National Reading Day, Delving into Dostoyevski’s Masterpiece

“I don’t think I can read this!” – the first thing my mind said as I looked at the thickness of the book in hand (that was almost 600 pages). Now, I love books and I love reading, and the thickness or number of pages doesn’t matter, but you know how sometimes you want to read something light and nothing too elaborate? I was in that kind of a mood, but also was waiting to read this book – Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevski – that I had heard so much about.

Today on National Reading Day, I thought of doing a short post about my first impression of this book and how it completely changed no sooner than after I started reading it. Despite the initial hesitation, I’m glad I opened it up, because not only did I start reading it but also got hooked to it within just a few pages. The characters are so memorable, the plot excellent, the writing flowing so seamlessly that you can actually picture every character. For me it was the protagonist Raskolnikov and his sister Dunya – I actually saw these characters playing out, inside my mind, and I’m not even kidding. Surely you understand that I’m not talking about faces but characters here. And oh! Of course the detective – Porfiry, how can one miss this sharp character?

Crime and Punishment being one of the most admired books, a lot of reviews literary and otherwise can be found on the internet, so I won’t go there. And anyway, I think it’s always best to read a book yourself to decide what and how it makes you feel. I’m more than sure in popular opinion it is one of the finest piece of literature ever.

Suggested Reading: The Book Thief and Accordion

The characters each had such strong place in the story. It feels as if the book was written as it is, word to word, while the whole story played out somewhere in real life. Because how else is it possible for one person – Dostoyevski, to be so many characters and play out each of their thoughts and actions before writing them down? How each character thought, and they are all so vastly different, how they act, and how they handle situations, their beliefs, philosophies and opinions, how is one person to know all of this? It baffles me to think how deep, vast and great a mind of a writer can be!

Crime and Punishment is a perfect example of a Classic book that stays relevant no matter the time, era, or geographical regions. Not having read too many classics, I always thought they were difficult to read and understand, maybe because I had started with Shakespeare and found the old English in his plays difficult to understand (I was very young then, and as it is English isn’t my first language). Never had I read this author before or even Russian literature, for that matter. Crime and Punishment is an excellent read and I highly recommend it.