Jump back to Previous: The Periodic Table - Chapter 21
I’ve taken a much longer break from blogging than I had anticipated. Not only has it been half a year but also an entire event greening season. Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival 2015 is now in the past and we are deep into the wonderful -- though wildly variable -- Indian Summer weather of October in San Francisco. Yesterday I went out on a perfect morning in only a t-shirt only to freeze in the wind whipped fog as I returned home in the afternoon. Today it is even warmer with no wind to speak of... though it’s still early afternoon.
The main reason for my blogging vacation was The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky, which is to be the next -- and this is completely unplanned -- addition to Regieren. And not just The Brothers K, I’ve been reading some other books that go particularly well with The Brothers K., so I will be covering them as well, though to a lesser extent.
The Brothers K. is not only an amazing precursor and compendium of many of the topics we’ve been dealing with here, but it is also a plot filled mess of a novel -- something I haven’t had to deal with before. I have extensive notes on the text but I’m still not quite sure how I will deal with the novel itself. I’m going to try to focus on the ideas, as I’ve done before, but while Dostoyevsky certainly fills his novel with mini essays, he also uses the plot and characters to make points crucial to understanding his philosophy -- or at least this is my impression. So I’m not going to talk about The Brothers K. as a novel, but I will be talking more about what he is doing with his characters and plot.
I’m still amazed that I’ve made it to the age of 63 without ever reading The Brothers K. It’s not like I haven’t read Dostoyevsky. It’s not like his name isn’t frequently mentioned along with Nietzsche and Kierkegaard as being important to the history of existentialism in the 19th century. It’s a mystery. And, as usual, I have the feeling I’m now reading him at just the right time.
This is going to be challenging both because there is just so much philosophical content to deal with, but also because Dostoyevsky seems to be both repetitive and contradictory. I anticipate borrowing more from other sources than has been my wont in the past. This is partly because the subject is new to me and I’m trying to gather more data to help me make sense of Dostoyevsky and to place him in what is turning out to be an unexpected new context.
Just a few words about the other texts getting blended in with The Brothers K:
Small Victories by Anne Lamott is a compilation of stories written over a long period of time. Lamott shares Dostoyevsky’s interest in faith and his eye for human fallibility. Lamott has a saving sense of humor or I might not have been able to get through all these stories. I hope to transport at least a suggestion of this humor here. But the parallels between these two authors, separated by about a century of time, is striking if you happen to be reading them together.
God’s Hotel by Victoria Sweet is about Laguna Honda Hospital (a former alms house turned modern medical facility here in San Francisco); also the history of Western Medicine, especially over the past several centuries; also the experience of taking the Santiago De Compostela pilgrimage; and finally what Sweet learned from all this. You wouldn’t expect it, but Sweet’s journey is relevant to the issues haunting Dostoyevsky (nihilism vs faith) as well as some of the issues that were crucial to Goethe in Faust and to Nietzsche and Michel Foucault (the Mephistophelian consequences of the age of science and reason starting in the 18th century and accelerating through the 19th century).
What I like best about this journey we are about to begin is that it lead me to a place I didn’t want to end up. That’s usually a good sign.
The structure of The Brothers Karamazov
This is here in part to show you why I find dealing with this novel so challenging and in part to help me wrap my mind around the novel as a whole.
Part One.
Book I. The History of a Family
Fyodor, Dmitri, Ivan and Alyosha Karamazov. Also Peter Miusov and the Elder Zossima introduced.
Book II. Unfortunate Gathering at the Monastery
Peter Kalganov, Maximov, Madam Hohlakov, Lise, Father Joseph, Father Paissy, Rakitin, Katerina and Grushenka.
Book III. The Sensualists
Gregory, Marfa, the story of Lizaveta, Pavel Smerdyakov.
Part Two.
Book IV. Lacerations
Father Ferapont, the schoolboys, Captain Snegiryov, Ilusha
Book V. Pro and Contra
"The Grand Inquisitor"
Book VI. The Russian Monk
The story of Zossima's brother and of "The Mysterious Visitor."
Part Three.
Book VII. Alyosha
Book VIII. Dmitri
Book IX. The Preliminary Investigation
Perhotin introduced.
Part Four.
Book X. The Boys
Kolya Krasotkin introduced.
Book XI. Ivan
"Ivan's Nightmare."
Book XII. A Judicial Error
Epilogue [In which a few (of many) loose ends are tied up]
On Reading The Brothers Karamazov & Small Victories
Why do we even try to plan our lives? I was determined to buy some recommended Faulkner novels today to read along with the Anne Lamott, but the (disturbingly disordered) local new and used bookstore only had the final of the three volumes, so I slipped down my list to Dostoyevsky.
Unusually for me, I read the foreword to The Brothers Karamazov first. Why isn't there a generic biography for all 19th century Russian novelists? If there is a difference between the biography of Tolstoy and of Dostoyevsky it doesn't leap to mind. Dissolute gamblers of the world unite! Without gambling debts the output of 19th century Russian novelists could probably fit on a small shelf.
Anne Lamott's Small Victories begins with a lament for the child raised by parents wrapped up in their own issues leading to poor self-esteem and a fondness for drink. But Dmitri/Dostoyevsky trumps her. (TBK Book I. 1-3.) (And how curious it is to give your own first name to the character based on a father you can't have been fond of. Does that indicate a kind of forgiveness? The ability to see your own failings in the failings of your parent?)
And what to make of the narrator of The Brothers K? He seem to be telling a story, the facts of which he is not always sure of -- though at other times he seems to be omniscient.
In both stories (Lamott's and Dostoyevsky's) it would be interesting to know more about the parents origins. How similar were their's to the childhoods of their children, for example.
Back to back I just read Lamott on forgiveness and the introduction of Alyosha (TBK Book I. 4.). Alyosha doesn't need to forgive because he doesn't feel anything needs to be forgiven... Lamott's point as well.
Alas, there seems to be no alternative but to cover these books in greater depth.
Jump to Next: The Brothers K. Bk. 1 & "Trail Ducks"
I’ve taken a much longer break from blogging than I had anticipated. Not only has it been half a year but also an entire event greening season. Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival 2015 is now in the past and we are deep into the wonderful -- though wildly variable -- Indian Summer weather of October in San Francisco. Yesterday I went out on a perfect morning in only a t-shirt only to freeze in the wind whipped fog as I returned home in the afternoon. Today it is even warmer with no wind to speak of... though it’s still early afternoon.
The main reason for my blogging vacation was The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky, which is to be the next -- and this is completely unplanned -- addition to Regieren. And not just The Brothers K, I’ve been reading some other books that go particularly well with The Brothers K., so I will be covering them as well, though to a lesser extent.
The Brothers K. is not only an amazing precursor and compendium of many of the topics we’ve been dealing with here, but it is also a plot filled mess of a novel -- something I haven’t had to deal with before. I have extensive notes on the text but I’m still not quite sure how I will deal with the novel itself. I’m going to try to focus on the ideas, as I’ve done before, but while Dostoyevsky certainly fills his novel with mini essays, he also uses the plot and characters to make points crucial to understanding his philosophy -- or at least this is my impression. So I’m not going to talk about The Brothers K. as a novel, but I will be talking more about what he is doing with his characters and plot.
I’m still amazed that I’ve made it to the age of 63 without ever reading The Brothers K. It’s not like I haven’t read Dostoyevsky. It’s not like his name isn’t frequently mentioned along with Nietzsche and Kierkegaard as being important to the history of existentialism in the 19th century. It’s a mystery. And, as usual, I have the feeling I’m now reading him at just the right time.
This is going to be challenging both because there is just so much philosophical content to deal with, but also because Dostoyevsky seems to be both repetitive and contradictory. I anticipate borrowing more from other sources than has been my wont in the past. This is partly because the subject is new to me and I’m trying to gather more data to help me make sense of Dostoyevsky and to place him in what is turning out to be an unexpected new context.
Just a few words about the other texts getting blended in with The Brothers K:
Small Victories by Anne Lamott is a compilation of stories written over a long period of time. Lamott shares Dostoyevsky’s interest in faith and his eye for human fallibility. Lamott has a saving sense of humor or I might not have been able to get through all these stories. I hope to transport at least a suggestion of this humor here. But the parallels between these two authors, separated by about a century of time, is striking if you happen to be reading them together.
God’s Hotel by Victoria Sweet is about Laguna Honda Hospital (a former alms house turned modern medical facility here in San Francisco); also the history of Western Medicine, especially over the past several centuries; also the experience of taking the Santiago De Compostela pilgrimage; and finally what Sweet learned from all this. You wouldn’t expect it, but Sweet’s journey is relevant to the issues haunting Dostoyevsky (nihilism vs faith) as well as some of the issues that were crucial to Goethe in Faust and to Nietzsche and Michel Foucault (the Mephistophelian consequences of the age of science and reason starting in the 18th century and accelerating through the 19th century).
What I like best about this journey we are about to begin is that it lead me to a place I didn’t want to end up. That’s usually a good sign.
The structure of The Brothers Karamazov
This is here in part to show you why I find dealing with this novel so challenging and in part to help me wrap my mind around the novel as a whole.
Part One.
Book I. The History of a Family
Fyodor, Dmitri, Ivan and Alyosha Karamazov. Also Peter Miusov and the Elder Zossima introduced.
Book II. Unfortunate Gathering at the Monastery
Peter Kalganov, Maximov, Madam Hohlakov, Lise, Father Joseph, Father Paissy, Rakitin, Katerina and Grushenka.
Book III. The Sensualists
Gregory, Marfa, the story of Lizaveta, Pavel Smerdyakov.
Part Two.
Book IV. Lacerations
Father Ferapont, the schoolboys, Captain Snegiryov, Ilusha
Book V. Pro and Contra
"The Grand Inquisitor"
Book VI. The Russian Monk
The story of Zossima's brother and of "The Mysterious Visitor."
Part Three.
Book VII. Alyosha
Book VIII. Dmitri
Book IX. The Preliminary Investigation
Perhotin introduced.
Part Four.
Book X. The Boys
Kolya Krasotkin introduced.
Book XI. Ivan
"Ivan's Nightmare."
Book XII. A Judicial Error
Epilogue [In which a few (of many) loose ends are tied up]
On Reading The Brothers Karamazov & Small Victories
Why do we even try to plan our lives? I was determined to buy some recommended Faulkner novels today to read along with the Anne Lamott, but the (disturbingly disordered) local new and used bookstore only had the final of the three volumes, so I slipped down my list to Dostoyevsky.
Unusually for me, I read the foreword to The Brothers Karamazov first. Why isn't there a generic biography for all 19th century Russian novelists? If there is a difference between the biography of Tolstoy and of Dostoyevsky it doesn't leap to mind. Dissolute gamblers of the world unite! Without gambling debts the output of 19th century Russian novelists could probably fit on a small shelf.
Anne Lamott's Small Victories begins with a lament for the child raised by parents wrapped up in their own issues leading to poor self-esteem and a fondness for drink. But Dmitri/Dostoyevsky trumps her. (TBK Book I. 1-3.) (And how curious it is to give your own first name to the character based on a father you can't have been fond of. Does that indicate a kind of forgiveness? The ability to see your own failings in the failings of your parent?)
And what to make of the narrator of The Brothers K? He seem to be telling a story, the facts of which he is not always sure of -- though at other times he seems to be omniscient.
In both stories (Lamott's and Dostoyevsky's) it would be interesting to know more about the parents origins. How similar were their's to the childhoods of their children, for example.
Back to back I just read Lamott on forgiveness and the introduction of Alyosha (TBK Book I. 4.). Alyosha doesn't need to forgive because he doesn't feel anything needs to be forgiven... Lamott's point as well.
Alas, there seems to be no alternative but to cover these books in greater depth.
Jump to Next: The Brothers K. Bk. 1 & "Trail Ducks"
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