Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Fyodor Dostoyevsky (1821 - 1881), russian writer, author of Crime and Punishment, Brothers Karamazov and The Idiot.

[dostoyevsky]

Lasar Segall, 1927.

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[russkayaliteratura]

In Russia. Soul of the people. Mikhail Nesterov. 1914.

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[russkayaliteratura]

More illustrations for The Demons, by Ilya Glazunov.

[dostoyevsky]

Ilya Glazunov's illustrations for The Demons.

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[dostoyevsky]

Dostoyevsky's notes for The demons. 1870-71.

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[dostoyevsky]

“I am a sick man . . .. I am a spiteful man. I am an unattractive man. I believe my liver is diseased. However, I know nothing at all about my disease, and do not know for certain what ails me. I don't consult a doctor for it, and never have, though I have a respect for medicine and doctors. Besides, I am extremely superstitious, sufficiently so to respect medicine, anyway (I am well-educated enough not to be superstitious, but I am superstitious). No, I refuse to consult a doctor from spite. That you probably will not understand. Well, I understand it, though. Of course, I can't explain who it is precisely that I am mortifying in this case by my spite: I am perfectly well aware that I cannot "pay out" the doctors by not consulting them; I know better than anyone that by all this I am only injuring myself and no one else. But still, if I don't consult a doctor it is from spite. My liver is bad, well—let it get worse!”

"Я человек больной… Я злой человек. Непривлекательный я человек. Я думаю, что у меня болит печень. Впрочем, я ни шиша не смыслю в моей болезни и не знаю наверно, что у меня болит. Я не лечусь и никогда не лечился, хотя медицину и докторов уважаю. К тому же я еще и суеверен до крайности; ну, хоть настолько, чтоб уважать медицину. (Я достаточно образован, чтоб не быть суеверным, но я суеверен). Нет-с, я не хочу лечиться со злости. Вот этого, наверно, не изволите понимать. Ну-с, а я понимаю. Я, разумеется, не сумею вам объяснить, кому именно я насолю в этом случае моей злостью; я отлично хорошо знаю, что и докторам я никак не смогу «нагадить» тем, что у них не лечусь; я лучше всякого знаю, что всем этим я единственно только себе поврежу и никому больше. Но все-таки, если я не лечусь, так это со злости. Печенка болит, так вот пускай же ее еще крепче болит!"

Fyodor Dostoyevsky, “Notes from Underground” (Записки из подполья, 1864). Trans. Constance Garnett.

Portrait of Dostoyevsky by Max Beckmann, 1921.

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[dostoyevsky]

Dostoyevsky, by Munch. 1902.

Actually found the proper art, based on an artwork by Felix Vallontton.

[dostoyevsky]

Dostoyevsky by Edvard Munch. 1902. Lost, I believe.

[russkayaliteratura]

Arrest of a Propagandist (1892) by Ilya Repin.

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[dostoyevsky]

Wandering souls (1920), first film adaptation of Dostoyevsky's The Idiot, now lost, with Asta Nielsen.

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[dostoyevsky]

Natalia Moisieva's Karamazov.

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[the-night-picture-collector]

Viktor Semenovich Vilner, Embankment, Scenes from Dostoyevsky’s “Crime and Punishment”, 1971

[dostoyevsky]

Axl von Leskoschek’s Brothers Karamazov illustration. 1944.

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[russkayaliteratura]

Vassily Perov, " The drowned one". 1867.

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[russkayaliteratura]

Edward Gorey beautiful covers for Vintage Russian Library.

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[athenaefilia]

“her beauty, her fantastic, demoniacal beauty.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky, from The Idiot (1868)

[bluelilybird]

“I think I could stand anything, any suffering, only to be able to say and to repeat to myself every moment, ‘I exist.’ In thousands of agonies – I exist. I’m tormented on the rack – but I exist! Though I sit alone in a pillar – I exist! I see the sun, and if I don’t see the sun, I know it’s there. And there’s a whole life in that, in knowing that the sun is there.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Brothers Karamazov