Lido ( )

This appears very well-researched and is extensively footnoted. Not for most general readers, but add a fifth star if you are very much interested in Dostoevsky or mid-nineteenth century Russia.

The book is described as condensed and abridged (from five volumes). The 950 pages are somewhat densely written, so that I would suspect: condensed and compressed.

The three big things I took from this:
(1) Dostoevsky was thrown in prison for four years as a result of his innocent association with a group of Russian intellectuals at the time of the European revolutions of 1848, which had put the tsar on edge. Only through his humbling experience with his peasant inmates did he come to understand the sentiments of the peasantry and so to realize that most of the ideals of those intellectuals were founded on unsound premises.
(2) His major works were in reaction to various intellectual currents of his time and place; for example atheism, socialism, determinism, nihilism, anarchism, and utilitarianism. His characters variously exemplified those ideals carried to their logical and dreadful extremes.
(3) He believed that the best hope for the future of Russia lay not in further westernization or revolution but rather in active faith in the Russian Orthodox church and loyalty to a tsar interested in the welfare of the Russian people. ( )

This is an almost perfect book: Frank combines fascinating history, insightful biography and above average literary criticism perfectly. I'm literally speechless; the only book I can think of to put beside this is MacDiarmid's 'Christianity: the first three thousand years,' which is similarly clear, stimulating, beautifully written and finely structured.
Aside from giving us a model for literary biographies, Frank also manages (possibly without knowing it) to write a perfect guidebook for writing novels: combine a deep fascination with your own time, an interest in human psychology, deep moral convictions, and a concern for the Big Ideas of human life in general. Then work your butt off. I'd like to think someone out there has managed to do that without being quite the twat that Dostoevsky became (yes- Russia (and by 'Russia' he of course means 'Orthodox peasants') will save the world). But I have no evidence of that as yet. If you like Dostoevsky's novels at all, this is well worth the effort.

Fun things that Dostoevsky said:

"You feel that one must have perpetual spiritual resistance and negation so as not to surrender, not to submit to the impression, not to bow before the fact and deify Baal, that is, not to accept the existing as one's own ideal." (376)

"The people are always the people.... but here you no longer see a people, but the systematic, submissive and induced lack of consciousness." (378)

"It is necessary to assume as author someone omniscient and faultless, who holds up to the view of all one of hte members of hte new generation." (480)

"'it is not worth doing good int eh world, for it is said, it will be destroyed.' There's something foolhardy and dishonest in this idea. Most of all, it's a very convenient idea for ordinary behavior: since everything is doomed, why exert oneself, why love to do good? Live for your paunch." (843) ( )

How could this be anything other than extraordinary?

This is perhaps one of the best biographies ever. Illuminating on so many levels. I learned so much, even about novels that I have read multiple times - such is the depth of both the biographer's knowledge, as well as Dostoevsky's nuanced and astonishing works. Frank also explores the culture and political background of Russia, providing much needed context. I could go on for paragraphs.

Emphatically recommended for all. ( )