Arian’s Reviews > The Idiot > Status Update
Arian
is on page 60 of 768
Dostoyevsky interrupts the flow of the narrative 'in order to establish, in the most straightforward and precise manner, the relations and circumstances that we find in General Yepanchin's household at the beginning of our tale.' This extract brings to the present a clear understanding of the context behind 'the incident' and Nastasya Filippovna's impending decision later this evening.
— Apr 30, 2026 03:29AM
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Arian
is on page 276 of 768
Dostoyevsky uses an orientalist myth. 'that is the very second that was not long enough for water to be spilled from the epileptic Mahomet's overturned water-jug, though in that very second he was able to survey all the habitations of Allah' to describe the timelessness of an epileptic premotion the Prince suffers, 'freezing Rogozhin to the spot and thus saved the prince from the inevitable blow of the knife'.
— Jul 29, 2026 08:09AM
Arian
is on page 254 of 768
Rogozhin says, 'when you're not there in front of me, I at once feel malice towards you, Lev Nikolayevich. These last three months, when I haven't seen you, I've felt bitter towards you every moment, by God, I have. I could've gone and poisoned you! It was like that. Now you've scarcely been sitting with me for quarter of an hour, yet all my malice is passing, and you're as dear to me as you used to be'.
— Jul 27, 2026 12:42PM
Arian
is on page 239 of 768
Another on capital punishment, 'she began to shout: "Encore un moment, monsieur le bourreau, encore un moment!" and for that moment, perhaps, the Lord will forgive her, because a misere worse than that is impossible to imagine for a human soul. Do you know what the word misere means? Well, that is the very personification of misere'.
— Jul 27, 2026 07:08AM
Arian
is on page 222 of 768
The narrator for Part 2 is almost a new character of its own. Our man on the ground (!) who happens to have observed the events of Part 1 and is informing the reader of what went down in the interim, but with a noticeable gap in knowledge.
— Jul 21, 2026 09:12AM
Arian
is on page 209 of 768
An 'ephemeral, romantic, indecent, but also colourful and original' evening closes part 1, with Nastasya Filippovna riding off with Rogozhin and rejecting the prince's proposal — after he'd already rejected Ganya's on her behalf. Ganya's vanity shows when he turns away from the 100,000 roubles she throws in the fire, wanting to 'feast my eyes on your soul as you crawl into the fire for my money'. BRAVO BRAVO BRAVO!!
— Jul 13, 2026 12:18PM
Arian
is on page 182 of 768
Ferdyshchenko has been the lone star in this extract! He seems to me an honest man (I'm reserving any conclusive judgement until the very end of the book). By his proposed petite jeu, Nastasya's turn to deliver an anecdote to her guests involved the prince in deciding for her on whether she should marry Ganya or not. The prince said no! Bravo EVERYBODY!
— Jun 19, 2026 02:24PM
Arian
is on page 158 of 768
Prince Myshkin stands before Nastaya Filippovna’s front door for ‘business’ that the reader knows nothing of. Ganya is pretty funny!
— Jun 07, 2026 04:22PM
Arian
is on page 131 of 768
Apologies for the hiatus. I’ve been slaving away at work and too upset about it to do anything else.
— Jun 05, 2026 03:27PM
Arian
is on page 105 of 768
Ganya, by exploiting the prince’s innocence, delivers a note to Aglaya, casting her as his only possible saviour from marrying Nastasya Filippovna as a ‘last attempt to save himself from perdition.’ ‘Do not be angry at the insolence of a desperate, a drowning man, for having dared to make a last attempt to save himself from perdition.’
— May 03, 2026 04:18PM
Arian
is on page 79 of 768
The prince, revisiting capital punishment, 'but he says that nothing was so hard for him at the time as the incessant thought: "What if I didn't have to die? What if I could get my life back - what an infinity it would be! And it would all be mine! Then I would make each minute into a whole lifetime.." He said that this idea finally turned into such a fury that he wanted them to shoot him as quickly as possible.'
— Apr 30, 2026 04:13PM
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Apr 30, 2026 03:35AM
It is rumoured that Yepanchin, a married man and father of three daughters, has been seduced by Nastasya Filippovna. To this the narrator says, 'it is well known that a man excessively carried away by passion, especially if he is getting on in years, becomes completely blind and is ready to suspect hope where there is none at all; not only that, but he loses his reason and acts like a silly child, though he may be a Solomon of wisdom.'
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