The Tragic Drama of the Unfolding of Personality in Crime and Punishment

Abstract

The present study interprets Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment in connection with tragic drama. According to our thesis, Ralkonikov’s trespassing behavior does not arise from ideological positions of his time, but finds its recondite mobile in his demonic per- sonality, inflated by an unbridled will of power. The Satanism that overcomes him does not break out as an exterior determination, but emerges from a deep wish to assume control, in accord with the Greek mythologem of man and the modern philosophem of subjectivity. In consonance with the protagonist’s disposition, the novel develops as a drama, concentrated, from start to finish, on the representation of the tragic emotions of anxiety and terror, triggered by the initial plan and the final execution of the assas- sination. To render Rakolnikov’s tragic consciousness, Dostoevsky operates a radical revolution in the history of the novel. The subtle artistry of the isomorphic correlation between the theme of the disrupted personality in dispute with itself and the equivalent monodialogic form of the narrative distinguishes the Russian novelist. As we demons- trate, the fictional revolution of the novel is not confined to the monodialogue typical of theatrical drama, always pronounced by the character in the first person, but constructs itself specifically as a narrative monodialogue, rendered in the third person and characterized by the interaction between the consciousness of the narrator and the emotional experience of the protagonist.