Crime and Punishment

‘Salvation lies within ourselves, for we live in a world that had been self-generated by the coming together of atoms; particles of matter that move within an infinite variety but without an overall, purpose or design.’
Ancient Roman Epicureans

It has to be said, at least by me, that when I began this famed novel by Dostoyevsky (The Brothers Karamazov, The Idiot, Notes from the Underground) in a park in Wales with a six-pack of Guinness cold in my hands, I rather loved the beginning and the way the crime spoken of is immediately discussed unlike in The Brothers Karamazov. That I liked. However, somewhere in the middle, the story does get slow and mundane. Fortunately, it gets back on the train and makes for a convincing classic.

What makes this book a good read, even with the hundred translations, is the underlying pace and message of the work. It would be fair to say that Dostoyevsky was well ahead in his time in portraying the inner tempest of men from all walks of life and was even a philosopher of sorts. Nietzsche was quite a fan; and with good reason. Some say that the works of this Russian writer are highly melodramatic but finishing this novel, I have to say that the over-sensualisation of his works were perhaps carried out with making a strong impression on the reader since most of his works are about symbolism, salvation and existentialism. Being a forerunner in his field, he was bound to appear contrived. He was only human and a Russian at that.

The beginning of Crime and Punishment introduces us to Raskolnikov, a student who is living in St. Petersburg and who is facing financial difficulties. To get the simple luxuries of a meal and a roof above his head, the young man is forced to plan and carry out the murder of an old and unkind pawnbroker, Alyona Ivanovna, and her innocent sister Lizaveta. He did not intend to kill Lizaveta but her interruption during the targeted murder brings her end as well. What follows is a series of paranoia, illness, depression and distrust as Raskolnikov suspects that everyone he comes into contact with suspects him of murdering the old moneylender, a murder that is the talk of the town.

There are various subplots in the novel as well involving the Marmeladova family, whom Raskolnikov comes into contact while planning the murder, and his own mother and sister – Dounya. However, the main theme of the novel is very much to do with Raskolnikov and his guilt and how he tries to justify his errors and construct escapes out of his awaiting punishment.

The novel is quite paced and accurately depicts the terror of a guilty man but is at times repetitive and over-indulgent with its own premises, so much so that one could be forgiven for predicting the climax. I rather like the end because of the way it reconciles Raskolnikov with his sanity and a partner, showing that if one takes the pains of redeeming himself of his sins then he can come across the flood of punishment as a changed and better man.

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The Great Gatsby

"Here was a new generation, a new generation dedicated more than the last to the fear of poverty and the worship of success, grown up to find all gods dead, all wars fought, all faiths to man shaken."
The Great Gatsby

The generation in question above is the one that was dominant between 1920 and 1930. The First World War had been done and dealt with the American society saw an appraisal of wealth that was much higher than other countries and hence the period has been dubbed as the ‘American High’ and the ‘Jazz Age’ because the only significance on American shores during the period were money and jazz respectively.

The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald (The Beautiful and the Damned, This side of Paradise) is set in this high and observes the decadence of the lucky and the not-so-lucky during this period of soaring economy and economized souls.

Nick Carraway, moves from the Midwest to Long Island in New York and stumbles across Jay Gatsby, a rich young man who lives next to him in his lavish mansion. Gatsby is famous for the luxurious parties he throws with doors open for one and all. A lot of people gossip about his accumulation of wealth because no one knows anything about his past. However, they are too busy enjoying his shindigs to come to any concrete conclusions. Gatsby had fought in the First World War but nipped by the need to make himself a wealthy young man and return to an old flame, Daisy Buchanan, he got involved in organized crime in the name of Meyer Wolfsheim and amassed the fortune on which he currently sits.

Now, Daisy Buchanan is a cousin of old Nick and the wife of his classmate from Yale: Tom Buchanan. Gatsby seeing the connection and eager to exploit it, not having seen Daisy for five years, arranges a meeting with the love of his life. The meeting doesn’t go well at first with both the lovers unnerved by their past and how it has come to the present. Jay Gatsby had sent a letter to Daisy on the eve of her marriage, asking her to wait for him to return, but Daisy had not and went on with it anyway.

Their meeting become more frequent, with Tom and Nick occasionally for attendance. All goes smooth till Tom begins to suspect an affair and confronts Gatsby. Gatsby, however, is also aware of Tom’s own numerous affairs; the latest involving Myrtle, the wife of an auto-mechanic, George Wilson. He tells Tom that Daisy will come with him, which she does because she does indeed love Jay Gatsby. Anxious by the confrontation between her lovers, Daisy leaves with Gatsby in his car to Long Island. The rest follow as well, in another car. It is following this pursuit of each other that tragedy strikes.

There is a hit and run when a woman is killed by the driver of Gatsby’s car, Daisy. The woman was Myrtle Wilson, Tom’s lover, who had run out to meet the car thinking it was Tom who was coming to meet her. Her enraged husband, George Wilson, is falsely led to Gatsby’s famous mansion where he shoots Gatsby to death and then kills himself. Daisy, shaken by the whole nerve-wracking episode, allows Tom to believe that it was indeed Jay Gatsby driving the car.

No one comes to Gatsby’s funeral; not one of his so called legions of friends. They had only hung around him to benefit from his generous disposition and then move to another host. The only attendants are Nick, Gatsby’s father Henry Gatz (Jay had changed his name to climb socially), an unnamed man who used to hang around in Jay’s library and Gatsby’s servants. They all pay their respects and part. Before moving back to the Midwest, Nick meets Tom and Daisy slates them off as being rich, spoiled people who leave it to others to clean their mess.

The Great Gatsby never saw much success when it was published or during Fitzgerald’s own lifetime. However, this due success did come through after the Second World War when the critics and ordinary readers alike saw the implication of the important novel and what it had originally set out to explore: the tainted American Dream.

For, truth be told that is what the novel is really all about, the dream of America. The popular American Dream, the one of wealth, celebration, prosperity, modernism, was already achieved by Gatsby and achieved quite well. However, Gatsby coming from a poor background and disciplined interests (as becomes evident from a book that his father shows to Nick before the funeral) is not materialistic. He had set off with bigger goals as a young man and the only one that he never realised was to find true love. It was for this true love that Gatsby had waited five long and lone years only to see it drive him six feet under. This heart-breaking defeat of a man with an ideal heart is what I think affixes the great to his name. It goes on to show that in a world gone mad in the collection of riches, the sanest man is the one who has all these riches but wants none of them. Of course, such a man is yet to be born and it is for this reason that Gatsby will go down in history as the modern Anteros; the 20th century’s example of unrequited love who ‘…paid a high price for living too long with a single dream.’