Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky lets the reader enter the mind of a murderer as he commits his crime and deals with the consequences. The novel addresses many philosophical questions and challenges preconceived ideas about good and evil. Many scholars agree that Dostoyevsky incorporated the personalities of the people in his life into his characters and that he made these characters deal with issues he faced, such as the existence of God. “Champion after champion [Dostoyevsky] was sent into the bloody field to fight life, as he himself claimed, to the death” (Murry 4). Among these “champions” he sent to “confront” his philosophical questions were Raskolnikov, a murderer, and Svidrigaylov, apparently unsympathetic. Svidrigaylov seems so unlikable because of the stories from his past that precede his appearance. The character of Svidrigaylov illustrates two concepts: what Raskolnikov would have been like if his superman theory had worked for him, and that a person who does not care about good and evil can do both extraordinary good and extraordinary evil . Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essay Raskolnikov is a handsome former academic who craves power. When we first meet him, he is obsessed with a task he is considering: “he even knew how many steps he was from his own door” (Dostoyevsky 3). (We later find out that the task involves assassinating a pawnbroker, Alena.) He kills her in an attempt to prove that he is an "extraordinary" man. According to Raskolnikov's theory of the superman, there are certain "extraordinary" men who must allow themselves to break the laws that inhibit their ideas (Dostoyevsky 249). We hear about Svidrigaylov long before he actually enters the story. Our first impression of him is not favorable, to say the least. Raskolnikov's mother writes him a letter telling him that if she had told of the "torments" his sister Dunya suffered at the hands of Svidrigaylov, Raskolnikov "would have ruined everything and come home" to help her (Dostoyevsky 28) . Throughout the book we learn that Svidrigaylov simply does what he wants, regardless of public opinion. Dostoyevsky made Raskolnikov and Svidrigaylov similar in order to illustrate Raskolnikov's superman theory through both his success and failure under comparable conditions (Santangelo 4). Raskolnikov realizes that Svidrigaylov is his counterpart (“[his] categorical denial is proof enough…he protests too much” [Jones 8]), and he looks at Svidrigaylov with fascination (Santangelo 4). He sees himself and the future of his theory in their shared “will to power” (Leatherbarrow 4) and their belief in “the right to cross all limits” (Santangelo 4). He and Svidrigaylov respect Dunya (Jones 9), Raskolnikov as a sister, and Svidrigaylov, as evidenced by the "moment of terrible, silent struggle" in his soul when she tells him that she can never love him (Dostoyevsky 477). Svidrigaylov even says that she “can only inspire the deepest respect, even in a completely bad character like” himself (Dostoyevsky 453). Both Raskolnikov and Svidrigaylov are afraid of death and both cross a moral line by deliberately committing acts of violence: Raskolnikov murders Alena and Svidrigaylov beats his wife, Marfa (Leatherbarrow 12). Although Raskolnikov and Svidrigaylov have much in common, they have one fundamental difference: Svidrigaylov succeeds where Raskolnikov fails. Raskolnikov is not able to free himself from themortality and before resorting to Christianity, he had to constantly rationalize everything he did. He cannot illustrate his own theory because he does not have the strength to free himself from the ideas of virtue and goodness. His ultimate confession shows that he has both of these ideas, but that he does not need either of them to be the “existential hero” (Bloom 36-37). Svidrigaylov, on the other hand, refuses to submit to any will other than his own. Throughout the novel, he engages in what some might call "debauchery" simply because he sees no reason to "restrain himself...if [he] feels like it" (Dostoyevsky 451); he plays cards and, as a married man, seduces the servants. He chooses to recognize himself and his will, rather than recognizing a power outside of himself, because that is what he knows (Murry 3). Svidrigaylov has completely freed himself from casuistry and does not feel the need to base his life on the demonstration of any theory, neither that of Raskolnikov, nor that of a religion (Bloom 37). For Dostoyevsky, Raskolnikov has the importance of a simple puppet compared to the significance of his other creation, Svidrigaylov. Svidrigaylov is the perfected and completed Raskolnikov (Murry 4). Raskolnikov's theory asserted that extraordinary people must allow themselves to commit acts that may not be socially or legally accepted. While Raskolnikov tries to allow himself to murder Alena without remorse, Svidrigaylov cheats and beats his wife and drives a servant to commit suicide without the slightest sign of guilt. “Raskolnikov's will is too weak to strive toward total omnipotence,” is how Dostoyevsky manifests his doubts about God and his “exploration of the nature of evil” in Svidrigaylov (Murry 1). The questions of whether crime and punishment exist are answered not in Raskolnikov (for whom "suffering might have been enough... although Dostoyevsky leaves the proof of that to another story"), but rather in Svidrigaylov, stronger and infinitely more complex (Murry 4). Svidrigaylov is the true hero of Crime and Punishment; he has the strength to achieve what Raskolnikov could not achieve. Svidrigaylov is the embodiment of what Raskolnikov could have been but never was (Murry 3). Raskolnikov recognizes "his superman" in Svidrigaylov's "moral independence...[and] in his disregard for accepted laws" (Leatherbarrow 13). Svidrigaylov is the “existential success” (Bloom 36). He feels no remorse (his “conscience is perfectly clear” regarding Marfa's death [Dostoyevsky 270]) and sees no deeper meaning in life than amusement. Raskolnikov wants the autonomous and absolutely free will of Svidrigaylov (Santangelo 4). Svidrigaylov does evil because something inside him tells him not to do it. He knows that to achieve total freedom, each of these instincts must be crushed, and unlike Raskolnikov, he finds it within himself to do so (Murry 3). Svidrigaylov achieves complete freedom, which does not necessarily imply happiness, but is freedom nonetheless (Bloom 37). In his existential success, Svidrigaylov went beyond the constraints of casuistry. “He transcended good and evil... [and] wanted his will to be omnipotent. Nothing will be forbidden to him... He will not go wrong by having even a slight semblance of right on his side. It is of its own right; another can only take it away” (Murry 3). Svidrigaylov is completely free from good, evil, shame and prejudice (Santangelo 4); it is simply “open…to all possible experiences of the universe” (Jackson 4). Svidrigaylov is a reflection of the universe, containing within himself the most extreme good and the most extreme evil without condemning either (Jackson 4). He can therefore dowhat some consider the ultimate evil by happily inflicting pain on innocents (Jackson 5-6) without any remorse and continuing to appear as normal as any other person (Jackson 5). When Raskolnikov accuses him of having killed Marfa, Svidrigaylov thinks he is defending himself by saying that he “only gave him a few blows with a stick, and that didn't even leave a mark” (Dostoyevsky, 270). The reader's first impression of him is that he is the embodiment of all evil (before he appears in the middle of Raskolnikov's nightmare, we learn that he murdered his wife, possibly abused of a little girl and tried to seduce Dounia), but that's what happens. only because “deliberate action of evil bodes ill for our minds.” The reader assumes that he is evil because he does bad things, "and yet this monster does good with an equal hand." He saves the orphans of Sonya and Marmeladov, he frees Dunya when she is entirely at his mercy even though he loves her passionately, and he financially helps a young girl he barely knows, without asking for anything in return. He is not evil with a penchant for good deeds, nor good with a penchant for evil. He is only his own will, undivided against itself (Murry 3). Having nothing beyond his own will, Svidrigaylov, however, cannot imagine anything outside of himself, including a greater purpose or meaning in life (Santangelo 4). He wanted everything, and therefore experienced everything, and “death is the last issue which, not being resolved, must be resolved” (Murry 4). This is where he and Raskolnikov differ. When Svidrigaylov states that Raskolnikov can either commit suicide or go to Siberia, he "has effectively identified the choices available to this miserable young man." Raskolnikov chooses one option, and his “alter ego” Svidrigaylov chooses the other (Connolly 2) because he is the concrete example of the “superman theory”. Having crossed moral boundaries, he does not distinguish between good and evil and can therefore do much of both.BibliographyBloom, Harold, Ed. Fyodor Dostoyevsky. Broomall: Chelsea House Publishers, 2003. Connolly, Julian. “An Overview of Crime and Punishment.” Exploring Novels, Gale, 1998. Literary Resource Center. January 25, 2008. http://galenet.galegroup.com/servlet/LitRC?locID=lac57609&stab=512&ASB2=AND&docNum=H1420002019&ADVSF1=connolly&ADVST1=CN&bConts=261&vrsn=3&ASB1=AND&ste=74&tab=2&tbst=asrch &n =10&ADVST3=NACox, Gary . “Part 4.” In Crime and Punishment: A Mind of Murder. pp. 81-97. Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1990. Literary Resource Center. April 9, 2008. http://galenet.galegroup.com/servlet/LitRC?locID=lac57609&ADVST2=KA&srchtp=adv&c=15&stab=512&ASB2=AND&ADVSF2=svidrigailov&docNum=H1420071232&ADVSF1=dost&ADVST1=NR&bConts=2638 43&vrsn=3&ASB1=AND&ste=74&tab=2&tbst = asrch&ADVST3=NADostoyevsky, Fyodor. Crime and punishment. New York: Oxford University Press Inc., 1981. Gibian, George. “Traditional Symbolism in Crime and Punishment”. PMLA, Vol. LXX, No. 5, December 1955, pp.970-96. Literary Resource Center. December 1, 2007. http://galenet.galegroup.com/servlet/LitRC?vrsn=3&dcoll=gale&locID=lac57609&c=l&ste=47&DT=Criticism&n=10&frmknp=1&docNum=H1420002015Jackson, Robert Louis. “Introduction: The Clumsy White Flower. » 20th century interpretation. On crime and punishment Ed. Eaglewood Cliffs Prentice-Hall, 1974. Jones, Malcolm V. “Crime and Punishment: Transgression and Transcendence.” Dostoyevsky: The novel of discord, pp.67-89. New York: Barnes and Noble Books, 1976. Literary Resource Center. April 9, 2008. http://galenet.galegroup.com/servlet/LitRC?locID=lac57609&ADVST2=KA&srchtp=adv&c=5&stab=512&ASB2=AND&ADVSF2=svidrigaylov&docNum=H1420071226&ADVSF1=dost&ADVST1=NR&bConts=514&vr s n=3&ASB1=AND&ste=74&tab=2&tbst =asrch&ADVST3=NALeatherbarrow, William J.=514