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comment by wasoxygen
wasoxygen  ·  3670 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: An interesting question

The Road broke me. It was the last book I can claim to have read in a sitting, though the sitting was split over two days, if that counts.

What was the Dostoyevsky that affected you?





ecib  ·  3669 days ago  ·  link  ·  

When they speak of the great Russian psyological novel authors, it isn't just a convenient label. In Crime & Punishment, the internal unravelling of the protagonist was rendered with such realism, it was almost to the point where I could understand him and his skewed point of view. It was that well written. This was profoundly disturbing and depressing while reading it, since the protagonist committed a grisly murder. It's one thing to make a character come alive, but another to tease out the threads of his mind and gently lead you to the same place he is going. Just made me feel like I understood the mechanics of a broken mind far more than I wanted to. The Road was emotionally impactful to a similar degree but in a more benign way as I had a relationship with the victims in that case.

thenewgreen  ·  3669 days ago  ·  link  ·  

I agree with your assessment of Crime and Punishment, it was disturbing how much I could "relate" to his way of thinking. I felt similarly after reading Albert Camus' the Stranger.

ecib  ·  3669 days ago  ·  link  ·  

I could not get into The Stranger. Camus is one of my favorite authors but I much prefer his political essays to his fiction. I started The Stranger after reading Letters to a German Friend and it was too much of a departure in style at the time I think.