The Brothers Karamazov is, according to the author
and his critics, Dostoyevsky's greatest and most revealing life work. A complex
tale involving a myriad of characters thrown together in a tumultuous web
of murder, love, and faith, it was Dostoyevsky's summary of all the ideas
exhibited in his previous works. With this novel, he used different characters
to represent different aspects of his own thought and personality, and through
the novel's action and conclusion, shows the conclusion of all his introspective
considerations throughout life. This site is a little introduction to the
novel, and a tribute to what I consider the greatest work in all literature.
The Characters:
Fyodor Karamazov - often called the most odious and loathsome character
in all literature, he is the father of the four brothers, and the person
whose traits give the name Karamazov an adjectival use within and outside
of the novel. Exhibiting all seven of the capital sins at one time or another,
he is Dostoyevsky's archetype of corruption and depravity, and the source
of most of the evil which transpires throughout the novel. Some critics say
he is representative of fallen mankind as a whole, and his sons of the different
ways in which the descendants of Adam deal with their inheritance of concupiscence.
Dmitri Karamzov - base, pleasure-seeking, and emotional, Dmitri,
more than his brothers, is truly his "father's son." He exhibits more of
his father's traits than any of his brothers, but he is quite immature, even
though he is eldest. Throughout the novel, it is apparent to the reader,
and the protagonist, Aloyosha, that there is still hope for Dmitri.
Ivan Karamazov - Ivan, an atheist, is the antithesis of his brother,
Aloyosha. He represents worldly knowledge and scholarship, and is a portrait
of the political philosophies that spread through Russia in the 19th century.
Ivan seems to be the hero through much of the novel, or the one of the brothers
who is most successful and secure, however Dostoyevsky shows clearly in his
contrast between Ivan and Aloyosha who the better of the two really is.
Smerdyakov - One night on a drunken escapade, Fyodor Karamazov
comes across a mentally retarded vagabond woman in the streets. She is a
well known tramp in the village. Karamazov gets the woman drunk, and then
rapes her. Nine months later, she dies giving birth to a son in an outhouse.
This son is the epileptic Smerdyakov, the illegitimate bastard child of
Karamazov. He is raised by Fyodor Karamazov's servant, Gregory. He is cruel,
dishonest, and cold-hearted.
Aloyosha Karamazov - the gentle and loving protagonist of the novel,
Aloyosha is a monk whose compassion is the moving force of the work. We see
most of the action through his eyes, and he goes between characters silently
observing the turmoil in their lives, and commiserating with them all through
his own sorrows. However, he remains focused on things past himself, and
he becomes the only character in all of Dostoyevsky's literature to find
true redemption. In Aloyosha, this novel, as well as every other Dostoyevsky
work, is consummated. It is believed that Aloyosha represents the author's
final acceptance of salvation and peace in his own life.
Cana Of Galilee
Part Three, Book VII, Chapter 4
It was very late, according to the monastery
rules, when Alyosha returned to the hermitage. The door-keeper let him in
by a special entrance. It had struck nine o'clock -- the hour of rest and
repose after a day of such agitation for all. Alyosha timidly opened the
door and went into the elder's cell where his coffin was now standing. There
was no one in the cell but Father Paissy, reading the Gospel in solitude
over the coffin, and the young novice Porfiry, who, exhausted by the previous
night's conversation and the disturbing incidents of the day, was sleeping
the deep sound sleep of youth on the floor of the other room. Though Father
Paissy heard Alyosha come in, he did not even look in his direction. Alyosha
turned to the right from the door to the corner, fell on his knees and began
to pray.
His soul was overflowing but with mingled feelings;
no single sensation stood out distinctly; on the contrary, one drove out another
in a slow, continual rotation. But there was a sweetness in his heart and,
strange to say, Alyosha was not surprised at it. Again he saw that coffin
before him, the hidden dead figure so precious to him, but the weeping and
poignant grief of the morning was no longer aching in his soul. As soon
as he came in, he fell down before the coffin as before a holy shrine, but
joy, joy was glowing in his mind and in his heart. The one window of the
cell was open, the air was fresh and cool. "So the smell must have become
stronger, if they opened the window," thought Alyosha. But even this thought
of the smell of corruption, which had seemed to him so awful and humiliating
a few hours before, no longer made him feel miserable or indignant. He began
quietly praying, but he soon felt that he was praying almost mechanically.
Fragments of thought floated through his soul, flashed like stars and went
out again at once, to be succeeded by others. But yet there was reigning
in his soul a sense of the wholeness of things -- something steadfast and
comforting -- and he was aware of it himself. He began praying ardently,
he longed to pour out his thankfulness and love...
But then his prayers were interrupted and he passed
suddenly to something else, and sank into thought, forgetting both the prayer
and what had interrupted it. He began listening to what Father Paissy was
reading, but worn out with exhaustion he gradually began to doze.
"
And the third day there was a marriage in Cana
of Galilee," read Father Paissy. "
And the mother of Jesus was there;
And both Jesus was called, and his disciples, to the marriage."
"Marriage? What's that?... A marriage!" floated whirling
through Alyosha's mind. "There is happiness for her, too... She has gone
to the feast.... No, she has not taken the knife.... That was only a tragic
phrase.... Well... tragic phrases should be forgiven, they must be. Tragic
phrases comfort the heart... Without them, sorrow would be too heavy for
men to bear. Rakitin has gone off to the back alley. As long as Rakitin broods
over his wrongs, he will always go off to the back alley.... But the high
road... The road is wide and straight and bright as crystal, and the sun
is at the end of it.... Ah!... What's being read?"...
"
And when they wanted wine, the mother of Jesus
saith unto him, 'They have no wine' "... Alyosha heard.
"Ah, yes, I was missing that, and I didn't want to
miss it, I love that passage: it's Cana of Galilee, the first miracle....
Ah, that miracle! Ah, that sweet miracle! It was not men's grief, but their
joy Christ visited. He worked His first miracle to help men's gladness....
'He who loves men loves their gladness, too'... He was always repeating that,
it was one of his leading ideas... 'There's no living without joy,' Dmitri
says.... Yes, Dmitri.... 'Everything that is true and good is always full
of forgiveness,' he used to say that, too"...
"
Jesus saith unto her, Woman, what has it to do
with thee? Mine hour not yet come.
"
His mother saith unto the servants, Whatsoever
he saith unto you, do it". . .
"Do it.... Gladness, the gladness of some poor, very
poor, people.... Of course they were poor, since they hadn't wine enough
even at a wedding.... The historians write that, in those days, the people
living about the Sea of Galilee were the poorest that can possibly be imagined...
and another great heart, that other great being, His Mother, knew that He
had come not only to make His great terrible sacrifice. She knew that His
heart was open even to the simple, artless merrymaking of some obscure and
unlearned people, who had warmly bidden Him to their poor wedding. 'Mine
hour is not yet come,' He said, with a soft smile (He must have smiled gently
to her). And, indeed, was it to make wine abundant at poor weddings He had
come down to earth? And yet He went and did as she asked Him.... Ah, he is
reading again"...
"
Jesus saith unto them, Fill the waterpots with
water. And they filled them up to the brim.
"
And he saith unto them, Draw out now and bear
unto the Governor of the feast. And they bore it.
"
When the ruler of the feast had tasted the water
that was made wine, and knew not whence it was (but the servants which
drew the water knew); the Governor of the feast called the bridegroom,
"
And saith unto him, Every man at the beginning
doth set forth good wine; and when men have well drunk, then that which
is worse; but thou hast kept the good wine until now."
"But what's this, what's this? Why is the room growing
wider?... Ah, yes... It's the marriage, the wedding... Yes, of course. Here
are the guests, here are the young couple sitting, and the merry crowd and...
Where is the wise governor of the feast? But who is this? Who? Again the
walls are receding.... Who is getting up there from the great table? What!...
He here, too? But he's in the coffin... but he's here, too. He has stood
up, he sees me, he is coming.... God!"...
Yes, he came up to him, to him, he, the little, thin
old man, with tiny wrinkles on his face, joyful and laughing softly. There
was no coffin now, and he was in the same dress as he had worn yesterday
sitting with them, when the visitors had gathered about him. His face was
uncovered, his eyes were shining. How was this, then? He, too, had been called
to the feast. He, too, at the marriage of Cana in Galilee....
"Yes, my dear son, I am called, too, called and bidden,"
he heard a soft voice saying over him. "Why have you hidden yourself here,
out of sight? You come and join us too."
It was his voice, the voice of Father Zossima. And
it must be he, since he called him!
The elder took Alyosha by the hand and raised him from
his knees.
"We are rejoicing," the little, thin old man went on.
"We are drinking the new wine, the wine of new, great gladness; do you see
how many guests? Here are the bride and bridegroom, here is the wise governor
of the feast, he is tasting the new wine. Why do you wonder at me? I gave
an onion to a beggar, so I, too, am here. And many here have given only
an onion each -- only one little onion.... What are all our deeds? And you,
my gentle one, you, my kind boy, you too have known how to give a famished
woman an onion today. Begin your work, dear one, begin it, gentle one! Do
you see our Son, do you see Him?"
"I am afraid... I dare not look," whispered Alyosha.
"Do not fear Him. He is terrible in His greatness,
awful in His sublimity, but infinitely merciful. He has made Himself like
unto us from love and rejoices with us. He is changing the water into wine
that the gladness of the guests may not be cut short. He is expecting new
guests, He is calling new ones unceasingly for ever and ever.... There they
are bringing new wine. Do you see they are bringing the vessels..."
Something glowed in Alyosha's heart, something filled
it till it ached. Tears of rapture rose from his soul.... He stretched out
his hands, uttered a cry and waked up.
Again the coffin, the open window, and the soft, solemn,
distinct reading of the Gospel. But Alyosha did not listen to the reading.
It was strange, he had fallen asleep on his knees, but now he was on his
feet, and suddenly, as though thrown forward, with three firm rapid steps
he went right up to the coffin. His shoulder brushed against Father Paissy
without his noticing it. Father Paissy raised his eyes for an instant from
his book, but looked away again at once, seeing that something strange was
happening to the boy. Alyosha gazed for half a minute at the coffin, at the
covered, motionless dead man that lay in the coffin, with the ikon on his
breast and the peaked cap with the octangular cross on his head. He had only
just been hearing his voice, and that voice was still ringing in his ears.
He was listening, still expecting other words, but suddenly he turned sharply
and went out of the cell.
He did not stop on the steps either, but went quickly
down; his soul, overflowing with rapture, yearned for freedom, space, openness.
The vault of heaven, full of soft, shining stars, stretched vast and fathomless
above him. The Milky Way ran in two pale streams from the zenith to the
horizon. The fresh, motionless, still night enfolded the earth. The white
towers and golden domes of the cathedral gleamed out against the sapphire
sky. The gorgeous autumn flowers, in the beds round the house, were slumbering.
The silence of earth seemed to melt into the silence of the heavens. The
mystery of earth was one with the mystery of the stars....
Alyosha stood, gazed our before him, and suddenly threw
himself down on the earth. He did not know why he embraced it. He could
not have told why he longed so irresistibly to kiss it, to kiss it all.
But he kissed it weeping, sobbing, and watering it with his tears, and vowed
passionately to love it, to love it for ever and ever. "Water the earth
with the tears of your joy and love those tears." His elder's words echoed
in his soul.
Why was he weeping?
Oh! In his rapture he was weeping even over those stars,
which were shining to him from the abyss of space, and "he was not ashamed
of that ecstasy." There seemed to be threads from all those innumerable
worlds of God, linking his soul to them, and his soul was trembling all
over "in contact with other worlds." He longed to forgive everyone and for
everything, and to beg forgiveness. Oh, not for himself, but for all men,
for all and for everything. "And others are praying for me too," echoed
again in his soul. But with every instant he felt clearly and, as it were,
tangibly, that something firm and unshakable as that vault of heaven had
entered into his soul. It was as though some idea had seized the sovereignty
of his mind -- and it was for all his life and for ever and ever. He had
fallen on the earth a weak soul, but he rose up in strength, and he knew
and felt it suddenly at the very moment of his ecstasy. And never, never,
his life long, could Alyosha forget that minute.
"Someone visited my soul in that hour," he used to
say afterwards, with implicit faith.
Within three days he left the monastery in accordance
with the words of his elder, who had bidden him "go forth into the world."
