/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.4691674]

Thinking of reading Dostoevsky's "Demons"/"Devils"/"The Possessed," because I'm fascinated by pre-1917 Russian revolutionaries. Haven't read Dostoevsky before. (I know, I know.)

Anyway, the jacket of the copy I'm contemplating buying makes it sound like a screed against revolution and atheism. Is it?

[Anonymous No.4691710]

>>4691674
You're pretty much me, it was the first Dostoevsky I read and I loved it. It does warn about accepting radical ideas but also mocks conservative Russians. But there is so much more to it, like philisophy (Camus writes about one of the characters in The Myth of Sisyphus).

[Anonymous No.4691722]

>>4691710
Which translation did you read? I usually just go with Oxford World's Classics because the translations are more to my taste than Penguin's and they're not that much more expensive.

[Anonymous No.4691738]

>>4691722
I usually read non-English literature in my native language (Hungarian), however, I can say that anybody who translates the title as "The Possessed" probably doesn't get much of the book.

[Anonymous No.4691761]

>>4691738
I'll probably just go Oxford, then. (Which has it as "Devils.")

I sometimes wish I belonged to an interesting nationality like yours rather than just being American.

[Anonymous No.4691779]

>>4691761
My version translated it as Devils, too.

My nationality isn't really interesting. The language is, though.

[Anonymous No.4692260]

>>4691761
Which translation is it?
P&V are generally considered the closest to the actual Russian, but I've always enjoyed McDuff's translations more

[IMPERATOR GALFRIDVS CAESAR GVI(...) !3zqDYT6COw No.4692570]

>>4691761

>American
>not interesting nationality
America has arguably the most uniquely blended culture in the world. It lies at the intersection of Western European and West African cultures, and there is an additional "American Spirit" which is totally unique from the national spirits it inherits - a certain frontier, do-it-yourself, individualist spirit which isn't replicated anywhere else. Add these three things together and you get something very special - and certainly "interesting". Furthermore, America has a truly glorious history given how brief it is, rising up from a petty rebel colonial state to the greatest power on earth. And of course what really seals the deal on America's greatness is its intellectual history, with a hugely disproportionate amount of the 20th century's greatest physicists, mathematicians, and philosophers being Analytic. Indeed, I would rank America as the third best nation, just behind Britain (or, if that's not acceptable as a nation, England), and the former lands of the HRE (or, if that's not acceptable as a nation, then I'd rank the US fourth, after Prussia and Austria). Indeed, I'd say that anyone who deems the US an "uninteresting" nation is merely looking for something agreeably "provocative" to say, since they don't know enough about anything to say anything else. I'm proud to be an American.

[IMPERATOR GALFRIDVS CAESAR GVI(...) !3zqDYT6COw No.4692577]

>>4692570

Sorry, meant to reply to this motherfucker:

>>4691779

[Anonymous No.4694002]

>>4692577
No, you didn't. "This motherfucker" was referring to the Hungarian nationality..

[Anonymous No.4694019]

What do you think about Gyergy Lukacs?

[Anonymous No.4694048]

>>4692570
America is interesting but as a cesspool, not for any of the laughable stuff you mentioned. Fuck off to /pol/, white boy.

[Anonymous No.4694071]

>>4694019
also,
>a screed against revolution and atheism
See Bakhtin's «Dialogism». He notes that in Tolstoy novels there is always one particular idea of what is right but made impossible by circumstance or mores, norms and interests. But all of his characters are dimly aware of that «truth». But in Dosto every characters makes a convincing case for his own ideology. That's the "dialogism". The plot is naturally a screed against whatever Russian censors did not like.

[Anonymous No.4694091]

>>4694048
queck how's english on the internet going muddy?

[Anonymous No.4694099]

>>4694048
Conveniently not addressing any of his points...

[Anonymous No.4694561]

>>4692260
Michael R. Katz.

[Claquesous No.4694574]

>>4694071
That's what I prefer, even and especially when it comes to works that support my own views. I can tolerate strawmen and cheap shots if the author makes it funny, though, like Chesterton does, for instance.