In order to establish the views on suffering held by the nineteenth-century (1821-1881) Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoyevsky, it is first necessary to determine the viewpoint of his age. In general, it was an age of humanitarianism-- the age of "compassion for the suffering of human beings," the age of optimism, of faith in a morality established by science and reason." Humanitarianism itself was an outgrowth of the Age of Enlightenment, the eighteenth-century intellectual movement which emphasized reason. This age of reason reflected the progress in science, which had weakened the hold of the Church and of faith on men's minds. Dostoyevsky's rejection of socialism made it necessary for him to reject the corollary of socialism: the elimination of human suffering. Thus he was forced to evolve a personal interpretation for the suffering that he would not let be abolished. Critics generally consider Siberia to be the turning point in Dostoyevsky's life, both from a personal and a literary standpoint. Before his imprisonment, Dostoyevskyts values were too immature for him to develop a significant theory illuminating the problem of suffering. It took Siberia to teach Dostoyevsky the meaning of metaphysical suffering-- the search for the meaning of God and reality. This meaning can be traced in the majority of his post-Siberian works in the form of the theory that happiness and ultimate salvation are made available to man through the purifying effects of his metaphysical sufferings.

No description available.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Rutgers University, 2008. / "Graduate Program in Literatures in English." Includes bibliographical references (p. 219-234).

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Chan, On Yue Joyce. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2013. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 316-329). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Abstract also in Chinese.

This thesis offers an analysis of the intertextual practices in Marie-Claire Blais's trilogy Soifs by which we explore the way the author integrates into her novels significant literary figures and texts in order to underline one of the trilogy's constant themes: the innocence and suffering of the victims of the twentieth century and of today. In this fiction saturated with literary and artistic references, literature appears as a standpoint on modern world and works are considered to be acts of creation that opposes to the "choeur de la destruction" the voices of writers and artists.

Thesis (M. Div.)--St. Vladimir's Orthodox Theological Seminary, 1978. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 68-73).

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This thesis examines the treatment of the theme of suffering by three modern authors: Feodor Dostoevsky, Albert Camus, and Milan Kundera. The analysis proceeds through the identification and examination of three primary concepts which I will argue are at the heart of their work, and which provide the conceptual foundations for their depictions of suffering: the wretched, the absurd, and the banal. These concepts will be used as an avenue through which to explore and articulate their treatment of suffering. It will be argued further that the work of these three authors forms a conceptual series, in that each contributes in an important way to the evolution of a modern secular way of thinking about suffering by producing portraits of suffering informed by concepts appropriate to specific moments in the modern era. The sense of wretchedness which emerges from Dostoevsky’s work is inextricably linked with the late nineteenth-century crisis-of-faith. The concept of the absurd ties Camus to the early-twentieth-century existentialist tradition, while the sense of banality in Kundera’s novels locates him in an era which has witnessed both the horrors of World War Two and the decline in the humanist tradition. The factor that unites them and gives order to their differences, however, is a common concern with questions of meaning. The loss of meaning in the modern era, and in particular the loss of meaning in relation to suffering, is a thread which develops progressively throughout the series. It is, as will be argued at the outset, what binds these three disparate authors together and what gives their work and their treatment of suffering a particular modern character. / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)