the very word "murder", he constantly asks himself: "... but how can that be?" The very opportunity to carry out his plans plunges him into horror, but trying to prove to himself that he belongs to the caste of higher beings who dare to shed "blood according to his conscience" the role of a noble savior. But Rodion's dream, described by Dostoevsky, nullifies all the cynical reasoning of the hero, revealing to us his vulnerable soul, helpless in his wandering.

Raskolnikov dreams of his childhood, his hometown. Childhood is usually associated with the most carefree period of life, devoid of the need to make vital decisions, to take full responsibility for their actions. And it is no coincidence that Raskolnikov returns to childhood in a dream. Already by this one can judge that the problems adult life he is oppressed, he wants to abandon them, not know them at all. In addition, childhood implies an instinctive distinction between good and evil. The image of the father with whom little Ro-dion walks in a dream is also symbolic. After all, the father is traditionally a symbol of protection, safety. The tavern they pass by and the drunken men running out of there are already images of the real world that has tortured the hero. One of the mu-zhiks, Mikolka, invites the others to ride on his cart, which is harnessed to "a small, thin, greedy peasant nag." Everyone agrees and sits down. Mikolka beats the horse, forcing it to pull the cart, but due to frailty it cannot even walk. The boy sees with horror how the horse "is being whipped in the eyes, in the very eyes!" Among the cries of a drunken crowd, one can hear "With her ax, what!" Then the owner frenziedly finishes the nag. Raskolnikov the child looks at everything that happens in terrible fear, then, in a fit of pity and indignation, he rushes to defend the horse, but, alas, it is too late. The atmosphere around what is happening is red-hot to the limit. On the one hand - the vicious aggression of the drunken crowd, on the other - the intolerable despair of a child, in front of whom a terrible act is carried out in its cruelty, shaking his soul with a thirst for the "poor horse". And in the center of everything - the horror and tears of the nag they are trying to achieve. To convey the expressiveness of the episode, the writer ends almost every phrase with an exclamation mark.

The dream, first of all, shows us a rejection of Raskolnikov's murder in kind. And the whole meaning of it, at first glance, is to reveal the true spiritual state of the hero, who, upon waking up, even turns to God with a prayer: “Lord ... show me my way, and I renounce this damned ... . my dreams! " However, the student will nevertheless carry out his terrible plan, and here one can discern the second, hidden, meaning of the dream. Indeed, in this dream, as in Raskolnikov's real life, we are talking about the ability to dispose of someone else's life - in this case, the life of a horse. A horse is a worthless and useless creature due to its weakness: "... and the mare is etta, brothers, only my heart is breaking: so, it seems, he killed her, he eats bread for free." As well as "a stupid, senseless, insignificant, angry, sick old woman, useless to anyone and, on the contrary, harmful to everyone, who does not know what she lives for, and who will die by itself tomorrow." Her life in the view of Raskolnikov is equal to "the life of a louse, a cockroach."

Thus, the first dream of Raskolnikov, on the one hand, reveals to the hero all the horror of what he had conceived, on the other hand, pushes him to commit a crime. But as the plot develops, Dostoevsky leads us to the idea of ​​the fidelity of only the first meaning of sleep - the cry of the soul about the inadmissibility of atrocities.