Things I enjoyed about the Brothers Karamazov
1. I liked the bit with the dog
2. At points it reminded me of Crime and Punishment (albeit a sort of low rent version)
3. Lise sort of interested me as a character, and her mother.
Things I didn't enjoy about the Brothers Karamazov
1. At least three times as long as it needed to be
2. Put me in mind of Crime and Punishment often enough to have me continuing to feel frustrated that it was nowhere near as good
3. All the pages and pages going on about god.
Perhaps it's my own fault for having enjoyed C&P too much, so BK was always going to be a disappointment, and I did try, I promise, and I soldiered absolutely all the way through, but now that I know I can do a Russian one so it's not the names that are the problem any more, for me with this one it was just the book that was the problem.
In C&P I believed in the hero, I believed in the way he changed over it and his internal agonisings and his unravelling and so on, and I believed in the tart with a heart, and I believed in the possibility of redemption. With BK I didn't really mind whether he did it or not, I didn't get why anyone would be so bothered about Grushenka, and I wasn't even slightly troubled about whether anyone was redeemed (apart from Kolya).
I think I'm going to refresh myself with a bit of Austen revision before diving into anything Russian again - probably Pride & Prejudice unless I get a better recommendation. But before even that, I think only finishing Little Women is going to work for me.
I recommend The Idiot as your next Russian venture, better even than C&P. But, as a break, how about some GK Chesterton? The Man Who was Thursday is a good read........or Wilde's Dorian Gray....or Mr Polly, HG Wells.....that period produced men who could write a dashed good story. If you insist on Austen, though, Mansfield Park or Persuasion for my money.
ReplyDelete