Raskolnikov and Svidrigailov: on the brink of suicide. Ф.М. Достоевский, Преступление и наказание
Raskolnikov
and Svidrigailov: on the brink of suicide.
In Dostoyevsky’s novel “Crime and Punishment”,
the main character, Rodion Romanovich Raskolnikov goes through a long series of
events, which compare and contrast him with the people around him. One of the
most significant characters crucial to understanding Raskolnikov’s personality
is Arkady Ivanovich Svidrigailov.
Overall, the enigma of Rodion’s
persona is expanded and illuminated by two characters: Svidrigailov as the
dark, calculative, and repulsive side; and Sonya Marmeladova as the
compassionate, humane, and spiritual half of Raskolnikov. What makes
Svidrigailov such an important element in the novel is the fact that by his
lack of morals and superiors, he becomes the epitome of Raskolnikov’ theory of
the Ubermensch, a thought Rodion conceived out of desperation and mental
fatigue.
It is the comparison of
Svidrigailov and Raskolnikov that eventually reveals each of them stands on the
theory of the Super-human. Despite all hopes of being among history’s great
people such as Napoleon, Julius Caesar et al, Raskolnikov fails the self-test
of belongingness to the superior class. Perhaps, Raskolnikov even hoped that
the murder, if committed without remorse or doubt, would propel him into
superiority. He definitely had the reasons to believe in his greatness because
it is evident that Raskolnikov clearly displays some of the qualities of a
Super-human, based on his own standards: he is intelligent, quite arrogant, and
his pride is very vividly apparent in his behavior with his only friend,
Razumikhin, and several occasions, on which he had refused to accept other
people’s assistance or support. But unfortunately, contrary to what Rodion had
anticipated, the murder delivers crippling inward blow to his conscience and
self-image, and Raskolnikov finally realizes that he is, in fact, nothing but a
“trembling creature.”
Svidrigailov, however, fits the
qualifications of an Ubermensch perfectly. There is nothing sacred in the world
for Arkady Ivanovich. The sole purpose of his life is the hedonistic pursuit of
his own selfish goals and practice of his self-made rights. The list of
examples that attest to Svidrigailov’s inhumanity is quite long, ranging from
lies and debt evasion to rape and, possibly, murder. For instance, when he
learns about the suicide of a fifteen-year old girl, whom he raped,
Svidrigailov shrugs without any remorse. The sadistic torment, which led his
servant Philip to suicide, also seems to have not given Arkady Ivanovich any
feelings of guilt. Svidrigailov is fully aware of his own vicious nature.
Shortly after his marriage to Marfa Petrovna, he announces to her that “he will
not be able to be a fully loyal husband.” Clearly, Svidrigailov is a person of
great vice and malice.
With such a clear distinction
between the characters, a distinction that decisively favors Svidrigailov as a
superior being, why does it so happen that Raskolnikov, a failed theorist, a
confirmed “louse”, finds a new life at the end of the novel, while Arkady
Ivanovich finally resorts to suicide? Is it not strange that Svidrigailov,
having become completely free from his marital duties (which he never honored,
anyway), endowed with substantial income from his deceased wife’s estate, not
burdened by any family obligations, would take his own life, while Raskolnikov,
a man who has betrayed himself and many people around him, with a murder on his
hands, and severe prosecution impending, would embrace his misery instead of
liberating himself in the waters of Neva?
Raskolnikov contemplates
suicide on many occasions throughout the novel. His first encounter with this
thought occurs at a canal bridge, where an ostensibly drunken woman jumps into
the dirty water in a suicidal attempt, but is rescued by the passersby. At this
point, Raskolnikov dismisses the idea of self-violence because it seems to be
too unsightly a spectacle. At several other times, it seems that the author is
repeatedly discussing suicide, calling it “going to America”, which is
suggested as an escape promising to remove an individual from all his/her
present difficulties. This notion becomes clearer near the end of the novel,
when Svidrigailov finally “goes to America” by a bullet to his right temple.
The last time when Raskolnikov returns to thought of suicide is on the night
before his final visit to the police station. After parting with Svidrigailov,
he walks to the middle of a bridge to contemplate suicide once again. However,
this time Rodion’s decision evolves from factors that are drastically different
from those he had before. There is an alternative. There is a hope of
regeneration and a normal life.
As portrayed by the biblical
figure of Lazarus, who rose from the dead after Jesus called to God and prayed
for Lazarus’ resurrection, Raskolnikov’s process of coming back to life begins
when he experiences a touch of divine intervention – love. Indeed, when a
person as ascetic and nihilistic as Raskolnikov experiences love, it does
seem like an impossibility whose occurrence may not be explained by anything other
than an act of God. Sonya Marmeladova is the object of Raskolnikov’s love and a
catalyst for his ultimate transformation. As Svidrigailov’s antagonist, Sonya
embodies the split Raskolnikov’s humane, compassionate side and leads him to
recognition and a new life.
Svidrigailov and Sonya are the
sides between which Raskolnikov vacillates throughout most of the novel. Having
read Rodion’s article about crime, Arkady Ivanovich finds it appropriate to
attempt to befriend Raskolnikov despite the latter’s explicit hostility. But
aside from Svidrigailov’s ambitions regarding Dunya and the discovery of
kinship between him and Raskolnikov, Arkady Ivanovich’s innermost reason to
search for someone who might help him escape the boredom, which he brought upon
himself by consistently committing various antisocial acts that alienated him
from everyone and left him utterly alone. The last straw for Svidrigailov is
the rejection he receives from Dunya, whom he desperately craved.
To further illustrate
Svidrigailov’s hopelessness, Dostoyevsky includes the story about Arkady
Ivanovich’s sixteen-year-old fiancée. Although it seems that a man as
perverse as Svidrigailov would not hesitate to take advantage of that innocent
child (after all, he has done it before!), Arkady Ivanovich pays his last visit
to that family and leaves a gift of fifteen thousand rubles. Later that night,
Svidrigailov has a dream, in which he morbidly contemplates the corpse of a
young girl who drowned herself after being raped. In the second dream he has
that night, he sees a five-year-old girl whose innocent countenance of a child
morphs into the expression of a veteran prostitute as Svidrigailov watches,
terrified. In the preceding days, Svidrigailov has been becoming increasingly
convinced of his own worthlessness, and these dreams finally allow him to see
who he is in perspective. No longer able to tolerate his own self, with no
place to go, and no one to help him find peace, Svidrigailov uses the last
bullet left in Sonya’s revolver to take his own life. Svidrigailov commits
suicide in front of a stranger whom the author identifies as Jewish, a people
Dostoyevsky regards with disdain, which further shows the desperate loneliness
that tormented Arkady Petrovich.
At the time of Svidrigailov’s
suicide, Raskolnikov’s story was also nearing its cathartic finale. Dostoyevsky
completes the picture of the novel’s denouement by creating an interesting
inconsistency in weather. It is stated that on the morning of Svidrigailov’s
suicide, the weather was a disgusting mixture of rain, fog, and stinging cold.
However, when narration turns to Raskolnikov and his walk to the police
station, the day is said to have been warm, sunny, and pleasant since that
morning. This is a deliberate artistic motion used by the author to contrast
the two characters who, at one point, stand somewhat close, but eventually
succumb to the separate fates they bring about by their predicaments.
This is the ultimate question
of this analysis: why did Svidrigailov, the real Ubermensch, commit suicide,
while Raskolnikov, the confirmed louse, was able to attain peace and a chance
to be happy? Well, it is, in fact, quite simple: it was Raskolnikov’s mistake
to think that he ever was a super-human, and it was his fortune that he did not
prove himself right. If Raskolnikov was a character parallel to Svidrigailov,
he, too, would have acted in these malicious, self-centered ways that would
have eventually brought about his tragic demise alongside Arkady Petrovich.
Perhaps it was Rodion’s youthful exuberance, the unrestrained flexing of his
intellectual muscle that provoked him to take on the principles of the world,
but it was his extraordinary luck to have near him the people who gave him back
his mind and his heart.