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Dostoevsky #4
Dostoevsky: The Miraculous Years, 1865-1871
This volume, the fourth of five planned in Joseph Frank's widely acclaimed biography of Dostoevsky, covers the six most remarkably productive years in the novelist's entire career. It was in this short span of time that Dostoevsky produced three of his greatest novels-- Crime and Punishment, The Idiot, and The Devils --and two of his best novellas, The Gambler and The Eternal Husband . All these masterpieces were written in the midst of harrowing practical and economic circumstances, as Dostoevsky moved from place to place, frequently giving way to his passion for roulette. Having remarried and fled from Russia to escape importuning creditors and grasping dependents, he could not return for fear of being thrown into debtor's prison. He and his young bride, who twice made him a father, lived obscurely and penuriously in Switzerland, Germany, and Italy, as he toiled away at his writing, their only source of income. All the while, he worried that his recurrent epileptic attacks were impairing his literary capacities. His enforced exile intensified not only his love for his native land but also his abhorrence of the doctrines of Russian Nihilism--which he saw as an alien European importation infecting the Russian psyche. Two novels of this period were thus an attempt to conjure this looming spectre of moral-social disintegration, while The Idiot offered an image of Dostoevsky's conception of the Russian Christian ideal that he hoped would take its place.
544 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1995
About the author
Joseph Frank
144 books118 followersJoseph Frank was professor emeritus of Slavic and comparative literature at Stanford and Princeton. The five volumes of his Dostoevsky biography won a National Book Critics Circle Award, a Los Angeles Times Book Prize, two James Russell Lowell Prizes, and two Christian Gauss Awards, and have been translated into numerous languages.
Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.
Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.
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Displaying 1 - 21 of 21 reviews
November 17, 2021
This is likely one of the best literary biographies I have ever encountered. The idea that it is one fifth of a project simply inspires awe at the erudition. I appreciate Frank as a stylist as well as a scholar. He is measured though. He always appears ask himself can this assertion be substantiated?
We find Dostoevsky a widowed and emotional mess. His brother has died. He's lonely and abruptly proposes to a number of younger women. He may have had a fling. He is supporting his brother's widow and family as well as his stepson from his first marriage. He makes arrangements for serialization as well as complete novellas, a contracted capacity which requires an almost superhuman velocity, at which point someone suggests a stenographer. The rest, as they say . . .
Dostoevsky hires Anna Snitnika to take dictation of what's to become The Gambler. He meets his deadlines, He proposes. She accepts. They flee Russia to avoid his creditors, all the while his seizure disorder reveals itself to his bride. Once abroad Dostoevsky falls prey to his one vice outside of resentment-- roulette. While in Germany and Italy he falls out again with Turgenev, his wife gives birth only for the child to die a short time later. He's struggling and yet still manages to write not one, but two masterpieces: Crime and punishment and The Idiot. This endeavor is heavy on literary analysis and I appreciate Frank's reading and his clarification on a number of points.
Dostoevsky continues to write, he finishes The Eternal Husband and begins a project which ultimately be The Demons and A Raw Youth. Contributing to a number of periodicals, he's finally poised to return to Russia and has found the temerity to avoid the casino. It isn't just volition but his devotion which is remarkable. While possessing a divine gift for polyphony, Dostoevsky was certainly a hedgehog, with at least a crusader's zeal in rhetorical terms. This biography is well worth anyone's time.
We find Dostoevsky a widowed and emotional mess. His brother has died. He's lonely and abruptly proposes to a number of younger women. He may have had a fling. He is supporting his brother's widow and family as well as his stepson from his first marriage. He makes arrangements for serialization as well as complete novellas, a contracted capacity which requires an almost superhuman velocity, at which point someone suggests a stenographer. The rest, as they say . . .
Dostoevsky hires Anna Snitnika to take dictation of what's to become The Gambler. He meets his deadlines, He proposes. She accepts. They flee Russia to avoid his creditors, all the while his seizure disorder reveals itself to his bride. Once abroad Dostoevsky falls prey to his one vice outside of resentment-- roulette. While in Germany and Italy he falls out again with Turgenev, his wife gives birth only for the child to die a short time later. He's struggling and yet still manages to write not one, but two masterpieces: Crime and punishment and The Idiot. This endeavor is heavy on literary analysis and I appreciate Frank's reading and his clarification on a number of points.
Dostoevsky continues to write, he finishes The Eternal Husband and begins a project which ultimately be The Demons and A Raw Youth. Contributing to a number of periodicals, he's finally poised to return to Russia and has found the temerity to avoid the casino. It isn't just volition but his devotion which is remarkable. While possessing a divine gift for polyphony, Dostoevsky was certainly a hedgehog, with at least a crusader's zeal in rhetorical terms. This biography is well worth anyone's time.
October 17, 2017
Finally, Volume Four digs into the real nitty-gritty, the beginnings of Dosty's first three of his Five Great Novels! The detail here is deep but well worth the slog. Frank researched the shit out of Dosty's bio, writings, and notebooks to come up with some new insights into "Crime & Punishment", "The Idiot", and "Demons", catching stuff a lot of scholars never did.
This really is such a rich biography, it's hard to not be endlessly impressed by it. Frank carefully combs through correspondence and very much into Dosty's often impenetrable notes to reconstruct the evolution of these three novels (and "The Gambler") and put them into their proper context with Dosty's life and thought. There's much here on his polemics with Turgenev and the nihilists, who were his philosophical betes noires. Frank also takes on the idea that Dosty was conservative and a reactionary (he wasn't).
Life-wise, this volume mostly covers Dosty's marriage to his second wife, his kids being born, and the period they spent abroad in Germany, Italy, and Switzerland.
Just wonderful!
This really is such a rich biography, it's hard to not be endlessly impressed by it. Frank carefully combs through correspondence and very much into Dosty's often impenetrable notes to reconstruct the evolution of these three novels (and "The Gambler") and put them into their proper context with Dosty's life and thought. There's much here on his polemics with Turgenev and the nihilists, who were his philosophical betes noires. Frank also takes on the idea that Dosty was conservative and a reactionary (he wasn't).
Life-wise, this volume mostly covers Dosty's marriage to his second wife, his kids being born, and the period they spent abroad in Germany, Italy, and Switzerland.
Just wonderful!
September 2, 2015
Joseph Frank's seminal work--a five volume literary biography of Dostoyevsky--is a staggering work. Other than the level of detail and the insightful analysis of Dostoyevsky's fiction, what really makes his work amazing is his ability to understand Dostoyevsky on Dostoyevsky's own terms, without any personal, political, cultural, or religious agenda of his own. The Dostoyevsky that comes out on the page is no less a fascinating character than any of his own novelistic creations. Special mention needs to be made of Frank's brilliant analysis of the notebooks to the Idiot. That glimpse into the creative process was worth the entire 562 pages. Just amazing work.
April 30, 2019
The artist writes miracles as his personal crises mount
‘The Miraculous Years’ is the fourth in Joseph Frank’s massive, five-volume biography of Fyodor Dostoevsky, publishing the first volume in the 1970’s and the final volume in the early 2000’s. This is generally regarded now as the most definitive biography of the Russian novelist. For those who don’t want to plough through all five volumes, Frank published a one-volume abridgment of the biography, ‘Dostoevsky: A Writer in His Time’, in 2009.
‘The Miraculous Years’ is particularly noteworthy because within its time span, Dostoevsky not only wrote three of his greatest masterpieces—‘Crime and Punishment’, ‘The Idiot’, and ‘Demons’ (referred to it by Frank under the title ‘The Devils’)—but he went simultaneously through relentless years of financial and emotional struggle, rendering the fact that out of all this turmoil he could produce in six short years three major works (as well as two significant novellas, ‘The Gambler’ and ‘The Eternal Husband’) truly miraculous.
In 1865, Dostoevsky’s beloved older brother had just died and Dostoevsky felt he owed it to his brother’s widow and children to provide financial support. This involved him assuming the debts his brother had incurred from the publication of their literary journals Time and Epoch as well as providing a regular allowance for his brother’s family. Around this time, Dostoevsky’s estranged first wife died so he felt obligated to provide for his stepson as well.
As if this was not sufficient financial challenge, Dostoevsky suffered from a gambling addiction that exacerbated his circumstances. The one positive byproduct of this illness was that it gave him a good idea for a short novel, appropriately called ‘The Gambler’. He had backed himself in a corner with his publisher Stellovsky. If he did not deliver a short novel by the beginning of November 1866, Stellovsky would acquire the right to publish all of Dostoevsky’s works up to that time without any compensation to the author.
Deciding to use a stenographer as a way of hastening the speed of delivery of his manuscript, Dostoevsky employed the young stenographer, Anna Grigorevna Snitkina. With Anna’s help, Dostoevsky met his deadline. Throughout these unique circumstances, they grew closer and in a month they became engaged. Anna remained devoted to him and fled with him to Europe, primarily as a means to avoid creditors. When they stopped in Baden-Baden Dostoevsky could not resist the urge to visit the roulette tables, where he promptly lost all the money he had saved to live on and then some, forcing them to pawn clothing, jewelry, and even Anna’s engagement ring. Frank renders every shameful, embarrassing setback and the repeated cycle of gamble - lose money - pawn possessions - tearfully beg Anna for forgiveness.
Over the next five years they would travel to Germany, France, Switzerland, and Italy. Anna recognized the gambling addiction for the illness it was and refrained from judging Dostoevsky’s moral character for it. The fact that they were usually the only two Russians surrounded by Europeans strengthened the emotional bond between them. Dostoevsky also realized that Anna was probably the only soul on the planet to have the saintly patience and devotion to stay with him through all their trials.
Dostoevsky’s xenophobia coupled with his contention that the Russian soul was where the heart of true Christianity lay in the modern world was put to the test while surrounded by rude, decadent Europeans. He felt ideologically opposed to the Nihilism of left-leaning Westernized Russians such as fellow novelist Ivan Turgenev. At one time they had been superficial friends but Turgenev’s declaration upon relocating permanently in Europe that he was no longer a Russian but was now a German citizen enraged Dostoevsky, who famously told Turgenev to order a telescope from Paris and train it on Russia because “otherwise it is really hard to make us out.”
Frank’s book serves the dual purpose of presenting a chronological biography as well as a critical analysis of each of Dostoevsky’s works. If all the chapters of literary criticism were extracted from each volume, they would be enough to fill a volume on their own. The biographical backgrounds to each of these novels are fully explored as well. Dostoevsky imbued Prince Myshkin, his saintly hero of ‘The Idiot’, with the same kind of epileptic fits from which he suffered as well and even has Myshkin recount a near execution which is modeled very closely upon his own experience, waiting his turn for the firing squad with the tsar’s merciful cancellation of the execution at almost the last minute. ‘The Devils’ dramatizes the Nihilistic rebellion in Russia twenty years after Dostoevsky’s own youthful participation on the fringes of a reactionary group—the activities that earned him his death sentence. In ‘The Devils’ there is even a thinly veiled caricature of Turgenev in the form of a celebrated writer named Karmazinov who is attempting to fraternize with the radical youth.
By the beginning of the 1870’s, the Dostoevsky’s have had one child that died after three months as well as another child, moved throughout four countries, and finally worked matters so they can return to mother Russia. Dostoevsky has been fortunate to have an extremely forgiving wife and a very understanding editor who has never refused to advance more funds to tie Dostoevsky over until he can finish his next promised manuscript.
At this point in his life, Dostoevsky has nine years left to live, years in which he will produce at least two more major novels, particularly his masterpiece, ‘The Brothers Karamazov’. More strife will lie ahead as well as more acclaim as Dostoevsky becomes, along with Tolstoy, one of the two most highly regarded writers in all of Russia. Those years are covered in Frank’s last volume— ‘Dostoevsky: The Mantle of the Prophet, 1871-1881’.
‘The Miraculous Years’ is the fourth in Joseph Frank’s massive, five-volume biography of Fyodor Dostoevsky, publishing the first volume in the 1970’s and the final volume in the early 2000’s. This is generally regarded now as the most definitive biography of the Russian novelist. For those who don’t want to plough through all five volumes, Frank published a one-volume abridgment of the biography, ‘Dostoevsky: A Writer in His Time’, in 2009.
‘The Miraculous Years’ is particularly noteworthy because within its time span, Dostoevsky not only wrote three of his greatest masterpieces—‘Crime and Punishment’, ‘The Idiot’, and ‘Demons’ (referred to it by Frank under the title ‘The Devils’)—but he went simultaneously through relentless years of financial and emotional struggle, rendering the fact that out of all this turmoil he could produce in six short years three major works (as well as two significant novellas, ‘The Gambler’ and ‘The Eternal Husband’) truly miraculous.
In 1865, Dostoevsky’s beloved older brother had just died and Dostoevsky felt he owed it to his brother’s widow and children to provide financial support. This involved him assuming the debts his brother had incurred from the publication of their literary journals Time and Epoch as well as providing a regular allowance for his brother’s family. Around this time, Dostoevsky’s estranged first wife died so he felt obligated to provide for his stepson as well.
As if this was not sufficient financial challenge, Dostoevsky suffered from a gambling addiction that exacerbated his circumstances. The one positive byproduct of this illness was that it gave him a good idea for a short novel, appropriately called ‘The Gambler’. He had backed himself in a corner with his publisher Stellovsky. If he did not deliver a short novel by the beginning of November 1866, Stellovsky would acquire the right to publish all of Dostoevsky’s works up to that time without any compensation to the author.
Deciding to use a stenographer as a way of hastening the speed of delivery of his manuscript, Dostoevsky employed the young stenographer, Anna Grigorevna Snitkina. With Anna’s help, Dostoevsky met his deadline. Throughout these unique circumstances, they grew closer and in a month they became engaged. Anna remained devoted to him and fled with him to Europe, primarily as a means to avoid creditors. When they stopped in Baden-Baden Dostoevsky could not resist the urge to visit the roulette tables, where he promptly lost all the money he had saved to live on and then some, forcing them to pawn clothing, jewelry, and even Anna’s engagement ring. Frank renders every shameful, embarrassing setback and the repeated cycle of gamble - lose money - pawn possessions - tearfully beg Anna for forgiveness.
Over the next five years they would travel to Germany, France, Switzerland, and Italy. Anna recognized the gambling addiction for the illness it was and refrained from judging Dostoevsky’s moral character for it. The fact that they were usually the only two Russians surrounded by Europeans strengthened the emotional bond between them. Dostoevsky also realized that Anna was probably the only soul on the planet to have the saintly patience and devotion to stay with him through all their trials.
Dostoevsky’s xenophobia coupled with his contention that the Russian soul was where the heart of true Christianity lay in the modern world was put to the test while surrounded by rude, decadent Europeans. He felt ideologically opposed to the Nihilism of left-leaning Westernized Russians such as fellow novelist Ivan Turgenev. At one time they had been superficial friends but Turgenev’s declaration upon relocating permanently in Europe that he was no longer a Russian but was now a German citizen enraged Dostoevsky, who famously told Turgenev to order a telescope from Paris and train it on Russia because “otherwise it is really hard to make us out.”
Frank’s book serves the dual purpose of presenting a chronological biography as well as a critical analysis of each of Dostoevsky’s works. If all the chapters of literary criticism were extracted from each volume, they would be enough to fill a volume on their own. The biographical backgrounds to each of these novels are fully explored as well. Dostoevsky imbued Prince Myshkin, his saintly hero of ‘The Idiot’, with the same kind of epileptic fits from which he suffered as well and even has Myshkin recount a near execution which is modeled very closely upon his own experience, waiting his turn for the firing squad with the tsar’s merciful cancellation of the execution at almost the last minute. ‘The Devils’ dramatizes the Nihilistic rebellion in Russia twenty years after Dostoevsky’s own youthful participation on the fringes of a reactionary group—the activities that earned him his death sentence. In ‘The Devils’ there is even a thinly veiled caricature of Turgenev in the form of a celebrated writer named Karmazinov who is attempting to fraternize with the radical youth.
By the beginning of the 1870’s, the Dostoevsky’s have had one child that died after three months as well as another child, moved throughout four countries, and finally worked matters so they can return to mother Russia. Dostoevsky has been fortunate to have an extremely forgiving wife and a very understanding editor who has never refused to advance more funds to tie Dostoevsky over until he can finish his next promised manuscript.
At this point in his life, Dostoevsky has nine years left to live, years in which he will produce at least two more major novels, particularly his masterpiece, ‘The Brothers Karamazov’. More strife will lie ahead as well as more acclaim as Dostoevsky becomes, along with Tolstoy, one of the two most highly regarded writers in all of Russia. Those years are covered in Frank’s last volume— ‘Dostoevsky: The Mantle of the Prophet, 1871-1881’.
January 26, 2014
This is where things really start heating up. Though I have given most of the other volumes high marks, none before this offer the historical detail, activity and bristling energy as offered on every page of Volume 4. Dos's courtship of his second wife is touching, and really endeared me to Dos even more.
I breezed through the first three in a couple weeks, enamored with Frank's project, and the unique way he approached biography, focusing not on life but the ideas of a man. But those years that the opening three years covered only produced one masterpiece: Notes From the Underground. This volume is called The Miraculous Years because they produced three massive ones -- Demons, The Idiot, Crime and Punishment -- which serve as the foundation of Dostoyevsky's immense oeuvre.
A really joyful book, but you must read the preceding books to get all that you can out of it.
I breezed through the first three in a couple weeks, enamored with Frank's project, and the unique way he approached biography, focusing not on life but the ideas of a man. But those years that the opening three years covered only produced one masterpiece: Notes From the Underground. This volume is called The Miraculous Years because they produced three massive ones -- Demons, The Idiot, Crime and Punishment -- which serve as the foundation of Dostoyevsky's immense oeuvre.
A really joyful book, but you must read the preceding books to get all that you can out of it.
December 28, 2019
Impecable, nada mas que decir, a eso se resume todo. Completísima biografía de Dostoievski como lo dice su título: en sus años milagrosos.
April 29, 2013
In which he knuckles down to writing novels. He marries his stenographer who seems to be the doormat-type. Yes, but see the last instalment of his life; and he's absolutely desperate to deliver his novels by deadline. Guess what the forfeit is if he doesn't? Abrogation of his rights to any profit from future works for the next ten years. So he hired a stenographer to go faster... and kept her. Most of the rest of this book is crit on the novels. What else did he have time for?
D. writes: "I am convinced that not a single one of our writers, whether past or present, ever wrote under the conditions in which I am continuously forced to write. Turgenev would die at the very thought." He also wrote, "My epilepsy has worsened so much that if I work for a week without interruption I have an attack, and the next week I cannot work because the result of two or three attacks would be -- apoplexy. And yet I must finish. That's my situation."
I find Frank's crit on the turgid side, but he's made me think of the novels as "ideological tragedies". I always knew they were about people driven mad by ideas, ideas worse than the people are: I guess he’s getting me more specific, as I slog through 50 pages on Crime & Punishment. Since Frank details the ideologies bubbling at the time, you see how Dostoyevsky extrapolated or pursued ideas to consequences no-one else had seen. Obviously people objected to that. 'Excuse me, we don't believe in knocking pawnbrokers on the head.' But that's the novelist's eyes, beyond ideology to what used to be called the universal human, eh? And why he makes sense to me, vital sense, and seems to be about ideas I’ve struck or half-had in my life, not what he found in a newspaper in Russia 1866.
D. writes: "I am convinced that not a single one of our writers, whether past or present, ever wrote under the conditions in which I am continuously forced to write. Turgenev would die at the very thought." He also wrote, "My epilepsy has worsened so much that if I work for a week without interruption I have an attack, and the next week I cannot work because the result of two or three attacks would be -- apoplexy. And yet I must finish. That's my situation."
I find Frank's crit on the turgid side, but he's made me think of the novels as "ideological tragedies". I always knew they were about people driven mad by ideas, ideas worse than the people are: I guess he’s getting me more specific, as I slog through 50 pages on Crime & Punishment. Since Frank details the ideologies bubbling at the time, you see how Dostoyevsky extrapolated or pursued ideas to consequences no-one else had seen. Obviously people objected to that. 'Excuse me, we don't believe in knocking pawnbrokers on the head.' But that's the novelist's eyes, beyond ideology to what used to be called the universal human, eh? And why he makes sense to me, vital sense, and seems to be about ideas I’ve struck or half-had in my life, not what he found in a newspaper in Russia 1866.
February 2, 2020
After I read Crime and Punishment in college, I was emboldened by the degree to which I had actually understood and enjoyed the novel. Feeling ambitious, the next summer I purchased copies of The Idiot, Demons, and the Brothers Karamazov. I was sure that I would now be able to crack these difficult tomes with ease now that I had gotten half a college education and increased the discipline with which I read. I was also more hell-bent than ever to dig into the great Russian after reading a poem of Charles Bukowski’s in an anthology that I had picked up at my college bookstore:
against the wall, the firing squad ready.
then he got a reprieve.
suppose they had shot Dostoevsky?
before he wrote all that?
I suppose it wouldn't have
mattered
not directly.
there are billions of people who have
never read him and never
will.
but as a young man I know that he
got me through the factories,
past the whores,
lifted me high through the night
and put me down
in a better
place.
even while in the bar
drinking with the other
derelicts,
I was glad they gave Dostoevsky a
reprieve,
it gave me one,
allowed me to look directly at those
rancid faces
in my world,
death pointing its finger,
I held fast,
an immaculate drunk
sharing the stinking dark with
my
brothers.
Imagine my disappointment in myself when I found I was, more or less, back at square one. I felt like I had when I was in high school, assuring my eleventh grade English teacher that I could give a speech on The Brothers Karamazov and all too quickly finding myself out of my depth. While I did have a greater handle on the generalities of Russian culture in the late nineteenth century, I still felt so much of the books going right over my head as it had when I was seventeen.
I found myself absolutely bewitched by the general ideas driving The Idiot and Demons, but when I read them the summer after my sophomore year of college, I found myself aimlessly skating over the surface of the novels, trying desperately to come away with some profound insight that I could share with people and not simply allowing myself to get absorbed in the story and let the insight come or not come as it would. So, the books sat on my shelf for four years. In the time those four years elapsed, I graduated from college; I had the good fortune to actually get a job in the field I had studied in college (Theatre), but my heart wasn’t in it, and I was probably the least accomplished person working at the Scenic Studio in St. Paul where I worked. One day, my boss took me aside and said that the budget couldn’t handle as many carpenters as they currently had, so he had to let me go. I stumbled around for the next year or so, doing odd jobs, bartending, doing some maintenance work in a few apartment complexes and eventually found myself on a siding crew working on new homes in the Twin Cities suburbs. While I perhaps never reached the same seedy depths that Bukowski had, I knew my life was turning into one of quiet desperation and there were a lot of days that I would come home from work at around four in the afternoon and just go right to bed without even making myself dinner because I couldn’t stand to be awake with my own thoughts.
One day, I forced myself to go out and walk in the sunshine. I went into Magers and Quinn: a bookstore in Uptown Minneapolis. I came across a copy of David Foster Wallace’s collection of essays, Consider the Lobster. When I scanned the contents, my eyes immediately went to his review of Joseph Frank’s Dostoevsky, which, at the time of Wallace’s writing was in its fourth volume: this volume. It would be another three years before I actually cracked the first volume of Frank’s immense work, but I did go home almost immediately to take a second stab at The Idiot. This time around, I actually lost myself in the story, and though I didn’t have a whole lot to say about it that was incredibly insightful, it was exactly the light in my dark night of the soul, such as it was, that I needed. It’s been about five years since then, as of this writing, and I’ve read or reread The Double, Notes From a Dead House, Notes from Underground, Crime and Punishment and The Gambler; and I’ve read four of the five volumes in Frank’s biography. I expect to finish reading or rereading The Idiot, The Eternal Husband, Demons, The Adolescent, The Brothers Karamazov and Volume 5 of Franks biography before the year is over. It’s been a long, hard road since that day in Magers and Quinn, but much like Bukowski I’m in a better place, and Dostoevsky has had no small role in that.
As far as Frank’s biography goes, there was still the last remaining bit of the purist left in me that felt like reading a biography of Dostoevsky to better understand his novels felt a little like cheating. I remember learning about New Criticism back in high school and its insistence to always value the text of a novel itself more than any context provided by the author’s life or the broader historical period. That school of criticism certainly has its uses insofar as it keeps critics from flying off the text and making claims that have no root in the work of art they attempt to clarify. Every work of art, however, is still informed by the time and place in which it was produced and by the individual who produced it. I have yet to find a greater example than Frank’s Dostoevsky of trying to elucidate those contextual details while still having the enrichment of the art as its raison d’etre. The work that Frank has produced is every bit as rich and rewarding as Dostoevsky’s novels. Much like Bukowski, I too am eternally grateful to Nicholas I for sparing Dostoevsky’s life and to Joseph Frank for chronicling the details of that life.
Final Score: 10/10
against the wall, the firing squad ready.
then he got a reprieve.
suppose they had shot Dostoevsky?
before he wrote all that?
I suppose it wouldn't have
mattered
not directly.
there are billions of people who have
never read him and never
will.
but as a young man I know that he
got me through the factories,
past the whores,
lifted me high through the night
and put me down
in a better
place.
even while in the bar
drinking with the other
derelicts,
I was glad they gave Dostoevsky a
reprieve,
it gave me one,
allowed me to look directly at those
rancid faces
in my world,
death pointing its finger,
I held fast,
an immaculate drunk
sharing the stinking dark with
my
brothers.
Imagine my disappointment in myself when I found I was, more or less, back at square one. I felt like I had when I was in high school, assuring my eleventh grade English teacher that I could give a speech on The Brothers Karamazov and all too quickly finding myself out of my depth. While I did have a greater handle on the generalities of Russian culture in the late nineteenth century, I still felt so much of the books going right over my head as it had when I was seventeen.
I found myself absolutely bewitched by the general ideas driving The Idiot and Demons, but when I read them the summer after my sophomore year of college, I found myself aimlessly skating over the surface of the novels, trying desperately to come away with some profound insight that I could share with people and not simply allowing myself to get absorbed in the story and let the insight come or not come as it would. So, the books sat on my shelf for four years. In the time those four years elapsed, I graduated from college; I had the good fortune to actually get a job in the field I had studied in college (Theatre), but my heart wasn’t in it, and I was probably the least accomplished person working at the Scenic Studio in St. Paul where I worked. One day, my boss took me aside and said that the budget couldn’t handle as many carpenters as they currently had, so he had to let me go. I stumbled around for the next year or so, doing odd jobs, bartending, doing some maintenance work in a few apartment complexes and eventually found myself on a siding crew working on new homes in the Twin Cities suburbs. While I perhaps never reached the same seedy depths that Bukowski had, I knew my life was turning into one of quiet desperation and there were a lot of days that I would come home from work at around four in the afternoon and just go right to bed without even making myself dinner because I couldn’t stand to be awake with my own thoughts.
One day, I forced myself to go out and walk in the sunshine. I went into Magers and Quinn: a bookstore in Uptown Minneapolis. I came across a copy of David Foster Wallace’s collection of essays, Consider the Lobster. When I scanned the contents, my eyes immediately went to his review of Joseph Frank’s Dostoevsky, which, at the time of Wallace’s writing was in its fourth volume: this volume. It would be another three years before I actually cracked the first volume of Frank’s immense work, but I did go home almost immediately to take a second stab at The Idiot. This time around, I actually lost myself in the story, and though I didn’t have a whole lot to say about it that was incredibly insightful, it was exactly the light in my dark night of the soul, such as it was, that I needed. It’s been about five years since then, as of this writing, and I’ve read or reread The Double, Notes From a Dead House, Notes from Underground, Crime and Punishment and The Gambler; and I’ve read four of the five volumes in Frank’s biography. I expect to finish reading or rereading The Idiot, The Eternal Husband, Demons, The Adolescent, The Brothers Karamazov and Volume 5 of Franks biography before the year is over. It’s been a long, hard road since that day in Magers and Quinn, but much like Bukowski I’m in a better place, and Dostoevsky has had no small role in that.
As far as Frank’s biography goes, there was still the last remaining bit of the purist left in me that felt like reading a biography of Dostoevsky to better understand his novels felt a little like cheating. I remember learning about New Criticism back in high school and its insistence to always value the text of a novel itself more than any context provided by the author’s life or the broader historical period. That school of criticism certainly has its uses insofar as it keeps critics from flying off the text and making claims that have no root in the work of art they attempt to clarify. Every work of art, however, is still informed by the time and place in which it was produced and by the individual who produced it. I have yet to find a greater example than Frank’s Dostoevsky of trying to elucidate those contextual details while still having the enrichment of the art as its raison d’etre. The work that Frank has produced is every bit as rich and rewarding as Dostoevsky’s novels. Much like Bukowski, I too am eternally grateful to Nicholas I for sparing Dostoevsky’s life and to Joseph Frank for chronicling the details of that life.
Final Score: 10/10
January 23, 2020
A WONDERFUL BOOK.
April 19, 2022
The fourth of Joseph Frank's five-volume literary biography on Dostoevsky, The Miraculous Years covers the time from just after the failure of the writer's second literary journal, Epoch, (and the financial burdens that failure would incur), through his meeting and marrying his second wife Anna, their exile abroad to avoid debt creditors, and the author's return to Russia four years later. The works covered, with both context and analysis by Frank, include Crime and Punishment, The Gambler, The Idiot, The Eternal Husband, and The Devils; Dostoevsky's writing so prolifically, and under such stress as is elaborated in the book, makes the choice of title obvious.
Because the biography's later volumes deal with Dostoevsky's heavier masterpieces, and because the book almost immediately approaches Crime and Punishment with the depth of analysis for which, in previous volumes, readers had to wait until the end, The Miraculous Years is, from a literary criticism standpoint, the densest volume so far. With his usual ability to present great literature in generally manageable terms, Frank provides many details of the circumstances and behind the major novels covered (which, often due to writing deadlines and sometimes censorship, Dostoevsky was not always able to lift up to his own standards of expression). While the intervening details of Dostoevsky's life are, as always, essential (his courting of the heroic Anna is a delight to read, and the context for his famous feud with Turgenev, the Dostoevskys' travels in Europe, and the explanation of sources behind The Devils are all excellent), the readings of the novels and novellas are in-depth and comprehensive.
While at times Frank's historicist interpretation tries, in my opinion, to link the books too exclusively to events and literature (essays, letters, etc) contemporaneous to the times, the readings give a solid basis for reading the books in context, and Frank's explanation of the overall structures (and Dostoevsky's stated but rarely fulfilled intents therefore) of the books provide an enlightening foundation from which to understand the works. It would have taken several rereads of the works for me to recognize the schema Frank points out in approachable prose. For those most interested in better understanding Dostoevsky's great works, this volume is worth waiting for (or skipping to).
Because the biography's later volumes deal with Dostoevsky's heavier masterpieces, and because the book almost immediately approaches Crime and Punishment with the depth of analysis for which, in previous volumes, readers had to wait until the end, The Miraculous Years is, from a literary criticism standpoint, the densest volume so far. With his usual ability to present great literature in generally manageable terms, Frank provides many details of the circumstances and behind the major novels covered (which, often due to writing deadlines and sometimes censorship, Dostoevsky was not always able to lift up to his own standards of expression). While the intervening details of Dostoevsky's life are, as always, essential (his courting of the heroic Anna is a delight to read, and the context for his famous feud with Turgenev, the Dostoevskys' travels in Europe, and the explanation of sources behind The Devils are all excellent), the readings of the novels and novellas are in-depth and comprehensive.
While at times Frank's historicist interpretation tries, in my opinion, to link the books too exclusively to events and literature (essays, letters, etc) contemporaneous to the times, the readings give a solid basis for reading the books in context, and Frank's explanation of the overall structures (and Dostoevsky's stated but rarely fulfilled intents therefore) of the books provide an enlightening foundation from which to understand the works. It would have taken several rereads of the works for me to recognize the schema Frank points out in approachable prose. For those most interested in better understanding Dostoevsky's great works, this volume is worth waiting for (or skipping to).
July 31, 2024
At long last the patient reader of Frank’s five volume biography of Dostoevsky finally gets to his masterpieces in the fourth volume. Frank does an excellent job again of placing the reader in the social-cultural context that these works germinated in. Frank takes you from beginning to end of how Dostoevsky created each of his masterpieces. C&P, the Idiot, and the Possessed are all covered masterfully and inspire the reader to undertake them once more, and this time with even greater understanding of the author’s intent. The gambler and Eternal husband are also covered in this volume. Dostoevsky said all his works, and really his whole life, turned on one frustratingly unknowable subject, the existence of God. No artist comes close to the inner workings of man’s faith and doubt on this existential dilemma. Dostoevsky’s journals showcase how he came to create the profound caricatures of each belief system of his time. The genius, and honestly the frustration, of Dostoevsky’s work is that he represents those with whom he disagreed with most strongly and most convincingly. His own belief system he leaves lacking because he believed it must be accepted on faith. No logical proofs or appeal to reason can ever turn a man into a true believer in his opinion, so it is only with touching anecdotes the he leaves you longing with all your ‘heart’ that our eternal dilemma is answered in the affirmative.
September 14, 2017
Excellent treatment of the most productive and also the most fraught period of Dostoevsky's post-Siberian life. His struggles for money were never more pronounced than during this period, as he left for a European vacation that turned into three years away due to financial straits. He had published C&P just before this, wrote The Idiot and The Eternal Husband during this stretch, and then began his novel Demons, before moving back to Russia to finish it there.
During this period, Dostoevsky's primary concerns of his mature work become solidified, as he situates himself firmly against the Nihilism running so rampant at that time. But at the same time, Dostoevsky wanted to propose an alternative that was grounded in Orthodox Christianity, a reality that is highlighted in all three major novels of this period (less so in Demons, though that is largely due to the excised chapter that includes Stavrogin's confession).
In the end, I am grateful for Frank's careful rendering of this period, particularly in the way he describes the novels coming together, often over long periods and through a variety of incarnations (this is especially true of The Idiot). That, combined with the biographical details as well as the careful attention to the writings themselves makes this work the most invaluable of the series.
During this period, Dostoevsky's primary concerns of his mature work become solidified, as he situates himself firmly against the Nihilism running so rampant at that time. But at the same time, Dostoevsky wanted to propose an alternative that was grounded in Orthodox Christianity, a reality that is highlighted in all three major novels of this period (less so in Demons, though that is largely due to the excised chapter that includes Stavrogin's confession).
In the end, I am grateful for Frank's careful rendering of this period, particularly in the way he describes the novels coming together, often over long periods and through a variety of incarnations (this is especially true of The Idiot). That, combined with the biographical details as well as the careful attention to the writings themselves makes this work the most invaluable of the series.
Read
November 18, 2023My favorite work of Dostoevsky's, Demons, is explored in detail here. Frank in unfortunate cold warrior mode makes a big deal about how many Russians after Stalin's death discussed widely the "prophetic" nature of Dostoevsky's text, warning as it did of the dangers of radicalism which came to pass under the Bolsheviks. But Frank contradicts this claim in admitting the targets of Dostoevsky's critique were the precursors to Trotsky's more terroristic socialism, such as Bakunin. These types of socialists Frank makes clear were despised by Marx and Engels and expelled from the First International with their hearty approval. Of course under Stalin this type of socialism was treated, appropriately, as a threat to the well being of the Russian people, and its violent adherents were put in jail or worse. People who have never spoken to or read about any of the victims of their violence decry this legal process as "authoritarian."
All that to say, I disagree with Frank's angle on Dostoevsky as a prophet of "Stalinism." I think instead he correctly foresaw the dangers of its opposition: Trotskyism.
All that to say, I disagree with Frank's angle on Dostoevsky as a prophet of "Stalinism." I think instead he correctly foresaw the dangers of its opposition: Trotskyism.
March 11, 2022
Ce n'était pas exactement ce à quoi je m'attendais, mais c'était tout de même une lecture intéressante. Ce que j'ai préféré, c'était l'aspect biographique. Les extraits des journaux de Dostoïevski et les analyses de ses œuvres, quoiqu’intéressants, l'étaient moins pour moi. Je pense que je préfère lire les romans de Dostoïevski que lire des analyses à leur sujet, mais je ne nie pas que je les comprends mieux, maintenant.
Ce que je retiens de ce livre sont surtout les événements de la vie de Dostoïevski. On parle entre autres de son arrestation, de son « simulacre de mise à mort », du mort de son frère et de sa première femme, et des conséquences de ces deux décès pour l'auteur, avant même d'aborder ce qui lui arrive pendant les « années miraculeuses ». On apprend qu'il a toujours des difficultés financières, qui le forcent à fuir à l'étranger, et que son premier enfant, Sofia, de sa deuxième femme, Anna, meurt à l'âge d'à peine quelques mois. À la fin du livre, Dostoïevski et Anna retournent en Russie, après un exil de quatre ans.
Ce que je retiens de ce livre sont surtout les événements de la vie de Dostoïevski. On parle entre autres de son arrestation, de son « simulacre de mise à mort », du mort de son frère et de sa première femme, et des conséquences de ces deux décès pour l'auteur, avant même d'aborder ce qui lui arrive pendant les « années miraculeuses ». On apprend qu'il a toujours des difficultés financières, qui le forcent à fuir à l'étranger, et que son premier enfant, Sofia, de sa deuxième femme, Anna, meurt à l'âge d'à peine quelques mois. À la fin du livre, Dostoïevski et Anna retournent en Russie, après un exil de quatre ans.
September 13, 2024
The weakest parts of the book are the literary analysis of the less important works. It’s just too hard to keep track of character names if you have not read the book. The book should’ve been written in such a way that someone who has or has not read the book can still process what is going on. Sometimes the author succeeds in this, and sometimes he doesn’t.
March 11, 2021
It was a fortune to have got hold of this volume, which is the fourth one in the five volume magnum opus biography of Dostoevsky. Brilliant portrayals of his psyche, struggles and amazing creativity. Must read for all Dostoevskists!!
December 22, 2016
For two reasons, this book may leave you with an urge to re-read the first three volumes; one because it contains sections that in another context have also been addressed in the other volumes and two because it presents a complicated social and political narrative in reference to Dostoevsky's works, which may be difficult to grasp by itself, all the more so, if you don't have a clear understanding of ideologies of people referenced in the narrative and discussed in prior volumes.
This book discusses three major works of Dostoevsky - Crime and Punishment, The Idiot and The Devils (also published as Demons and The Possessed) along with some less known works such as The Eternal Husband and The Gambler. You can read this volume with or without reading the works referenced in it. If you have already read the works discussed in the book you will find it easy to grasp the depth of analysis on different characters and may find yourself going back to reading the work again with new perspectives on the characters. On the flip side, if you haven't read the book but are getting introduced to it by this book, you may be able to appreciate the historical context of the work before you spend time reading it, although it may be difficult to keep up with the description of characters in a context of a novel that you haven't yet read. Nevertheless, this book will spur the desire to read these works and get familiar with the context. It may just happen that after you finish reading Dostoevsky's novels, you are again nudged into picking up this volume to get a deeper understanding of the work and before you know you could be in a recursive loop of reading Dostoevsky and Joseph Frank!
This book discusses three major works of Dostoevsky - Crime and Punishment, The Idiot and The Devils (also published as Demons and The Possessed) along with some less known works such as The Eternal Husband and The Gambler. You can read this volume with or without reading the works referenced in it. If you have already read the works discussed in the book you will find it easy to grasp the depth of analysis on different characters and may find yourself going back to reading the work again with new perspectives on the characters. On the flip side, if you haven't read the book but are getting introduced to it by this book, you may be able to appreciate the historical context of the work before you spend time reading it, although it may be difficult to keep up with the description of characters in a context of a novel that you haven't yet read. Nevertheless, this book will spur the desire to read these works and get familiar with the context. It may just happen that after you finish reading Dostoevsky's novels, you are again nudged into picking up this volume to get a deeper understanding of the work and before you know you could be in a recursive loop of reading Dostoevsky and Joseph Frank!
June 8, 2009
They get better and more in-depth as you go. This fourth installment of Frank's biography concentrates on renewals in Dostoevsky's life. His second wife Anna is devoted to him and bears him children. His new publishers advance him money when he needs it. His friend Maikov supports him in Russia, while he travels abroad. D's gambling does some harm, but solidifies Anna's devotion to him. Quarrels with Turgenev also solidify D's nationalism and anti-nihilism.
The only eccentricity that remains against Dostoevsky is his unfortunate xenophobia. Perhaps Turgenev's pro-german interjections were spurred by D's complaints. Ultimately, D was offended by Turgenev's Smoke and his cowering before nihilism.
I'm excited to read the last of Frank's volumes. Dostoevsky's life presents a storybook climax - the egoist, the rebel, the convict/convert, the impoverished, the wise (This is my extremely unpolished outline).
The only eccentricity that remains against Dostoevsky is his unfortunate xenophobia. Perhaps Turgenev's pro-german interjections were spurred by D's complaints. Ultimately, D was offended by Turgenev's Smoke and his cowering before nihilism.
I'm excited to read the last of Frank's volumes. Dostoevsky's life presents a storybook climax - the egoist, the rebel, the convict/convert, the impoverished, the wise (This is my extremely unpolished outline).
April 14, 2008
This volume covers Dostoyevsky's second marriage, his 'exile' in Germany and Switzerland, his increasingly nationalistic outlook, the renewed feud with Turgenev, and his ongoing polemics against the younger (and older) generation of radicals. Writings discussed include Crime and Punishment, The Gambler, The Idiot, and The Devils. Indispensable.
June 19, 2010
Volume IV of Frank's 2500-page literary biography. Explores the six years in which he produced some of his greatest work: Crime and Punishment, Demons, The Idiot, The Gambler. Full discussion on each of these works. Also details his attraction and marriage to the adorable Anna, his second wife.
December 18, 2010
Excellent!
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