Post by Arctura on Mar 24, 2014 23:43:18 GMT
WIP...everything but the conclusion...don't feel obliged to read it all when it's finished
The Harsh Reality: A Comparison of Nihilism in Crime and Punishment and Our World
A paragon of realist literature, Fyodor Dostoevsky deftly exposes nihilism in his novel, Crime and Punishment, published in 1866. Its protagonist, Rodion Raskolnikov, is intelligent yet bitter and unfeeling, having denounced his morality and bonds with society. He embodies the qualities of nihilism, the desertion of all emotional and ethical concerns. This philosophical doctrine is historically ubiquitous, particularly with the Nihilist Movement, one of Imperial Russia’s Great Reforms, and the growing apostasy and atheism of postmodernity; both instances aptly highlight the abandonment of virtue.
Raskolnikov is an impoverished ex-student living in St. Petersburg, the grimy, plagued, and urbanized capital of the Russian Empire. He “is nothing but a poor half-crazed creature, soft in temperament, confused in intellect” (Waliszewski), a maverick who believes he must deliver society from mediocrity. Deluded, he murders Alyona Ivanovna, a pawnbroker, and her unsuspecting half-sister, Lizaveta. Throughout the story, Raskolnikov undergoes transformations in all facets of his life, many of which are attributed to his infatuation with Marmeladov’s humble daughter, Sonia. Forced into prostitution, she is seen by Raskolnikov as a fellow transgressor of morality, but also as a savior that will renew him. This new development causes him to decry his nihilistic lifestyle as desolate and insufferable and to expiate, ending his self-imposed alienation and long suffering. Notwithstanding the title, the story has little to do with the crime or the punishment; the true focus is the turbulent internal conflict of Raskolnikov - the constant doubting of his motives and the psychological torment he endures.
Raskolnikov’s egotism and unsentimentality alienate him from society, for he views himself superior and all others as subordinate. He narrowly evades confronting his landlady, not out of shame of his unpaid dues, but because “he had become so completely absorbed in himself, and isolated from his fellows that he dreaded meeting, not only his landlady, but anyone at all” (Dostoevsky 1). This strict, voluntary estrangement from his peers and society exhibits nihilism, because he values only the individual.
Intrusive thoughts do not always develop into actions, as most people dismiss them as ‘fleeting annoyances’, but when they do, the consequences are potentially disastrous. Raskolnikov has many intrusive thoughts about murdering the miserable pawnbroker. After a close encounter with his landlady, he thinks, “I want to attempt a thing like that and am frightened by these trifles’” (Dostoevsky 2). This is one of several duplicitous ideas that pass through Raskolnikov's mind. He is contemplating the death of an innocent not so much for her money - the obvious motive - but to prove his superiority to society, which he blames for his crippling poverty. Even theoretically, he is a nihilist because a mere consideration of killing requires some moral abandonment.
As aforementioned, his dangerous intrusive thoughts manifest in reality; he “pulled the axe quite out, swung it with both arms, brought the blunt side down on her head...the body fell back...she was dead” (Dostoevsky 69). In addition to Alyona Ivanovna, Raskolnikov kills Lisaveta, as she witnessed him standing near her sister’s mangled body. Raskolnikov believes that by committing the murder of the old woman, he is rightfully removing “a louse...a useless, loathsome, harmful creature” (Dostoevsky 358) from society, a mentality of political nihilists. This also demonstrates utilitarianism - a normative ethical doctrine that states moral decisions should be founded upon the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people.
It demands to be understood that Raskolnikov was acting on supremely selfish impulses. He claims that he wishes to purge society of its ills and be a “benefactor of mankind” (Dostoevsky 360), but he places priority on proving his own superiority. He justifies his actions with his misguided theory of the “extraordinary man”, which he detachedly elucidates to Porfiry Petrovich and Razumihin. Raskolnikov summarizes, “An extraordinary man has the right...to overstep...certain obstacles, and only in case it is essential for the practical fulfillment of his idea (sometimes, perhaps, to the benefit to the whole of humanity)” (Dostoevsky 226).
Raskolnikov murders the pawnbroker, because he wants to prove his experiment correct, that he can effectively transcend the law for a higher purpose. Understandably, Porfiry inquires, “What if some man or youth imagines that he is a Lycurgus or Mahomet - and suppose he begins to remove all obstacles...he has some great enterprise before him and needs money...and tries to get it” (Dostoevsky 230). Raskolnikov is precisely the figure Porfiry is describing; he imagines himself to be of equal status to ‘extraordinary men’, such as Napoleon, Machiavelli, and King Solomon. The cruel method which Raskolnikov employs to fulfill his “great enterprise” demonstrates nihilism.
After Raskolnikov realizes his crimes served no ‘higher purpose’, he is extracted from his delirium at last. “Everything takes on a new physiognomy, and a new meaning to him...his whole soul is metamorphosed and in constant discord with the life around him” (Melchior); consequently, he becomes more accepting of relationships, which he so ardently avoided before. He is quickly enamored with Sonia Marmeladov. After hearing his confession, she “is terrified at his self-abasement…[and] begs him to rise” (Melchior). It is refreshing to Raskolnikov how she wears her piety as a cross and can find fortune in adversity. Through Sonia, Dostoevsky reveals his crowning concept that only by atonement and suffering can one achieve happiness. She spurs a faithless Raskolnikov to repent and tells him, “Stand at the cross-roads, bow down, kiss the earth which you have defiled...say to all men aloud, ‘I am a murderer!’ Then God will send you life again” (Dostoevsky 361).
Following this absolution, he goes to Siberian prison and learns the extent of the other prisoners’ detest of him. Most of it is credited to his irreverence, as well as the banality of his crimes - a majority of them are political prisoners who have been arrested for their intellectual beliefs, not for a petty and imprudent murder. Raskolnikov “had never talked to them about God nor his belief, but they wanted to kill him as an infidel” (Dostoevsky 468). A rejection of religious belief is markedly nihilist; it is epistemological nihilism, the renunciation of preexisting structures and given truths in favor of a materialistic one. One of those given truths or early rationalizations of the world is the existence of God, which was considered by the nihilists to be antithetical to freedom.
The events detailed in Crime and Punishment are largely influenced by the historical context. The author “often represents Western European ideas as dangerous diseases infecting, or as spirits possessing his morally shaken characters” (Historical Context). The book contains heavy undertones of its real world parallels, and this is due to the interdependent relationship between Russian literature and the revolution, known as the Nihilist Movement. It was a loosely organized sociopolitical and intellectual crusade that revolutionized Imperial Russian in the mid-nineteenth century. The conflict was between the new generation, the Nihilists or “New People”, and their parent’s generation. In response to the Crimean War of the 1850’s, The New People blatantly defied the regime and sought to subvert the Tsarist monarchy, aristocracy, and Eastern Orthodox Church. They rejected all conventions in an effort to transform society. The Nihilists “advocated a social arrangement based on rationalism and materialism as the sole source of knowledge and individual freedom as the highest goal” (Nihilism). Instead, it alienated the revolutionaries from the educated public, and the Nihilists became a branch of the intelligentsia, members of Russia’s intellectual community. The movement eventually deteriorated into pandemonium, and by the late 1870s, a nihilist was anyone affiliated with clandestine political groups that advocated terrorism.
The intelligentsia, comprised of authors, philosophers, radicals, and politicians, was greatly invested in the environment that bred the revolution. When Western philosophies permeated the nation, the “Russian intellectuals were profoundly shaken by the works of Kant, Hegel, Marx and others, and Raskolnikov’s ‘exceptional man’ is something of a brutalized reading of Hegel’s world historical figure” (Historical Context). Evidently, Dostoevsky was not a proponent of nihilism’s integration, given he emphasizes Raskolnikov’s vastly unscrupulous nature. Crime and Punishment may be the crown of morality tales, the story focusing solely on the psychology of Raskolnikov; the characters are merely helping to characterize him. The “version of nihilism offered...is then, primarily, a snapshot of the popular culture in which nihilism dwelt as much as it is a recollection of the trend” (A History of Russian Nihilism). By borrowing Hegel’s idea and amplifying it, Dostoevsky reinforces the improbability of an ‘exceptional man’ and of the hazards of nihilism. He also seeks to eradicate society’s deification of conquerors, such as Napoleon, who were once condemned as despots.
Dostoevsky appropriates other Western philosophical thought that relate to Raskolnikov’s nihilism, one of which “came from the utilitarian thought of John Stuart Mill, Jeremy Bentham, and William Godwin...such phrases as “the greatest good for the greatest number” (Historical Context). Utilitarianism boils down to an iconic and polemic saying: The ends justify the means. Though Mill fought to erase this misconception, utilitarianism was regarded by the general public as an unorthodox practice. Another Western concept represented in Crime and Punishment is Utopian Socialism, exemplified by figures such as Charles Fourier and Robert Owen. It is an umbrella term to describe any projects or doctrines that express the longing for a radical transformation of society, according to socialist principles; however, they are often chimerical, perhaps even messianic and cannot indicate a viable solution. The nihilists “also believed in voluntarism, which was that a small minority could change society”. This belief that only the peasant was an agent of major social change was the nihilist contribution to Utopian Socialism.
The preceding environment aside, the revolution itself considerably influenced the country’s prolific writers, especially Dostoevsky, his novels centering on aspects of the movement. The new generation invested in political nihilism; they disregarded all values and used radical tactics for societal benefit. To them, “good and evil are nebulous, and values addressing such are the product of nothing more than social and emotive pressures” (Nihilism). Similarly, Raskolnikov is motivated by his belief that he is removing a “louse” from St. Petersburg, which is expelled near the close of the book when he accepts his mortal status. Utilitarianism is commonly linked to political nihilism, “the belief that the destruction of all existing political, social, and religious order is a prerequisite for any future improvement” (Nihilism). An ethical principle initially conceived to promote the greatest happiness, utilitarianism has been polluted by the revolution, where it “served to bludgeon opponents of reform” (John Stuart Mill). A nihilist “in the popular stereotype, became a revolutionary who believed that the end justified any means, including terror” (Nihilistic Sentiments). This is the most significant parallel between Crime and Punishment and the movement. Dostoevsky, having an aversion to nihilism, embraces this stereotype. Raskolnikov’s claim of societal benefit belies his dangerous nihilistic tendencies.
Nihilism is “often associated with extreme pessimism and a radical skepticism that condemns existence”, and having “no loyalties, and no purpose other than, perhaps, an impulse to destroy” (Nihilism). This negative connotation exists chiefly because nihilism was strongest as a political position, rather than an intellectual supposition; it was used as a weapon of usurpation. However, other types of nihilism are more individualistic and therefore more ‘acceptable’. One such form is epistemological nihilism. As mentioned previously, it is the extreme skepticism of the world’s given truths, the foundations that mankind have relied on to make sense of worldly phenomena. The most widely known one is the existence of a god or gods. Epistemological nihilists were liberally influenced by Hegel’s posthumous followers, the Left Hegelians, who believed in a radical interpretation of his philosophy. They “valued Freedom and Reason above all else, critiquing religion as irrational, and arguing the story of Jesus was a myth warped by those in power to subdue the masses” (Philosophies). To them, sacrosanct truths are symptomatic of a defective world mythos.
As Nietzsche predicted, there is a steadily growing cynicism in postmodern society, which can be ascribed to an increase of the questioning of human origins. Atheism and apostasy - renunciation of or opposition to a former religion - is more prevalent now than ever, particularly in areas with non-theocratic governments. In the twenty-first century, religion is no longer the top echelon of social strata. With the freedom of choosing one’s own religion, there is alternatively the freedom of not having one. Additionally, religious ideals, regardless of denomination, are not strongly applied in the public school curriculum, politics, or science. Once sacrilegious concepts, such as evolution and the heliocentric model and are now common knowledge. The ‘heathens’ of the past are everyday members of society.
More accurately for the postmodern condition, epistemological nihilism is relabelled as antifoundationalism. ‘Antifoundationalism’ is more applicable for the modern world, because unlike epistemological nihilism, the conclusion of ‘there is no God’ comes rather easily. The “crisis of nihilism that has tormented modern philosophers for over a century has given way to mild annoyance or, more interestingly, an upbeat acceptance of meaninglessness” (Nihilism). The extreme confusion is seemingly absent, given that atheism is a product of years of foundation and its stigma has mellowed greatly. Also, reason and individual morality prevails over the judgement of an unseen, infallible source.
The constant variable in all forms of nihilism - political, ethical, epistemological, and existential - is the a concentrated materialism, that “only what is perceptible exists” (A History of Russian Nihilism) and according to Nietzsche, that “there is no objective order or structure in the world except what we give it” (Nihilism). This view is represented especially in epistemological nihilism, or antifoundationalism. Deciding that the visible realm is supreme automatically negates the existence of any preexisting structures, which is in this case, God.
However, atheists and apostates are only partially antifoundationalists. The one distinguishing factor is the existence of a life purpose, an ultimate goal to work towards; nihilists oppose any such purpose. One can be utterly faithless and still “seek a single, all-encompassing totality" (Nihilism 3). This differentiation is crucial. Though, in spite of this organization of existence, postmodernity is still considered the world where “God is dead” (Nihilism 3). Those sacrosanct truths no longer serve to establish order or impose obligations upon us.
