Crime and Punishment

Discussion Questions.  

Question 4

Sonya is a timid, quiet and easy embarrassed person, but she is also devout and devoted to her family. She prostitutes herself and sacrifices to maintain her family.

Dunya is Raskolnikov's sister and she is so beautiful, she wants to marriage with a high social class guy named Luzhin to help her brother in his economical balance in contrast to Sonya.

Katerina Ivanovna is the consumptive wife of Marmeladov. Her serious illness gives her flushed cheeks and a persistent, bloody cough. She is very proud and repeatedly declares her aristocratic heritage compared to Dunya and Sonya.

They are stereotypes of that time. They all are physically and emotionally beautiful girls, which hadn't had a good future thanks to their social position and economical power. They are the kind of girls that engage with someone with higher position so that they can live with better conditions. Dunya and Sonya are more this kind of girls, Katerina Ivanovna is different. Because she marriages Marmeladov that was poor and her aristocracy came down because her social position became lower.

Dunya is about to marry Luzhin and this affects Raskolnikov temper when he got angry and his turns furious, because he doesn't want Luzhin as his sister's husband. Raskolnikov feels pity about Katerina because Marmeladov died and she has to sustain her daughters, so Raskolnikov gave away his money and this is when we see compassion on Raskolnikov. Raskolnikov is not influenced by Sonia, she is grateful because of what he did for Marmeladov when he had the accident. Raskolnikov feels sorry for her and this compassion makes him a sentimental person.

These girls influence him in the way he regrets for the things he feels guilty about.

Question 5

I think Dostoyevsky wanted to convey a universal concept of CRIME trhough a well-complex character that is almost a psycho. Raskolnikov was decided to murder Alyona and consequently Lizaveta, he remains convinced that the murder of the pawnbroker was justified. But punishment appears in this story when he tortures himself with the idea that he is going to be caught up and that someone might suspect of him. So to carry out the plot it was necessary to choose an insane, dramatic and a dual character that is about to confess because he is tormented of this idea of guilt. He demonstrate this by fainting and storming out when the conversation of the murder is discussed, so this type of character is very melodramatic to understand better the severity of committing a crime and how that person feels and accept that punishment, that at the same time is found under contrition.


Diego Alejandro Cabrera Zúñiga.
A01375114.