The Idiot

I think I love Prince Myshkin, the hero of this novel by Dostoevsky. He’s a heroically good, heroically innocent man who doesn’t follow the ordinary patterns of life in Russia, nor the ordinary way of speaking – and so he alters everyone around him. Such uniqueness can’t survive forever, though. He is insulted, cheated and laughed at. Everyone in this story is either laughing hysterically or getting really angry. In the end, he goes back to the asylum from whence he came; because there is no place for a good man in that society.

Dostoevsky is of course a writer and a half. I love his sympathetic and simple description of an epileptic seizure, clear because he suffered from epilepsy himself. I love Myshkin’s quiet defence of himself when someone calls him an idiot. The humour in portraying Russian upper-class society, as well as its ugly tragic nature, is deftly portrayed. There are a lot of small stories within this larger picture, from one character or another, and they’re all engaging and vivid. There’s nothing simplistic about the people or the incidents, even though they are ordinary people and ordinary incidents.

There are some very funny moments – like Aglaia demanding, “Did you get my hedgehog?” – and then, soon after, you’re brought to tears by Ippolit’s simple question on the best way to die, and Myshkin’s perfect answer: “Pass us by, and forgive us for living.” There are all sorts of digressions on nature and death and life and different philosophies like nihilism, and then there’s stories about eating Catholic monks . . . the women in the story are incredible, Shakespearean characters, and so are half the odd generals who wander in and out. The love story is beautiful and yet the strangest you’ve ever come across, and altogether this is a wonderful, incredible, amazing book, and I’m so glad that it exists and I’ve found it.