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The primary goal of this paper is to investigate the phenomenon of a dream, a desire, or an idea transpiring in the thoughts of an individual, growing in importance to the individual, and finally becoming an idée fixe, or irresistible idea, which cannot be suppressed by the individual. The investigation will be concerned with the two of Dostoevsky's heroes who best exemplify the phenomenon.

This study provides a detailed analysis of the confession motif in Dostoevsky' s Crime and Punishment. It discusses Dostoevsky's use of the sacramental concept of confession, in which the estranged person is reunited with the human community through contrite confession. Throughout the novel, Raskolnikov wavers between desiring estrangement and seeking union. These two poles are shown in his encounters with Sonya and Porfiry (who represent union) and Luzhin and Svidrigaylov (who represent estrangement). Sonya and Porfiry tell Raskolnikov to confess and accept responsibility for his life; Luzhin and Svidrigaylov show him how to continue passing responsibility to others. This study also demonstrates that the epilogue is not merely a tag, as some Dostoevsky critics have argued. Rather, Raskolnikov' s redemption is the only thematically and psychologically valid conclusion.

Esta pesquisa é composta de uma tradução do original em russo da novela Uma anedota desagradável, de Fiódor Dostoiévski, publicada em 1862 na revista Vriêmia, seguida de um breve comentário sobre ela. Para o estudo do texto considerou-se que seu tema está relacionado com artigos publicados pelo escritor, em que ele expõe as suas observações acerca da intelliguentsia e da sociedade russa da época. No que se refere ao tratamento dado ao tema, o escritor empregou amplamente recursos associados ao universo grotesco, como o riso e a paródia, tanto para a descrição das personagens como para a narração dos acontecimentos. / This research is composed of a translation from the Russian novella An unpleasant anecdot, by Fyodor Dostoyevsky, published in 1862 in the periodic Vriemia, followed by a brief commentary about the periodic. To the study of the text was considered that the theme is related to the articles published by the author, on which he exposes his observations about the intelliguentsia and the Russian society of that time. Regarding the treatment given to the theme, the writer largely used resources associated to the grotesque universe, like the laughter and the parody, as to the description of the characters as well as to the narration of the events.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 2000. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 251-260).

Esta pesquisa é composta de uma tradução do original em russo da novela Uma anedota desagradável, de Fiódor Dostoiévski, publicada em 1862 na revista Vriêmia, seguida de um breve comentário sobre ela. Para o estudo do texto considerou-se que seu tema está relacionado com artigos publicados pelo escritor, em que ele expõe as suas observações acerca da intelliguentsia e da sociedade russa da época. No que se refere ao tratamento dado ao tema, o escritor empregou amplamente recursos associados ao universo grotesco, como o riso e a paródia, tanto para a descrição das personagens como para a narração dos acontecimentos. / This research is composed of a translation from the Russian novella An unpleasant anecdot, by Fyodor Dostoyevsky, published in 1862 in the periodic Vriemia, followed by a brief commentary about the periodic. To the study of the text was considered that the theme is related to the articles published by the author, on which he exposes his observations about the intelliguentsia and the Russian society of that time. Regarding the treatment given to the theme, the writer largely used resources associated to the grotesque universe, like the laughter and the parody, as to the description of the characters as well as to the narration of the events.

This paper explores the dialectical concept of love in Dostoyevsky's The Brothers Karamazov through Katerina and Grushenka, the heroines, and Dmitri Karamazov. Dostoyevsky's dialectic is most accurately described by the terms Eros and Agape, as defined by Denis de Rougemont in Love in the Western World. Chapter One examines the character of Katerina and establishes that although her love is ostensibly Agape, her most frequent expression of love is Eros. Chapter Two establishes that Grushenka's most frequent expression of love is Agape although ostensibly Eros. Chapter Three demonstrates how each woman personifies a pole of Dmitri Karamazov's inner conflict, and then traces his development with regard to his relationship to each woman.

This study is an examination of the rhetorical concept of the dialectic as it is realized in selected works of North American dystopian literature. The dialectic is one of the main factors in curtailing enlightenment rationalism which, taken to an extreme, would deny man freedom while claiming to bestow freedom upon him. The focus of this dissertation is on an analysis of twentieth-century dystopias and the dialectic of Fyodor Dostoevsky's Grand Inquisitor parable which is a precursor to dystopian literature. The Grand Inquisitor parable of The Brothers Karamazov is a blueprint for dystopian states delineated in anti-utopian fiction. Also, Dostoevsky's parable constitutes a powerful dialectical struggle between polar opposites which are presented in the following twentieth-century dystopias: Zamiatin's Me, Bradbury's Farenheit 451, Vonnegut's Player Piano, and Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale. The dialectic in the dystopian genre presents a give and take between the opposites of faith and doubt, liberty and slavery, and it often presents the individual of the anti-utopian state with a choice. When presented with the dialectic, then, the individual is presented with the capacity to make a real choice; therefore, he is presented with a hope for salvation in the totalitarian dystopias of modern twentieth-century literature.

In this thesis I compare the views of Joseph de Maistre and Fyodor Dostoyevsky with regard to the relation between modernity and the theologico-political problem. I integrate this comparison within the general context of the reflection concerning modernity and the theologico-political problem, as well as within the context of two Christian theological traditions, Catholic and Orthodox, on the basis of which the two authors develop their religious and political thought. In particular, I analyze the views of the two authors with regard to the origins and the defining traits of modernity. Likewise, I present their opinions concerning the consequences which are inherent in the modern project. Viewing modernity first and foremost as an attempt to build a secular world that would define itself by its opposition to what both authors regard as authentic Christianity, Maistre and Dostoyevsky emphasize the fact that, having theological origins that mark the totality of its becoming, modernity should be understood on the basis of a theologico-political reflection. Associating the modern ambition to build a secular world with the fate of the biblical Tower of Babel, both authors adopt a prophetic posture, announcing the collapse of the modern project as well as the ultimate eschatological resolution of the modern crisis. Yet, the two authors are differentiated by their interpretations of the relation between modernity and the theologico-political problem, identifying differently the theological origins of the modern crisis. In this sense, while according to Maistre modernity originates in the Protestant Reformation, for Dostoyevsky, modernity’s origins must be located in the transformations of Western Christianity that have finally lead to the latter’s separation from Eastern Orthodoxy. These differences of interpretation lead to the articulation of two different responses to the modern crisis, which are rooted in two different Christian theological traditions. Consequently, if in reaction to the modern crisis Maistre affirms the Catholic principle of authority, whose highest expression is the concept of papal infallibility, Dostoyevsky opposes to this crisis the Orthodox principle of brotherhood in Christ. The critique of modernity culminates in the thought of the two authors with an approach of the complex and troubling problem of theodicy, which, Maistre and Dostoyevsky believe, stands at the origin of the modern opposition to Christianity and its traditional institutions.

Revision of the author's thesis (doctoral)--Paris VII, 1987. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 441-449).