Thursday, March 02, 2006

Dostoyevsky

The name of the book that Locke gives to Henry Gale is The Brothers Karmazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. Henry Gale stated later in the show that he prefers Hemingway and can't get 5 pages into the Dostoyevsky book. Here is a summary of the book that I found online:

Dostoyevsky’s 1880 novel, The Brothers Karamazov, is a tale of bitter family rivalries. It is the last of Dostoyevsky’s famous and well-regarded novels and begins on a bright day in August at a meeting that has been organised to settle the differences of the Karamazov family. Fyodor is an extravagant buffoon and travels with his second son Ivan. Old Fyodor Karamozov’s youngest son Alyosha is with the wise Father Zossima, an elder, who he greatly respects and lives with. Dmitri, the oldest son, appears and is soon in a rage with his father over the question of whether he owes Fyodor debts or Fyodor owes him an inheritance. We learn of Katerina Ivanova who has proposed marriage to Dmitri and the shameful way in which both he and his father are in competition for the love of Grushenka, the latter having taken out 3,000 rubles to bribe her away from his son. Dmitri threatens to kill his father but not Grushenka. Throughout Alyosha is the confidante of his brothers, and Ivan tells of his love for Katerina and the poem that he has written showing his pessimism, The Grand Inquisitor, before leaving for Moscow on the advice of Smerdyakov. Father Zossima dies and certain controversy arises at the monastery about his possible sainthood. The tale of the brothers goes on with ever more confused loves and the murder of Fyodor which it transpires that one of the brothers accidentally encouraged. The fate of brother Dmitri in a lengthy trial is finally the issue at stake and a lengthy exile in Siberia awaits him.

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