The Philosophical Laboratory Case of Crime and Punishment Analysed in Three Narrative Levels

Abstract

The country, the city, and the mind: while being an arbitrary split, this is a handy one in discussing the arguments of Dostoevsky's polemical masterpiece Crime and Punishment. The novel argues for post-enlightenment ideas that snowballed into the nineteenth century and corrupted the country, both morally and philosophically. In this essay, the representation of the corruption of these three levels will be analysed within the framework of the thought experiment conducted on the impoverished student Raskolnikov, showcasing his intertwined fate with the state of Russia.