This course will focus on two of Dostoevsky’s novels — Crime and Punishment and The Brothers Karamazov — and will also include some of his shorter fiction. We will read his works as novels of ideas and as great works of literature, looking closely at the ways Dostoevsky develops ideas, characters, and plot. The main thread will be chronological, as we follow Dostoevsky’s life and the great issues of his day through the prism of his writing.

Students will write two papers and take two exams, although they may choose instead an intensive writing option entailing the writing and revising of four papers.

Texts:
Fyodor Dostoevsky, Poor Folk (Penguin) ISBN 0-14-044505-6 (McDuff Translation)
Fyodor Dostoevsky, Notes from Underground and The Double (Penguin) 978-0-14-044252-6 (Coulson Translation)
Fyodor Dostoevsky, Crime and Punishment (Vintage) (Pevear and Volokhonsky, trans) ISBN 0-679-73450-3
Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Eternal Husband (Bantam) ISBN 978-0-553-21444-4 (Pevear and Volokhonsky trans)
Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov (FSG) 0-374-52837-3 (Pevear and Volokhonsky Translation)

Prerequisites: None. Classes and readings in English.