Notes from a Dead House (Vintage Classics)

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One formative moment of Dostoevsky’s prison time was a staged execution designed to convince him and his fellow convicts that they were being subjected to the death penalty. Referred to by the prisoners as "the man with the eight eyes" due to his apparent omniscience, he is universally despised and feared. Women of the Gulag 2 Marianna Yarovskaya plain 2021-12-17T19:12:59+00:00 Swarthmore Russian 037 2018 Marianna Yarovskaya 43.

Moreover, Dostoevsky views human character and morality as being fundamentally shaped by the conditions individuals inhabit. After the Ball" 2 Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy plain 2021-12-17T19:09:49+00:00 Swarthmore Russian 037 1911 Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy 55. This eternal restlessness, manifesting itself silently but visibly; this strange fervor and impatience of sometimes involuntarily expressed hopes, at times so unfounded that they were more like raving, and, what was most striking of all, that often dwelt in the most practical-seeming minds—all this gave the place an extraordinary appearance and character, so much so that these features may have constituted its most characteristic qualities.

Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk: A Sketch” 5 Nikolai Semyonovich Leskov plain 2021-12-17T19:18:43+00:00 1865 53.

Orloff, a notorious criminal and escapee, who Alexander Petrovich describes as "a brilliant example of the victory of spirit over matter", unlike some other prisoners whose fearfulness proceeded more from their complete submission to matter. The 103 third parties who use cookies on this service do so for their purposes of displaying and measuring personalized ads, generating audience insights, and developing and improving products.Petrov, an externally quiet and polite man who befriends Alexander Petrovich and often seeks his company, apparently for edification on matters of knowledge. Dostoevsky then dedicated his life to literature, writing novels and journals and making frequent trips throughout Europe for the remainder of his life.

Dostoevsky’s constant preoccupation is the meaning of human freedom and the prisoners’ preservation of their dignity. After graduating, he worked as an engineer and briefly enjoyed a lavish lifestyle, translating books to earn extra money. Nikita Sergeyevich Mikhalkov plain 2021-12-17T19:08:55+00:00 Swarthmore Russian 037 2007 Nikita Sergeyevich Mikhalkov 55.

No prison writing is professional, but nor is any of it exactly recreational; it comes, by definition, from environments where “any self-willed display of personality … is considered a crime. Gary Rosenshield analyzes the presentation of pain, especially due to corporal punishment, in Doestoevsky’s Notes from the House of the Dead. At the same time, he’s hinting at a theme on which Notes from a Dead House constantly insists: the numbing, repetitive dullness of prison life.

Dostoevsky describes Goryanchikov’s time in prison in detail throughout his novel and focuses primarily on observations that he makes during his first months in a hard labor camp in Siberia. The account he wrote afterward, Notes from a Dead House (sometimes translated as The House of the Dead), is filled with vivid details of brutal punishments, shocking conditions, and the psychological effects of the loss of freedom and hope, but also of the feuds and betrayals, the moments of comedy, and the acts of kindness he observed. Violence and degradation will erode morality and produce criminality, while in contrast, “humane treatment may make a human being even of someone in whom the image of God has faded long ago” (Dostoevsky, 112). Gorbunov and Gorchakov 2 Joseph Aleksandrovich Brodsky plain 2021-12-17T19:20:36+00:00 Swarthmore Russian 037 1968 Joseph Aleksandrovich Brodsky 59.The second convict Alexander Petrovich mentions is not referred to by name, but his character and crime (killing his father to obtain his inheritance) are discussed in some detail. Prisoner of the Mountains 2 Sergei Vladimirovich Bodrov plain 2021-12-17T19:17:12+00:00 Swarthmore Russian 037 1996 Sergei Vladimirovich Bodrov 41. Everyman’s Library pursues the highest production standards, printing on acid-free cream-colored paper, with full-cloth cases with two-color foil stamping, decorative endpapers, silk ribbon markers, European-style half-round spines, and a full-color illustrated jacket. His story is, finally, a profound meditation on freedom: “The prisoner himself knows that he is a prisoner; but no brands, no fetters will make him forget that he is a human being. My Fellow Prisoners 2 Mikhail Borisovich Khodorkovsky plain 2021-12-17T19:18:05+00:00 Swarthmore Russian 037 2014 Mikhail Borisovich Khodorkovsky 50.