preview

Crime And Punishment Indecisive Quotes

Decent Essays
Open Document
Blood is Thicker than Water, but not Vodka

After the gruesome murder in Part 1 of Fyodor Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment, Raskolnikov becomes indecisive in his guilt, ethics, and even daily actions, and through the uncertainty he loses all the control he had in his life. He goes around debating whether he should turn himself in, the people he should tell, and his future actions. In his indecisiveness he begins to feel helpless, and through his friend’s death and his total exhaustion, it seems like he loses only more control. His day culminates, as he arrives home, only to realize he forgot his family’s expected arrival, and becomes inadequately prepared to deal with his family’s caring concern. After having so much power through the murder…show more content…
He does this physically with money and figuratively with his language. Ivanovna worries about financial problems because of her late husband, and while Raskolnikov tries to give her “a debt to his friend,” the “twenty roubles,” he uses ellipses; synonymous with both his hesitation and uncertainty in this sentence, as well as synonymous with his indecisive nature and trouble controlling even the smallest aspect of his life (179). His murder has been his only decisive action. Later, as he talks with his friend Razumikhin, ellipses still constantly split up his speech up until he tries to abruptly end his conversation with “Good-bye,” “I say Good-bye,” and “give me your hand, Good-bye (186).” Raskolnikov desperately tries to control the conversation, or at least control the end of the conversation, in three ways: purely with language, with language and power in diction, and with a physical connection between them. Razumikhin does not leave. His staying, even after Raskolnikov practically begs, displays the extremely small amount of control Raskolnikov has, even over his…show more content…
When he first enters his house, his family had “been crying” and had “suffered agonies” waiting, yet it changes to a “cry of rapturous joy” once he appears, immediately displaying the stark contrast between his emotional and affectionate family and him (186). His mother and sister clasp him in their arms, yet a “sudden, unbearable thought” prevents him from even “lifting his arms to embrace them (186).” As his family affectionately cries and hugs him, he is so selfishly concerned with his own past actions, he fails to return even the slightest bit of their caring and endearment. In exact contrast to his family “kiss[ing] him, laughing” and “cry[ing],” “he took a step forward, faltered, and fell to the ground (186).” Raskolnikov obsesses so much about his crime and his guilt, that when he tries to take a step forward and accept his family’s love, he falters and faints, showing after his murder of Alyona, he is completely unable to reunite with the pure joy and love that his family
Get Access
Related
Get Access