The Brothers Karamazov: A Novel in Four Parts With Epilogue
precisely the type of man who is not only worthless and depraved but muddleheaded as well—one of those muddleheaded people who still handle their own little business deals quite skillfully, if nothing else.
Larissa Volokhonsky • The Brothers Karamazov: A Novel in Four Parts With Epilogue
Fyodor Pavlovich was both shrewd in money matters and muddleheaded at the same time.
But still there are readers of such delicacy that they will certainly want to read to the very end so as to make no mistake in their impartial judgment. Such, for instance, are all Russian critics.
Larissa Volokhonsky • The Brothers Karamazov: A Novel in Four Parts With Epilogue
The narrator should make another reference to "Russian Critics" in the AK introduction.Perhaps something like, "Some could not wait for the second part of the story and have passed judgment on the first part alone. Without wishing to accuse of them of premature judgment, they may have cause to revise their judgments after reading the second part of the story—if they choose to read it, that is.But the favorable reception of the first part gives the narrator confidence that the second part is worth telling. For, after all, many readers have found his strange and curious hero "noteworthy" enough to follow into the second novel. They must recognize that he had the seeds of extraordinary attainments in him even as a novice--both the in the literal sense and in the metaphorical one.
I have been wasting fruitless words and precious time, first, out of politeness, and, second, out of cunning.
Larissa Volokhonsky • The Brothers Karamazov: A Novel in Four Parts With Epilogue
What is the "cunning" he is talking about?Is it that he is "giving readers the best excuse to drop the book"? In that way, no one can blame him for his project. He is telling everyone in advance that they have his permission to drop the book right away. So if they continue, they have no one to blame except themselves.The introduction to AK should repeat this idea, bringing up the fact that anyone who is reading the second novel could only be interested because they went through the first novel completely. If they did so out of duty to themselves, that is their responsibility, and the narrator should remind them that they should not feel compelled to read the second one either.
It is impossible for me to do without this first novel, or much in the second novel will be incomprehensible.
Larissa Volokhonsky • The Brothers Karamazov: A Novel in Four Parts With Epilogue
Since the second novel would be "incomprehensible" without the first, it is important that AK keep referring to BK, both in its plot elements and in its themes.Keep a record of items from BK to repeat or refer to in AK.
For not only is an odd man “not always” a particular and isolated case, but, on the contrary, it sometimes happens that it is precisely he, perhaps, who bears within himself the heart of the whole, while the other people of his epoch have all for some reason been torn away from it for a time by some kind of flooding wind.
Larissa Volokhonsky • The Brothers Karamazov: A Novel in Four Parts With Epilogue
This is a key statement.Most of the rest of the world has missed what this "odd" man Alexei has found: the secret of "dying to bring forth fruit."When the ego dies, the Zen "normal" person steps forth, and his or her every action is pregnant with fruit because it is always perfectly suited to the moment—because there is no "I" to impose its imperfections on the otherwise perfect world.Lots of repetition of this idea in the second novel would be a good thing.
The thing is that he does, perhaps, make a figure, but a figure of an indefinite, indeterminate sort.
Larissa Volokhonsky • The Brothers Karamazov: A Novel in Four Parts With Epilogue
A's "indeterminate" figure is one of a helpful boy, a messenger, a go-for, full of good will, eager to see everyone heppy—but lacking a strong character of his own.Perhaps he is regarded as an "angel" precisley because of this lack of ambition, lack of a personal goal—quite unlike the traditional hero of a novel.In the second novel, he has managed to beomes well known in society even though he never committed to any part of it. This is the way most people go through life, doing the next thing, without a plan.And this can be a good life, doing good for others.But it cannot be the life of a novel's hero.
What is notable about your Alexei Fyodorovich that you should choose him for your hero?
Larissa Volokhonsky • The Brothers Karamazov: A Novel in Four Parts With Epilogue
"Notable" and "noteworthy" are words that have to be resurrected by the narrator in the new introduction. The reader of the new novel must have thought Alexei "notable" even as a young man, though he did nothing at all in the first novel of note. That means they saw through A's bland following up on other people's errands.But in the second novel, his oddness comes to reveal the heart of all men—that we all are awareness itself, divested of Self.
Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit. John 12:24
Larissa Volokhonsky • The Brothers Karamazov: A Novel in Four Parts With Epilogue
This is the key to the second novel as well. Alyosha's death as an odd and relatively non-noteworthy person radiates out through everyone who knew him. Like Zosima and all enlightened people, they inspire others to be kind, generous, self-sacrificing, and chreeful in the face of life's cruelties and miseries.Alyosha's speech at the end of BK is shown to be ego-driven and therefore "fruitless" because A's self is driving the desire to help. Herzenstube's "pound of nuts" to the child Dmitry is the model of selfless inspiration of the souls of others. Without thought, without a desire to be recognized, without a desire to make an impact on people—this is way that deep impressions are made on people, not by doing "extraordinary" things.The ending of AK, or at least A's last deed in the book, must show up the foolishness of A's speech to the boys in BK and must be a scene of such profound pathos and self-disappearnace that no one can doubt that this is moment that the kernal dies.
precisely the type of man who is not only worthless and depraved but muddleheaded as well—one of those muddleheaded people who still handle their own little business deals quite skillfully, if nothing else.
Larissa Volokhonsky • The Brothers Karamazov: A Novel in Four Parts With Epilogue
Fyodor Pavlovich was both shrewd in money matters and muddleheaded at the same time.