Crime and Punishment: Book Review

By Mayukh Kashyap

The book Crime and punishment is a novel by the Russian Fyodor Dostoevsky. The book Crime
and Punishment follows the mental anguish and moral dilemmas of Rodian Raskolnikov, an
impoverished ex-student in Saint Petersburg who plans to kill an unscrupulous pawnbroker, an
old lady who stores money and valuable objects in her flat. He theorizes that that with money
he could liberate himself from poverty and go on to perform great deeds, and seeks to convince
himself that certain crimes are justifiable if they are committed in order to remove obstacles to
the higher goals of ‘extraordinary’ men. Once the deed is done however, he finds himself
racked with confusion, paranoia, and disgust. His theoretical justification loses all power as he
struggles with guilt and horror and confronts both the internal and external consequences of
his deed.

In the first chapter of the book we are introduced to Rodian Raskolnikov and the very poor
state in which he lives, which had lead him to think that committing a crime is justifiable. We
read about how he was trying to avoid his landlady, because he became completely absorbed in
himself and had isolated himself from his fellows that he dreaded meeting, we also find out
that he not only avoided his landlady but everyone. Raskolnikov was crushed by poverty and
anxieties weighed upon him, this made Raskolnikov very desperate which led him to believe he
should commit crime. In the start Raskolnikov questioned if committing a crime is justifiable or
not. He visited the pawnbroker with the idea to plan a way to steal from her. While going to her
he still questioned if he should commit the crime while also coming up with a plan to steal from
her. After his visit he saw a tavern and went to the tavern for a drink.

From the first chapter we can conclude that this work by Dostoevsky show what kind of
desperate situation human have to go through in society and it show that when human are left
with no option they are bound to commit crime to free themselves from the shackles that bind
them. It also portrays the life of a social deviant as Raskolnikov was a social deviant as he would
not follow the social norms and isolate himself from the society.