Famous Translations -- The Brothers Karamazov (Volume 1 and 2, Color Illustration Edition)

Author: (Russian) Dostoevsky
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-02-01
Features: This book is the last long (novel) of the great Russian writer Dostoevsky and one of his main representative works. The author uses the tragic patricide as the main plot, shaping the typical images of the old Karamazov and his several sons. In a small town, the father and the eldest son Mitka compete for a common mistress, and in addition to disputes over property, they become irreconcilable. The illegitimate son of the old man, Smeltyakov, influenced by the extreme egoism of the second son Ivan's philosophy of "one can do as one pleases," and also because of his own humiliation, takes advantage of the conflict between the father and the eldest son to kill his father. The eldest son Mitka is suspected of imprisonment; the second son Ivan is tormented by guilt and becomes mentally ill; Smeltyakov also commits suicide due to a mental breakdown; only the innocent and kind youngest son Alyosha, who has a loving heart for everyone, remains. He is unwilling to stay alone in his hometown and leaves. The Karamazov family finally ceases to exist.
"Crime and Punishment" is a grand-scale novel with social philosophical content, a summative work of Dostoevsky's lifelong thoughts and literary exploration. Through the intense conflicts between father and son, brothers, and the Karamazov family in the provincial landlord society of old Russia, caused by money and lust, it profoundly reveals the social contradictions and human nature under the impact of capitalism and the power of money in Russia at that time, with a heart-stirring artistic effect. The spiritual characteristics of moral decline and unrestrained desires of the Karamazov family in the work are known as the "Karamazov character" in literary history. Dostoevsky was one of the most original writers in 19th-century Europe, together with Balzac and Dickens, hailed as the "master of the unreachable heights of European novel art." His works focus on psychological analysis and the revelation of consciousness. Through an in-depth exploration of the sins of the human world and a sharp, merciless dissection of human nature, he elevates the art of narration to a new realm, reflecting his originality as a master of the Russian realist psychological school in art and is revered as a master by many modern literary schools.