REVIEWS

Hans-Peter Beer. Die Gestalt des Eugenij Pavlovic Radomskij in Dostoevskijs Roman "Der Idiot". (Skripten des Slavischen Seminars der Universität Tübingen, 15). Tübingen, 1978. 72 pp. DM 3 paper.

Christiane Heim. Die Gestalt Svidrigajlovs in Dostoevskijs Roman "Verbrechen und Strafe". (Skripten des Slavischen Seminars der Universität Tübingen, 16). Tübingen, 1978. 81 pp. DM 3,50 paper.

Dorothee Schwarz, Thomas Heckert und Rudolf Pollach. Studien und Materialien zu Dostoevskijs Roman "Der Idiot". (Skripten des Slavischen Seminars der Universität Tübingen, 17). Tübingen, 1978. 87 pp. DM 4 paper.

The common denominator of the above-listed works is their authors' insufficient acquaintance with works published in the U.S., England, and even in Germany on subjects within their fields of concentration. Christiane Heim should have consulted E. J. Simmons, "Dostoevsky - the Making of a Novelist" (London: Oxford University Press, 1940); "Dostoevsky: A Collection of Critical Essays," ed. René Wellek (New York: Prentice-Hall, 1962), and my own book "F. M. Dostoevsky: Dualism and Synthesis of the Human Soul" (Carbondale:

Southern Illinois University Press, 1963). Had she familiarized herself with the above monographs, she would have discovered that the character of Svidrigajlov has been treated extensively by these scholars. There are also annoying spelling mistakes in Ms. Heim's bibliography: Chikago instead of Chicago, "The Mayor Fiction" instead of "The Major Fiction" (p. 80), and so forth.

Dorothee Schwarz's lengthy essay "Dostoevskijs Auffassung von der Eigenart und Bestimmung Russlands nach seinem Roman 'Der Idiot"' (pp. 4-59 in "Skripten" (No. 17) reveals a similar lack of familiarity with a number of important works on the subject, such as "F. M. Dostojewski, Was vermag der Mensch? - Ein Brevier," ed. Reinhard Lauth (München: R. Piper & Co., 1949); Fedor Stepun, "Dostojewski und Tolstoj - Christentum u. soziale Revolution" (München: C. Hanser, 1961); N. Gorodetzky, "The Humiliated Christ in Modern Thought" (New York: Macmillan, 1938); N. Zernov, "Three Russian Prophets: Khomiakov, Dostoevsky, Soloviev" (London: S. C. M. Press, 1944); and W. Hubben, "Four Prophets of Our Destiny" (New York: Macmillan, 1952), among many others.

Thomas Heckert's arrangement of events in their chronological order in Dostoevsky's novel "The Idiot" has no bibliography, but may have some value for those researchers who wish to reconstruct "die Vorgeschichte der Handlung des Romans" (pp. 61-80).

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Rudolf Pollach's "Bezifferung der Abschnitte des Romans 'Der Idiot' und vergleichende Übersicht über die Seitenzahlen in den beiden letzten russischen Gesamtausgaben und in der deutschen Übersetzung von Arthur Luther" (pp. 81-86) will have, no doubt, some interest for the German reader of "The Idiot" who may wish to compare the Russian text and its German translation.

The appeal of Nos. 16 and 17 of the "Skripten" is, thus, rather limited.

Not so with No. 15 of the "Skripten", representing a study by Hans-Peter Beer, "Die Gestalt des Eugenij Pavlovic Radomskij in Dostoevskijs Roman 'Der Idiot'," submitted by him in 1977-8 as a "wissenschaftliche Arbeit für die Prüfung für das Lehramt an Gymnasien" (p. 70). But even this instructive study lacks in its bibliography the names and titles of several important American (and English) books, such as E. Wasiolek, "Dostoevsky. The Major Fiction" (Cambridge/Mass.: MIT Press, 1964), "Dostoevsky: A Collection of Critical Essays", ed. René Wellek (New York: Prentice-Hall, 1962), and R. Curie, "Characters of Dostoevsky: Studies from Four Novels" (New York: Russell & Russell, 1966), to name just a few. However, Mr. Beer's approach and treatment of his subject is very interesting. He defines his objective on p. 1: "Die vorliegende Arbeit versucht, die Funktion Radomskijs in der Handlungsstruktur und in der moralphilosophischen Aussage des Romans zu bestimmen." Mr. Beer persuasively argues that one of the functions of Radomskij is to convey Dostoevsky's ideas, with maximum artistic detachment, for example, his disapproval of Nihilism and of the Russian intelligentsia's alienation from the Russian nation; his agreement with Lomonosov's, Pushkin's, and Gogol's respective portrayals of specific characteristics of the Russian man, and his insistence upon the moral superiority of Prince Myshkin in comparison with his fellow men within the novel. The theme of duality underlying "The Idiot", and the discrepancy which exists between "Sein und Schein, zwischen Inhalt und inhaltsleerer Form, zwischen 'krasota' -und 'krasivost'" (p. 56) are also amplified through Radomskij, as Mr. Beer elaborates clearly in his essay. His comparisons between Myshkin and Radomskij, N. N. Strakhov and Radomskij, and Stravrogin are enlightening and convincing, especially in view of the fact that the character of Radomskij has been largely neglected by modern critics and scholars.

I object only to Mr. Beer's search for a meaningful connection between the name "vel'monchik" (which Dostoevsky entered in his initial Notes with reference to Radomskij) and "vel'mozha," and to Mr. Beer's surprising hypothesis that Russian names ending in 'skij are of West.Slavic origin, thus revealing "den verwestlichten Charakter der russischen Aristokratie" (p. 48). The Russian "raznochincy," whose names also end in -skij (Belinskij, Chernyshevskij, Pomjalovskij, and Gieb Uspenskij, for example), were indeed no representatives of the Russian westernized aristocracy!

Ternira Pachmuss -- University of Illinois

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Jacques Catteau. La création littéraire chez Dostoievski. (Bibliothèque russe de l'Institut d'études slaves, 49). Paris: L'Institut d'études slaves, 1978. 615 pp. 96,30 F, paper.

La publication du livre de J. Catteau est un événement important pour tous ceux qui s'intéressent non seulement à l'oeuvre de Dostoievski, mais également à l'homme et aux problèmes que posent la névrose et l'épilepsie dans la genèse des romans de cet écrivain.

Disons tout de suite que le livre est une contribution en grande partie nouvelle et originale dans un domaine qui, malgré l'immense littérature consacrée à Dostoievski, suscite encore de grands points d'interrogation: à savoir celui de la genèse de l'oeuvre dostoievskéienne. En étudiant le comment Dostoievski a écrit ses livres, peut-on apporter des points de vue nouveaux sur l'oeuvre achevée? Comme l'écrit J. Catteau dans son avant-propos, "Notre intention est... de renverser la démarche habituelle de la critique qui part de l'oeuvre accomplie pour comprendre l'idée et analyser l'expression... Pour ce on épousera le temps naturel de la gestation, on étudiera d'abord les conditions dans lesquelles elle s'effectue, c'est-à-dire le milieu créateur, puis le processus créateur lui-même, enfin l'oeuvre créée dans ses structures essentielles" (p. 14-15). Tel est le programme que se propose J. Catteau. A-t-il réussi à le remplir? Nous n'hésiterons pas à répondre oui, et de manière quelquefois magistrale.

Dans une première partie, J. Catteau va chercher à déblayer le terrain en se penchant sur l'héritage culturel et social qui a été celui de Dostoievski. Nous sommes ici dans un domaine bien connu. Le mérite de J. Catteau c'est non pas l'extraordinaire érudition dont il fait preuve quand il scrute les lectures de Dostoievski dans les domaines de la littérature, de l'histoire et de la philosophie, mais de nous montrer comment ces lectures ont été assimilées, comment à travers elles Dostoievski parvient à ses propres certitudes. Au lieu d'une banale étude des influences, J. Catteau nous montre comment un écrivain de génie peut en empruntant ses matériaux aux écrivains et aux penseurs du passé, construire un système original. "L'écrivain n'a de rapports avec ses prédécesseurs qu'après les avoir investis d'une signification toute personnelle, parfois à rebours de l'opinion du moment" (p. 88). Et cet effort de Dostoievski, comme l'écrit J. Catteau, se poursuit toute sa vie. "Il a greffé sur son organisme, sa chair et son sang l'acquis d'une culture qui s'interroge à travers ses divers représentants" (p. 123).

C'est le chapitre V intitulé "La maladie" qui, à mon sens, est le plus discutable du livre. Que J. Catteau n'aime pas la méthode psychanalytique appliquée à la littérature, c'est son droit le plus strict. Il a beau jeu évidemment quand il critique le célèbre article de Freud intitulé "Dostoievski et le parricide" ou le livre fort discutable de J. Neufeld "Dostojewski. Skizze zu seiner Psychoanalyse". Mais enfin, les objections que 3. Catteau oppose à la méthode psychanalytique, ne dépassent pas les banalités auxquelles Chasseguet-Smirgel, Sarah Kofman, A. Clancier et

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bien d'autres ont répondu depuis longtemps. Il y a, à mon sens, plus grave. J. Catteau se lance dans une analyse de l'épilepsie de Dostoievski, et principalement de l'aura extatique que notre écrivain prête au prince Myshkin, que je ne saurais accepter. J. Catteau va jusqu'à écrire "... l'analyse faite par Myshkin de la singulière aura qu'il a le privilège de vivre, une seconde avant la crise, est une construction après coup de son esprit en quête d'une "haute synthèse de la vie", de l'Idéal de l'Imitation du Christ". Et J. Catteau va plus loin. S'appuyant sur l'autorité du professeur H. Gastaut, qui nie carrément l'existence même d'une aura extatique, il va hasarder une thèse plus ou moins identique (p. 178-181). Je me content de renvoyer J. Catteau aux études du professeur H. Ey intitulées "Etudes psychiatriques" (t. III). Le docteur Ey montre que, dans certains types d'épilepsie, les phénomènes psychiatriques sont particulièrement nombreux, que l'aura existe et qu'elle ouvre le malade à une expérience de bouleversement de la conscience inoubliable, qu'elle en modifie le psychisme.

Je sais bien que c'est là que le bat blesse J. Catteau, qui soutient que l'épilepsie chez Dostoievski n'a exercé une influence sur l'oeuvre que dans la mesure où elle a été dominée, réduite, où elle n'a été qu' "un adjuvant, le choix créateur demeurant premier". Que J. Catteau le veuille ou non, l'épilepsie n'est pas une maladie comme les autres. Il est paradoxal de ne pas vouloir admettre que l'oeuvre de Dostoievski est toute entière colorée, à partir de 1860, par cette maladie. Ce qui n'est pas diminuer, comme a l'air de le croire J. Catteau, la valeur de l'écrivain et l'importance de l'oeuvre. Que J. Catteau excuse le ton un peu vif de mes reproches, mais sur ce point mes partis pris, et je le reconnais volontiers, sont directement opposés aux siens.

J'en arrive maintenant à la partie la plus intéressante et la plus originale du livre, celle intitulée "Le processus de la création". Partant des "Pauvres gens" et élargissant son analyse à toute l'oeuvre de Dostoievski, J. Catteau nous montre comment Dostoievski utilise "l'image à valeur conceptuelle" empruntée "à ses amis et quelquefois à ses ennemis" (p. 259). Ces images que J. Catteau appelle des "images migrantes" sont puisées dans le patrimoine idéologique collectif et Dostoievski en les faisant siennes, en les transmutant, éveille un profond écho chez le lecteur de son temps, mais aussi chez le lecteur contemporain grâce à un "code métaphorique" aisément déchiffrable.

Enfin, faisant appel aux Carnets de Dostoievski, aussi bien ceux de 1' "Adolescent" que ceux des "Démons" ou à ces notes qui auraient du donner naissance à 1' "Athéisme" et à la "Vie d'un grand pécheur", J. Catteau cherche à saisir l'essence du processus créateur chez notre écrivain. Reprenant la méthode de Bakhtin, J. Catteau s'appuie, non comme le critique russe sur une oeuvre achevée, figée, mais sur l'oeuvre en train de naître. On voit tout de suite combien la méthode peut se révéler féconde. 3e ne peux entrer ici dans tous les détails de l'analyse de J. Catteau. Disons simplement que dans cet immense fouillis que constituent les "Carnets" de Dostoievski, où les personnages apparaissent et disparaiss-

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ent, où l'intrigue hésite entre de multiples directions, dans cet immense désordre créateur, J. Catteau trouve un ordre. "Chez Dostoievksi le plan n'est jamais premier ni définitif: il se construit à mesure que le roman progresse" (p. 340). L'originalité de la méthode est de dégager ce que J. Catteau appelle des "systèmes gravitationnels" (p. 360), autrement dit des structures qui, au fur et à mesure que le projet du roman progresse, se transforment en d'autres structures qui empruntent aux premières tout en les modifiant: une sorte de composition en spirale. Je laisse au lecteur la surprise de pénétrer, seul, dans la découverte de la méthode, qui permet à l'auteur de multiplier des remarques originales sur l'oeuvre elle-même, la psychologie des personnages, les adhésions de Dostoievski à tel système philosophique ou religieux.

Enfin dans une dernière partie, "Le temps et l'espace dans l'oeuvre romanesque", J. Catteau étudie le temps comme "structure fondamentale de l'expérience tragique du héros", un temps par conséquent comprimé ou dilaté, accéléré ou ralenti, lieu essential de la liberté pour Dostoievski.

L'expérience du héros dostoievskéien se déploie dans un espace qui constitue "la structure de la signification, du déploiement de la conscience" (p. 565). Cette analyse permet à J. Catteau d'étudier au passage certains thèmes particulièrement intéressants chez Dostoievski: le mythe de l'âge d'or, la sémantique des couleurs, le thème du soleil couchant etc.

Il m'est finalement difficile de résumer dans ce bref compte-rendu toute la richesse de ce livre, qui ne se contente pas d'être une analyse du processus créateur chez Dostoievski, mais qui apporte de multiples points de vue sur l'oeuvre dans son ensemble.

Enfin, et ce n'est pas son moindre mérite, J. Catteau ne s'exprime pas dans l'affreux jargon universitaire à la mode, qui rend généralement illisible une grande partie de la production de nos collègues de langue française. Au moment où les docteurs Diafoirus tiennent souvent le haut du pavé, il faut a. J. Catteau non seulement du courage, mais de l'audace pur ne pas hésiter à employer une langue claire, précise, subtile parfois et qui s'accorde toujours à sa pensée.

J. Drouilly -- Université de Montréal

NB. Je signale à J. Catteau deux erreurs qui lui ont échappé quand il a révisé ses épreuves: ce n'est pas bien entendu le 26 décembre 1881 qu'est mort Dostoievski, mais le 26 janvier de la même année (p. 140). Et (p. 153, 1. 13) c'est le 15 novembre et non le 15 septembre 1865 que Dostoievski a eu une crise d'épilepsie.

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Geoffrey C. Kabat. Ideology and Imagination: The Image of Society in Dostoevsky. New York: Columbia University Press, 1978. 195 pp. $ 15,00.

"World view" is a term critics are fond of using when wishing to sum up a writer's entire life and thought in a single paragraph. Geoffrey Kabat, however, thoughtfully writes almost 200 pages to reveal two rather distinct views of the world which occupied most of Dostoevsky's mature years. One, which Kabat calls the "ideological", represents "a relation to the wold based on rigid boundaries and rejection (one could even say excommunication) of all that appears alien and problematic" (p. 164). Kabat contrasts this closed, static vision of reality and of history with what he terms the "imaginative" mode, which "represents a higher order of relationship, more comprehensive, more open, and based on mediation between apparent contraries: self-other, appearance-essence" (p. 164). This second understanding states in another way what Cleanth Brooks has appraised of the poet in his essay, "The Language of Paradox" ("The Well-Wrought Urn"). Nonetheless, the distinction is helpful for those readers of Dostoevsky who find it difficult to reconcile his thoughts in the "Diary of a Writer" with his fiction.

In Chapter 1, "The Emancipation and the Intelligentsia", the author provides a quick historical sweep through the fundamental causes of the serfs' freedom. In chapter 2, "Period of Transition: Dostoevsky's View of History", Kabat provides a more substantial and perceptive account of Dostoevsky's writings. In elaborating his thesis the author shows that to understand Dostoevsky's view of history in the "Diary", a view characterized by ideology, is to discover contradictions in his fictional writings which enunciate a view of reality based on "the raw daily facts of lived history" (p. 13). The former view, characteristic of the intelligentsia, simplifies reality, reduces ambiguity, and looks for the cliche to dissolve mystery. The consequence of such a reduction of complexity is a "decline in a sense of community, continuity, and tradition" (p. 18). Egoism, individualism, and fragmentation surface as the moral foundation in constructing the tower of Babel. One might here recall Donald Fanger's excellent study of this same theme in "Dostoevsky and Romantic Realism."

The people, however, as Kabat quotes Dostoevsky, reveal that dimension of existence which preserves mystery, a "faith in Christ and their sense of morality and community" (p. 19). He continues by pointing to what Dostoevsky believed was the greatest task facing Russia during her period of transition from serfdom to emancipation - reconciling the people with the intelligentsia. For this to occur the intelligentsia must be regrounded on the earth, while for their part the peasantry must gain literacy so to ingest Russia's literary heritage. This belief of Dostoevsky's is another canon in the Russian writer's ideological response to complex issues, one here involving an entire people.

In chapter 3, "The Imagination of Society", Kabat treats at length "Notes From the House of the Dead". Here he describes Dostoevsky's education

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at the hands of the outcasts, the peasant criminals, and those men who show no promise of being redeemed. But in the infernal Dantesque geography of prison, Kabat asserts, Dostoevsky learned that human suffering is universal and, at times, though different in intensity, not unlike the Russian writer's own moral suffering. The implication is that this is the price he must pay for knowledge of the Russian soul. While not explicitly stated, it seems that what Kabat wishes to reveal is an awakening of Dostoevsky's imagination through suffering. Here he learns of the common Russian psyche. I say this because of Kabat's statement about the act of imagining: "Imagination grasps deep similarities. Ideology, on the other hand, posits differences a priori" (p. 75). It is unfortunate, however, that the writer uses no sources on imagination. He excludes some particularly fine works on his topic, such as William Lynch's "Christ and Apollo", "Images of Hope", and "Images of Faith". Of course, Sartre's study on "Imagination" as well as James Hillman's study on fantasy and imagination ("Revisioning Psychology", "The Myth of Analysis") would have been fundamental sources from which to draw support for his statements on imagination. As it stands, Kabat's distinction between imagination and ideology seems at times contrived.

The second half of chapter 3 develops the idea that while any possibility of Europe achieving or even promoting a world harmony among men is slight, it is Russia's task, according to Dostoevsky, to unite mankind spiritually. For him, London and Paris are the two centers which reveal most clearly the modern "divided, alienated European man" (p. 84), while the Russian common man, uncorrupted by the glow of the Enlightenment, may in fact be able to recover Paradise.

In chapter 4, "The Economics of Writing", Kabat centers on three separate concepts which weave together into a coherent meaning: 1. freedom from environment; 2. suffering, which promotes this freedom, and; 3. the act of writing. The "productivity of suffering" which Kabat assigns to Dostoevsky, leads him to suggest that there is a causal connecting principle between Dostoevsky's position as a writer, the subject matter of his fiction, and "his ability to represent processes which are transforming society" (pp. 106-07). The suggestion is that by way of suffering Dostoevsky is able to present in his fiction "an idealism which is more real than the realism of contemporary cultural critics. This chapter, while certainly informative, nevertheless seems to be the flattest and least inspired of the six. Nothing new is added to what one assumes students of Dostoevsky already know.

The heart of Kabat's study is found in chapter 5, "Fantasy and Fiction". Its strength, no less than its interest, resides in the author's treatment of Dostoevsky's fiction directly. Especially informative are his insights into fantasy and its expression in three major novels. Because of my own interest in fantasy, especially in "The Idiot", however, I was disappointed to find that Kabat skips this important novel which treats so thoroughly this mode of consciousness. It left what he suggests of fantasy in "Crime and Punishment", "The Possessed", and "The Brothers Karamazov" incomplete.

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Particularly strong and convincing is Kabat's interpretation of Stavrogin in "The Possessed", especially his remark that "this novel marks the apogee in Dostoevsky's later novels of the proliferation of fantasy and delusion" (pp. 135-36). His discussion of the father-son motif in "The Brothers" is also helpful in understanding the relation between Father Zosima, Fedor Karamazov and the Grand Inquisitor and the three Karamazov sons. Considering the chapters prior to this central study, the reader can clearly follow Kabat's central thesis, namely, how the individual, the family, the polis, and an entire culture are all indissolubly affected by one another; that ideologically Dostoevsky called for a universal harmony among all dimensions of Society without regard for inherent contradiction, while imaginatively he accepted in his fiction the difficulty of achieving such a golden age of cooperation among men.

The final chapter, "Creative Process: From Ideology to Imagination", concludes that for Dostoevsky, "land is the basis for human rights, and that the European notion of abstract freedom for landless factory workers is a sham" (p. 167). Here he returns to that earlier distinction between country and city, peasantry and intelligentsia, illiteracy-literacy, individual and community. Kabat devotes the remainder of the chapter to summarize from the "Diary" Dostoevsky's anti-semitism. Quoting heavily from the "Diary" he writes that "for Dostoevsky the Jew is by definition a threat to Russia's well-being; he represents something essential in the current disintegration of Russian society, in the loss of traditional values, the spread of atheism and materialism" (p. 172). However, Dostoevsky's change in attitude toward Jews from that cited above to one which reveals their humanity is for Kabat the central example of a shift from ideological thinking, which insists on strict boundaries, to imaginative thought, which accepts the world with its imperfections.

The story of the peasant Marej who Dostoevsky recalls comforted him as a child, as well as his recognition of the humanity of some of the most hardened criminals he met in prison promotes a change in attitude toward the world from one which is "closed, hostile and abstract" (p. 180) to one tolerant and concretely rooted in the everyday world.

At the risk of allowing my own imagination to read too much into Kabat's study, I would nevertheless praise his insights into Dostoevsky's fiction for their suggestiveness. He implicates areas of study which would, I believe, prove fruitful, especially the ideology of several of Dostoevsky's characters, and the relation between fathers and sons. That Kabat failed to include anything of "A Raw Youth" or any of the short fiction might encourage further study of Dostoevsky's metamorphosis from ideology to imagination.

Dennis P. Slattery -- Irving, Texas

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Vladislav Krasnov. Solzhenitsyn and Dostoevsky. A Study in the Polyphonic Novel. Athens: The University of Georgia Press, 1980. 226 pp.

The idea of tracing the Dostoevsky-Solzhenicyn relationship is a relevant and timely one. Even more praiseworthy is the attempt made in this book to apply Bakhtin's concept of Dostoevsky's polyphonic novel to Russia's latest Nobel prize winner. While most Western scholars were quick to note the "Tolstoy connection", it is by now quite obvious that Dostoevsky and Solzhenicyn have much more in common. Strangely enough, this realization seems to have coincided with a waning of interest in Solzhenicyn, at least among liberal Western intellectuals. And in this another similarity with Dostoevsky can be detected: while the importance of Dostoevsky the novelist continues unabated, his ideas are either neglected or dismissed as conservative, outdated and in general unacceptable. Lately the same fate has befallen Solzhenicyn.

In his introductory chapter, Krasnov succinctly summarizes Bakhtin's observations on the polyphonic nature of the Dostoevskian novel. If Krasnov had continued to focus primarily on pointing out generic and structural affinities, his book might have turned out to have been wholly admirable. Although it is true that in both authors characters are "bearers of ideas", Krasnov's attempt to find similarities between these characters is an unhappy one. It seems pointless to compare Stalin with the Grand Inquisitor, Rubin with Ivan Karamazov, Nerzhin with Alesha, and Sologdin with Stavrogin (p. 12). Thus Stalin is described as an epigone of the Grand Inquisitor (he is perhaps closer to Shigalev). After all, the Grand Inquisitor is surrounded by a certain aura of Romantic grandeur, while Stalin is depicted as a lonely, doddering tyrant. Irony which is completely absent in the approach to the Grand Inquisitor is an important element in the depiction of the aging dictator.

In general, lapses in pursuing these supposed character parallels in a consistent manner undercut the author's own conclusions. For example, Sologdin is at one point likened to Dmitrij Karamazov, and yet Stavrogin -to whom Sologdin is also compared - and Dmitrij Karamazov are poles apart. The statement that Dmitrij Karamazov and Sologdin "share such important traits as vitality, physical prowess, and attraction to women" (p. 88) is rather meaningless. It could easily fit numerous other literary characters as well, including Anatole Kuragin. The very attempt to link Sologdin and Stavrogin appears futile; the salient fact about Stavrogin is his destructiveness. Wittingly or unwittingly he causes the ruin not only of the women in his life but of some of the men too. Sologdin may be crafty and scheming, but contact with him is shown to have enriched Nerzhin's life. Equally unsatisfactory is Gleb Nerzhin's juxtaposition to Alesha Karamazov: Alesha is meek and submissive while Nerzhin is a fighter.

Finally, Krasnov is quite inaccurate in quoting the two lines from Esenin's poem "Mne ostalas' odna zabava..." as "The white rose of truth will never

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be reconciled with the black toad of evil" (p. 68). The tragic intent of these lines, "Rozu beluju s chernoj zhaboj / Ja khotel poven'chat'," can hardly be captured by such oversimplifications.

On the other hand, chapter 7, "No Main Hero," based on Solzhenicyn's own statement of his understanding of the polyphonic principle, "Each person becomes the main hero as soon as the action reverts to him", is more rewarding. Chapter 8 is fascinating in its attempt to establish analogies (and differences) with Dante's "formal polyphony". The author is also correct in .interpreting "August 1914 as a basically anti-Tolstoyan work, (chapter 13) But he is grievously wrong in his reading of the Gumilev poem, "The Choice". Krasnov gives the poem a symbolic (and prophetic) interpretation and completely misses the poet's irony in regard to the "incomparable right" to chose one's death.

In conclusion, the book is rewarding as long as it does not stray from its central purpose: the tracing of polyphonic elements in Solzhenicyn's work. In fact, it is a fascinating account of Solzhenicyn's relationship to two of Russia's greatest novelists. Krasnov is possibly underrating Tolstoy's presence, for Solzhenicyn's moral concerns seem quite close to Tolstoy, and it is Tolstoy's story that serves as a catalyst in. bringing about Podduev's conversion in "The Cancer Ward". In spite of Krasnov's unfortunate predilection for finding models in Dostoevsky's fiction for some of Solzhenicyn's characters, and other minor failings, he has written a useful and informative book.

Ludmila Koehler -- University of Pittsburgh

Rudolf Neuhäuser. Das Frühwerk Dostoevskijs: Literarische Tradition und gesellschaftlicher Anspruch. Heidelberg: Carl Winter, 1979. 327 pp.

Several good books on Dostoevski] have appeared In recent years, some, like Maximilian Braun's "Dostojewskij" (1976) or Joseph Frank's "Dostoevsky: The Seeds of Revolt, 1821-1849" (1977), following traditional lines, others, like W. Schmid's "Der Textaufbau in den Erzählungen Dostoevskijs" (1973), applying new, structuralist and semiotic, methods. Neuhäuser's book leans toward the latter, but does so from a broad base of biography, Russian intellectual history, and comparative literary studies. His erudite and intelligent book addresses itself to the scholar, taking a good deal of knowledge for granted. His approach is soberly objective. It will contribute to a better critical understanding of at least several of the works discussed, though it will not necessarily bring them closer to the general reader (as Viktor Shklovskij said of Roman Jakobson's celebrated analysis of "Ja vas ljubil"). Neuhäuser by and large avoids aesthetic judgement, perhaps rightly so in view of his objective approach.

"The Landlady" is a good case in point. Neuhauser ingeniously interprets this story as a "sociopolitical allegory" and as such, recognizes it as a

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work of considerable depth and indubitable importance. He does not neglect to point out a number of earlier interpretations, each of which in its own way tried to salvage the reputation of this story which Belinskij had called a misguided attempt at combining Marlinskij with Hoffman, with a touch of Russian narodnost' added for good measure. Still, the question of the artistic success or failure of the story cannot be avoided, nor subsumed under the interest presented by its philosophic and psychological content or its relevance to the genesis of Dostoevsky's later works. Belinskij's reference to Hoffmann is pertinent, even though the critic failed to point out the allegoric meaning of "The Landlady." Hoffmanns's modern fairy tales, like "The Landlady", often carry an allegoric message. But the better of them are beautiful stories even if the allegoric message does not reach the reader, which simply is not true of "The Landlady".

Neuhäuser's approach is predominantly a structural one and his well-founded assumption is that Dostoevsky was generally aware of the structural principles active in his works. Specifically, Neuhäuser seeks to connect elements of novelistic structure with ideas which held sway over the writer's mind at the time in question. Several important traits of Dostoevsky's early works, his well-known "conclave", for example, are linked to Fourier's Utopian socialist ideas. Of particular interest are Neuhäuser's efforts - successful, so it appears - to integrate Dostoevsky's literary quotations and allusions, even at this early stage, with the structure of the work as a whole, "as a hint devised by the author which helps the reader to decipher the semantic structure (Bedeutungsstruktur) of the work" (p. 310). I somewhat disagree, however, with Neuhäuser's notion that the literary allusion plays a lesser role in Dostoevsky's early post-Siberian works. This notion seems unfounded in view of the central role played by the travesty of Gogol' and his "Selected Passages" in "The Village of Stepanchikovo" (1859) and the rich and functionally decisive literary allusions, several of which are pointed out by Neuhauser, in "Notes from the Underground". Only recently, Gleb Zhekulin has made a strong case for a direct connection between "Skvernyj anekdot" (1862) and Gogol's story "The Overcoat." (See "Bulletin" of the IDS, 7:80-81)

While Neuhäuser perceives each work as a structured whole, he also points out that the structure of each work must be seen as multilevelled. In his analysis of "The Double", Neuhäuser distinguishes the levels of style, genre, literary models and reminiscences, social criticism, the philosophic-metaphysical, and that of ethical problems. To these, his analysis of "The Landlady" adds an autobiographic and a psychological level. In Neuhäuser's most ingenious interpretation of "The Insulted and Injured," organized somewhat differently, a historical level is added, as the plot of that novel is seen as a recapitulation of two decades of Russian intellectual history. Neuhäuser's structural analyses are the most novel and most stimulating aspect of his study. His observations regarding the stylistic texture of Dostoevsky's early works are based on Bakhtin's conception of "the alien voice" ("chuzhoj golos") and, except for some ' interesting points of detail, do not go beyond Bakhtin. They have merit

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nevertheless, since readings of Dostoevsky's texts which do not heed Bakhtin's warnings against homophonic interpretation of Dostoevsky's polyphonic compositions do still appear even in otherwise excellent and well-informed Dostoevsky criticism.

Altogether, Neuhäuser's book deserves a careful reading. It is well worth a Dostoevsky scholar's time and attention. There will be something new and interesting in it for everyone, specialist in Dostoevsky, student of Russian literature, or comparatist.

Victor Terras -- Brown University

A. D. Nuttall. Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment: Murder as Philosophic Experiment. Sussex: Sussex University Press, 1978. 126 pp. £ 3,50, £t 1,75 paper. Distributed in U.S.A. by Humanities Press, Inc. Atlantic Highlands, N. J., in Europe by Scottish Academic Press Limited, 33 Montgomery Street, Edinburgh EH7 5JX.

Professor Nuttall's slim book on "Crime and Punishment" is not meant for the Dostoevsky specialist or the trained Russian critic. He does not know Russian and remarks in the preface that Slavicist colleagues in Great Britain disagree with a number of his opinions. The volume is part of a series called "Text and Context: A Series for Students", which no doubt explains the modesty of its research apparatus. The bibliography is very brief and, perhaps as a result, many standard opinions on the novel are included as if they were first observed by the author. Some examples include the presence of insect imagery, the importance of cramped space as an indication of Raskolnikov's inner tension, Svidrigajlov's importance as a symbolic extension of the hero's prized power theory, and similarities between the novel's narrative structure and that of the popular detective thriller. The casual, often chatty quality of the book's style suggests the class room lecture.

There is a peculiar narrowness to the book's historical sense of Dostoevsky's artistic imagination. Professor Nuttall approaches Raskolnikov as a presager of modern existentialist issues. In pursuit of such time-honored parallels, however, he ignores Dostoevsky's own contextual presentation of freedom and choice in the novel itself. As a result, Raskolnikov emerges here as inferior to Svidrigajlov as a free agent of choice. The hay market confession is reduced to a "nervous spasm" (p. 69) while the hero's existentialist failure is implied in his contrition. Svidrigajlov is the novel's real hero, we read, because he never bows before anyone or anything. No consideration of the meaning of isolation within personal will, or the meaningful community posed by love or humility, make their way into this book's reliance on French existentialist nostrums. Then, again, we read with some surprise the opinion that Porfirij Petrovich, the police inspector, is something of a clever but uncaring bureaucratic functionary

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who cares nothing for Christian values or for Raskolnikov: "Porfirij recommends suffering as a doctor might recommend a dose of castor oil" (p. 69). The assertion is even made that "I think we may say that Dostoevsky hates Porfirij" (p. 68). Raskolnikov's psychological stresses concerning ethical responsiblity for the murder boil down to a combination of self hypnosis and a mild case of schizophrenia in Nuttall's treatment. Then again, a good deal of time is spent on suggesting that Dostoevsky, without knowing it, reproduced essential issues raised much earlier in the economic theories of Jeremy Bentham and Hume's assessment of links between individual self-awareness and rationalism.

As a literary essay this volume is interesting. But as a reliable aid to serious student inquiry into Dostoevsky's novel, and thence into his broader system of human problem solving, it regrettably closes off more productive territory than it opens.

Roger B. Anderson -- University of Kentucky

B. G. Reizov, ed. Dostoevskij v zarubezhnykh literaturakh. Leningrad: Nauka, 1978. $ 4,90.

In his "Instead of a Preface" ("Vmesto predislovija") Reizov states that "in the interpretation of the bourgeois literary criticism Dostoevsky's artistry (= "tvorchestvo") is usually excluded". Reizov goes on to explain that the bourgeois critics are primarily interested in picking out (=izjat') Dostoevsky's thoughts out of context and in using them for their own non-literary ends. Other methods most often used by Western scholars in general, says Reizov, are biographical and Freudian "in purely sexual terms". As for the existentialists, who are especially interested in Dostoevsky in order to attribute their own points of view to him, they simply use Dostoevsky's works "as a pedestal for their own future monument". Such literary atrocities notwithstanding, Reizov reassures the reader that the correct understanding of the great Russian writer has begun to "penetrate the masses of 'zarubezhnykh' readers" who are no longer satisfied with the literature of absurd violence end evil "prevalent in many capitalist countries".

Despite such an unscholarly, purely political preface, the book itself contains seven essays dealing with Dostoevksy's role in foreign literatures which often contradict the presuppositions of the editor. Scholarly sound is the essay of I. P. Volodina on Dostoevsky and Italian Literature. The Italian critics, according to Volodina, were ahead of all other Europeans since the first (Italian) article (on Dostoevsky) appeared in "Rivista contemporanea" as early as 1869. Volodina presents a brief history of Italian criticism of Dostoevsky's works beginning with Angelo De Guebernatis who, in 1899, noted Dostoevsky's mastery of psychological analysis; Domenico Ciampoli, who understood Dostoevsky's universality; and such

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critics as T. Carletti and L. Capuana, who evaluated the Russian writer from the point of view of Naturalism. Volodina also examines Dostoevsky's influence on Italian writers such as D'Annunzio, Deledda, and Pirandello.

N. I. Kravcov investigates Dostoevsky's influence on Bulgarian, Czech, Polish, and Yugoslavian writers. Rather than approach the question bibliographically, Kravcov divides Dostoevsky's role in Eastern-European Slavic literature into four distinct periods: the blossoming of realism, the period of modernism, the period between the two World Wars when expressionism waged a battle against Socialist Realism, and the post-war period of Socialist Realism triumphant.

In her article "Dostoevsky in French Literature of the Twentieth Century," A. I. Vladimirovna concentrates mostly on André Gide and concludes that Gide understood Dostoevsky badly and was himself a poor imitator of the Russian writer who at times completely distorted Dostoevsky's ideas.

A more erudite study is E. P. Kukshin's "Dostoevsky and Camus". Kukshin demonstrates an excellent knowledge of Camus' work, his evolution as a writer and thinker and, unlike Vladimirova, is not interested in "proving" that the French writer was but an imitator of his Russian model. Unlike most Soviet critics, Kukshin recognizes Dostoevsky's contribution toward depicting the role of the unconscious-subconscious in human beings, but his article, while an excellent one, is more relevant to the study of Camus than to that of Dostoevsky.

G. M. Fridlender examines Dostoevsky's heritage in German and Austrian literatures. This subject has been investigated extensively in both pre-Revolutionary and Soviet criticism; yet Fridlender makes a good summary of its history, with special attention given to Thomas Mann's views on Dostoevsky.

V. V. Dudkin concentrates on German criticism of Dostoevsky between 1882 and 1925, but devotes most of his article to Nietzsche's comprehension of the Russian novelist. Dudkin realizes the temptation to scrutinize influences and resists it by attempting to deal with the complexities of comparativism. He feels that both Dostoevsky and Nietzsche were writing during an epoch of crises which they regarded as a time of triumph for the Kingdom of Evil. Yet, according to Dudkin, Nietzsche identified not so much with Dostoevsky himself as with his Underground Man. "The human and democratic instinct of the Russian writer", he concludes, are in "irreconcilable contradiction with the 'sokrovennye instincts' of the immoralist-philosopher."

A. G. Berezina also rejects a simplistic approach to literary influences when she examines Hermann Hesse's perception of Dostoevsky. Her article is primarily an analysis of Hesse's development as an interpreter of Dostoevsky's philosophy and, through him, of Russia, although she touches briefly on "Steppenwolf". It is Dostoevsky's influence, she states, that

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caused Hesse to take up the problem of evil in his work. But while the Russian writer dealt with this problem on a universal and philosophical level, Hesse's idea of evil is that of the death of culture, philistinism and bourgeoism.

The overall aim of the work under discussion here is to demonstrate not only the great influence that Dostoevsky exerted on European literature, but also to examine his role as a catalyst in the consciousness of European writers. For a comparativist the book sheds no new light on the subject. What is interesting about the work, and most encouraging as well, is evidence that existentialism, problems of evil as a philosophical dilemma, and writers like Camus and Hesse have now, thanks to Dostoevsky, penetrated Soviet literary criticism to a certain extent.

Irina Kirk -- University of Connecticut

Babel Brown, Nathalie. Hugo & Dostoevsky, Ardis: Ann Arbor, 1978. (XII + 186 pp.) Cloth $ 5,00.

Dr. Nathalie Babel Brown's medium-sized book (150 pages of text, 19 pages of pertinent and useful notes and 10 pages of what is properly qualified as selected bibliography) has been judged by no lesser a specialist in the field as Professor Robert Belknap who wrote a short Introduction, as a work which "clarifies our understanding of two great masters, and (...) illuminates the development of one of mankind's major achievements, the novel in nineteenth-century Europe" (p. XII).

Before examining this rather strong claim which, one should hastily add, has been made not by the author but on her behalf, I should like to say how much pleasure I have derived from reading "Hugo & Dostoevsky". It is written in plain English which avoids the jargon and the obfuscating syntax beloved by so many comparativists. It clearly shows the author's interest in what she is doing and the attention with which she has read the primary sources. Its composition is lucid and easy to follow - short preface which indicates the direction in which the study will go rather than its precise aim, followed by a chapter which sets the topic into its historical and literary context, followed by three chapters which form the core of the study and in which are analysed in great detail 1. - structural similarities between "Les Miserables" and "Crime and Punishment"; 2. -Raskolnikov's first dream; and 3. - his third dream, followed by a conclusion in which the purpose of the study is spelled out, namely "only to reveal the mechanisms by which materials from "Les Miserables" were transformed and redistributed once they had been apprehended by a kindred genius" (p. 149). And, finally, the book is well produced and very carefully proofread - I noticed altogether 16 misprints, mainly in names (e. g., R. Peace became Pease, p. 167; is the "I", instead of "F. I." Tiutchev in the passage quoted on p. 155, the proofreader's oversight?)

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Turning now to the double-barrelled claim made on behalf of "Hugo & Dostoevsky", I feel that Professor Belknap overstates his point. Dr. Babel Brown's study concerns itself with minute segments of each writer's work, namely with the adaptation and transformation in Dostoevsky's "Crime and Punishment" of three motifs used by Hugo in two of his works - "Les Misérables" and "Le dernier jour d'un condamné", and therefore it cannot "clarify our understanding of two great master", even though it shows convincingly how these motifs or "specific passages" (p. 69) which Dr. Babel Brown has chosen for examination have been absorbed and transformed. Nor does the study "illuminate(s) the development of (...) the novel (...)", but limits itself to stating, as regards the novelists in general rather than novels, that each author approaches "his task with a different purpose and a different philosophy in mind" and that "the message (the author) sought to illustrate" in his work "greatly affected what he said and how he said it" (p. 37; also p. 28-9, 68, 89, 105, 129, 133, 148-9) - in short, that it is the author's intent which determines and shapes his work -hardly a new and original thesis.

What is, however, original is the consistent application by Dr. Babel Brown of the methodology which she has decided to use in her study and which she defines as "close reading of the text" (p. 28), acknowledging on the one hand, that in general the literary critic needs "all the help she can get from the historian, sociologist, linguist..." and warning on the other hand before the "danger of reducing literature to some formal schema" (p. 28-9). And one can only agree whole-heartedly with her when, in giving grounds for her choice of methodological approach, she says: "the more we learn about the specific phenomena of literary creation, the more we are convinced that the origins and ultimate meanings of literary works are essentially unknowable and 'spiritual' in substance" (p. 29).

The results contained in analytical chapters II, III and IV of Dr. Babel Brown's investigation of absorption and transformations in "Crime and Punishment" are revealing and convincing, even though the answer to her emphatical question as to " w h y Dostoevsky turned to Hugo" (p. 29) is given not specifically, as one would have wanted her to do but in such diffused terms - "imagination and talent respect few proprieties and acknowledge no frontiers" (p. 29) - as to be meaningless.

A few questions could be asked concerning the three core chapters of the book:

What has the epigraph to chapter III (p. 30), taken from Solzhenicyn's "Letter from Rjazan" ", to do with this chapter's content and intent?

Does Mrs. Svidrigajlov deserve to be considered a "major character (which plays a) primary role"? (p. 31)

Does Hugo's "Melancholia" need to be discussed at such a length, since it had no direct impact on Dostoevsky when he wrote Raskolnikov's first dream? Dr. Babel Brown shows that "Melancholia" was in Hugo's mind when he wrote the passage in "Les Miserables" and that it influenced

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Nekrasov's "Before Dusk", but she herself says that only the latter two works were creatively used by Dostoevsky. Also pattern 5 (p. 102) would be more telling if instead of authors' names titles of works only were used, thus: "Melancholia" affecting both "Les Miserables" and "Before Dusk" and these two affecting the "First Dream'.

Is the identification of the old woman in the Hugo's "Condamnés" dream with the guillotine (p. 129, 132) not, perhaps, a little too far-fetched?

Some author's comment would have been of interest as regards Dostoevsky's angry outburst (quoted on p. 14) against all those who misunderstood and falsified Hugo's romantic formula "le laid existe à côté du beau". It seems to be directed against Belinskij and his followers who urged artists to concentrate in their works the attention mainly on the dark and sordid sides of human condition; it is ironic to see how the "foolish caricatures" (Dostoevsky's term) of this formula became ingrained by 1862 in Russian tradition: Dostoevsky himself uses the shortened, false and misleading formula "Le laid, c'est le beau" which, in this form, is the perfect explanation of so many of his contemporaries' biased vision of the surrounding world.

But these are all questions by an interested reader rather than minor criticism. A more substantial objection, however, could be raised to what appears to be an excessively lengthy and detailed argumentation in the analytical chapters. Raskolnikov's first dream is a case in point: was it really necessary to go through four patterns of relationship between the texts of Hugo, Nekrasov and Dostoevsky before arriving at the satisfactory pattern 5, and was it really necessary, in order to do so, to write 34 pages? It seems to me that the first 22 pages of these passages could have been replaced by the reproduction of relevant texts plus a couple of explanatory paragraphs and that by then even a not too attentive reader would have been able to deduce the correct pattern.

"Hugo & Dostoevsky" is the proof that consistent use of a firmly defined methodological approach can produce useful and interesting, though limited, results and thus help to transform what were vague feelings and surmises into reality. This is what Dr. Babel Brown says (p. 149) that she expects scholarship to do. By having written a book which satisfies this condition and which, in addition, is easy to read, she has eminently succeeded in the task she had set before her.

Gleb Zekulin --Toronto