Showing results by author "Fyodor Dostoyevsky" in All Categories

A century after it first appeared, Crime and Punishment remains one of the most gripping psychological thrillers. A poverty-stricken young man, seeing his family making sacrifices for him, is faced with an opportunity to solve his financial problems with one simple but horrifying act: the murder of a pawnbroker. She is, he feels, just a parasite on society. But does the end justify the means? Rodion Romanovitch Raskolnikov makes his decision and then has to live with it.

Prince Lyov Nikolayevitch Myshkin is one of the great characters in Russian literature. Is he a saint or just naïve? Is he an idealist or, as many in General Epanchin's society feel, an "idiot"? Certainly his return to St. Petersburg after years in a Swiss clinic has a dramatic effect on the beautiful Aglaia, youngest of the Epanchin daughters, and on the charismatic but willful Nastasya Filippovna. As he paints a vivid picture of Russian society, Dostoyevsky shows how principles conflict with emotions - with tragic results.

Also known as Demons, The Possessed is a powerful socio-political novel about revolutionary ideas and the radicals behind them. It follows the career of Pyotr Stepanovich Verkhovensky, a political terrorist who leads a group of nihilists on a demonic quest for societal breakdown. They are consumed by their desires and ideals, and have surrendered themselves fully to the darkness of their "demons". This possession leads them to engulf a quiet provincial town and subject it to a storm of violence.

Fyodor Dostoyevsky is a titanic among the world's great authors, and The Brothers Karamazov is often hailed as his finest novel. A masterpiece on many levels, it transcends the boundaries of a gripping murder mystery to become a moving account of the battle between love and hate, faith and despair, compassion and cruelty, good and evil.

"White Nights" is one of Dostoyevsky's shorter works told from the standpoint of an ultimate introvert, brought briefly out of his shell by love. It might have been written 170 years ago, but certain aspects of it are very relatable to the modern listener, especially to those of us who gravitate toward solitude and introversion. 

Prince Myshkin returns to Russia from an asylum in Switzerland. As he becomes embroiled in the frantic amatory and financial intrigues that center around a cast of brilliantly realized characters and that ultimately lead to tragedy, he emerges as a unique combination of the Christian ideal of perfection and Dostoevsky's own views, afflictions, and manners. His serene selflessness is contrasted with the worldly qualities of every other character in the novel. 

Rodion Romanovich Raskolnikov, a former student, lives in a tiny garret on the top floor of a run-down apartment building in St. Petersburg. He is sickly, dressed in rags, short on money, and talks to himself, but he is also handsome, proud, and intelligent. He is contemplating committing an awful crime, but the nature of the crime is not yet clear. Thus begins Crime and Punishment with all the twists and turns and philosophical questions that permeate Dostoyevsky's writing. A world classic! Please note: This audiobook is in Russian.

"The Grand Inquisitor" is a central chapter of Dostoyevsky's novel The Brothers Karamazov. The middle brother, Ivan, is having a conversation with his younger brother, Alyosha. Ivan represents the rationalist and nihilistic ideology that permeated Russia in the 19th Century. Alyosha's beliefs counterbalance his brother's. He embodies hope. Ivan tells Alyosha a vision where the grand inquisitor, during the Spanish inquisition, encounters Jesus Christ, who has made a return to Earth.

Living in a squalid room in St. Petersburg, the indigent but proud Rodion Raskolnikov believes he is above society. Obsessed with the idea of breaking the law, Raskolnikov resolves to kill an old pawnbroker for her cash. Although the murder and robbery are bungled, Raskolnikov manages to escape without being seen. And with nothing to prove his guilt and a mendacious confessor in police custody, Raskolnikov seems to have committed the perfect crime. But in Dostoyevsky’s world of moral transgressions, with its reason and its consequences, Raskolnikov’s plan has a devastating hitch.

The murder of brutal landowner Fyodor Karamazov changes the lives of his sons irrevocably: Mitya, the sensualist, whose bitter rivalry with his father immediately places him under suspicion for parricide, Ivan, the intellectual, driven to breakdown, the spiritual Alyosha, who tries to heal the family's rifts, and the shadowy figure of their bastard half-brother, Smerdyakov. Dostoyevsky's dark masterwork evokes a world where the lines between innocence and corruption, good and evil, blur and everyone's faith in humanity is tested.

Loosely based on sensational press reports of a Moscow student’s murder by fellow revolutionists, The Possessed depicts the destructive chaos caused by outside agitators who move into a provincial town. The enigmatic Stavrogin dominates the novel. His magnetic personality influences his tutor, the liberal intellectual poseur Stepan Verhovensky, and the teacher’s revolutionary son Pyotr, as well as other radicals.

"Djadjushkin son" - radiospektakl' po motivam odnoimennoj povesti Fjodora Dostoevskogo. Povest' byla opublikovana v Sankt-Peterburge v 1859 godu. V provincial'nyj gorod Mordasov priezzhaet staryj bogatyj knjaz' K. Odna iz mestnyh dam, Mar'ja Aleksandrovna Moskaljova, stremitsja vydat' za nego zamuzh svoju doch' Zinu. Takim obrazom Mar'ja Aleksandrovna zhelaet steret' v mordasovskom obshhestve pamjat' o neudachnom romane Ziny i uchitelja ejo mladshego brata.

Inside this collection of timeless masterpieces, you’ll find three of Dostoyevsky’s most famous works - the gripping, drama-packed The Brothers Karamazov; a powerful account of a naive prince returning to his homeland and finding a world ready to take advantage of him in, The Idiot; and finally, a deep and thought-provoking novel about an impoverished student who, upon pushing himself to murder to get by, struggles with the guilt and ramifications as his actions and beliefs haunt him in the 1866 novel Crime and Punishment.   

In "Notes from Underground" by Fyodor Dostoyevsky, we are not talking about revolutionary personalities, a secret struggle for some ideas or about a curtain of secrets and mysteries. The hero of the "underground", the author of the notes, is a collegiate assessor who retired after receiving a small inheritance. He lives poorly, in a wretched room on the outskirts of Petersburg. And the "underground" is psychological.

The Possessed, also called Demons, is Fyodor Dostoevsky's novel about life in Russia at the end of the 19th century. In this highly political novel, Dostoevsky portrays the revolutionaries as demons or devils as they plot ruin and eventually turn on each other. Please note: This audiobook is in Russian.

One of the most fascinating psychological struggles of the modern world revolves around the competing tension between existential philosophy and metaphysical spirituality. "The Dream of a Ridiculous Man" beautifully encapsulates the extremes of both points of view and provides the listener a front row seat to a battle that still rages today.

The Brothers Karamazov is a tale of a complicated and broken family headed by a father, Fyodor Karamazov, who becomes entangled with his three sons, whom he neglected, after both mothers died.

The short works of Dostoevsky exist in the very large shadow of his astonishing longer novels, but they too are among literature's most revered works and offer keys to understanding the themes in his longer works. Contained in this volume are the short stories "White Nights", "A Disgraceful Affair", and "The Dream of the Ridiculous Man", three of Dostoevsky's most troubling, moving, and poignant works.

Crime and Punishment is a novel by the Russian author Fyodor Dostoyevsky. It was first published in the literary journal The Russian Messenger in 12 monthly installments during 1866. Later, it was published in a single volume. It is the second of Dostoyevsky's full-length novels following his return from five years of exile in Siberia. Crime and Punishment is considered the first great novel of his "mature" period of writing.

Often considered one of the first ever psychological thrillers, Crime and Punishment is a gripping tale of a poverty-stricken young man in Saint Petersburg, Russia, who hatches a plan to kill someone for money. Once the deed is done, he finds himself racked with guilt, confusion and disgust for his act. In this new recording, Will Poulter gives new life to the troubled protagonist, Rodion Raskolnikov, in a performance that will have you questioning where we draw the line between right and wrong.