Arian’s Reviews > The Idiot > Status Update

I thoroughly enjoyed reading the general's personal (but fantastical of course) narrative of Napoleon's march into Moscow. He opens his account by clarifying to the prince that he was 10 years old 'because as a 15 year old I would not have run away from our wooden house on Staraya Basmannaya on the day of Napoleon's entrance to Moscow, leaving my mother, who was too late to leave Moscow, and trembling with fear...

The opening of the final part of the story focuses on the 'commonplace' characters of our story. The narrator speaks of Gavrila, 'indeed, there is nothing more vexing, for example, than to be wealthy, of decent family, of decent appearance, not badly educated, not stupid, even kind-hearted, and at the same time to possess no talent, no special quality, nor even any eccentricity, not a single idea of one's own...

As I’m on the final part of the story I think this is a good moment to reflect a little. It’s taken me awhile to get to this point (close to five months) and it’s bcos of the philosophy woven into the narrative. This is the most challenging novel I’ve read, emotionally and intellectually, and I’m glad I’ve taken my sweet time. I look forward to the endgame!

‘Let us allow that the spark of consciousness was lit by the will of a higher power, let us allow that it was suddenly instructed by that higher power to destroy itself, because for some reason - and the reason was not even explained - that’s just how it was up there, let us allow, I admit all that, but there still remains the eternal question: why is my meekness demanded in all this?…

‘Individual kindness will always remain, because it is a need of the personality, a living need for the direct influence of one personality on another. (…) How can you know, Bakhmutov, what significance this communication between one personality and another may have in the fate of the personality that is communicated with?….

Without a doubt, Ippolit is the most tragic character I have ever read. In his 'NECESSARY EXPLANATION' (which I suspect is his suicide note) writes about 'the idea that it was not worth living for a few weeks (..) and that the first moment that this thought penetrated me completely and directly was at the very same moment when it occurred to me to sample life for the last time, and I wanted to see people and trees...

I'll admit that I've read too much without updating my progress (it's gotten so good). Rogozhin and the Prince meet for the first time since 'you made an attempt on my life', says Myshkin. The Prince reaffirms Rogozhin, saying, 'the only Rogozhin I remember is the one with whom I exchanged crosses as a brother that day; I wrote that to you in my letter yesterday, so that you'd stop thinking about all that delirium'.

I really enjoyed reading Keller's confession to the Prince. Keller says to the Prince after he revealed his true motive 'by means of tears', 'Well, that's how to flabbergast a man completely! For pity's sake, Prince: such simple-heartedness, such innocence as were unheard of even in the golden age, and then suddenly you pierce a man through like an arrow, with such profound psychology of observation.'

'Yes, nature is given to mocking! Why does she create the very finest beings just in order to mock them? Was it she who made it so that (...) she destined him to say things on account of which so much blood was shed that it it were shed all at once people would probably have drowned in it? Oh, it's good that I am dying! I would also probably have uttered some horrible lie, nature would have betrayed me like that!'

A man claiming to be the rightful heir to the prince's fortune declares his 'human right, a natural one; the right of common sense and the voice of conscience, and even though this right of ours is not written down in any rotten human code of law, a decent and honest man is obliged to remain a decent and honest man even on those points that aren't written down in the law books.'