The world of the dispossessed is a novel of crime and punishment. The world of the humiliated and insulted (F.M

Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky entered literature as a defender of the “humiliated and insulted.” His novels show terrible pictures of poverty, loneliness, abuse of man, and the unbearable “stuffiness” of life.

The favorite place of action in Dostoevsky's works is St. Petersburg. This is a city of slums in which petty officials, artisans, townspeople, and students live. And the author constantly draws attention to the stuffiness and stench that reigns in the city: “The heat outside was terrible, and besides, it was stuffy, crowded, there was lime everywhere, scaffolding, bricks, dust.”

The theme of “humiliated and insulted” is of great importance for revealing the plot of the novel. It helps to understand, on the one hand, one of the reasons for Rodion Raskolnikov’s crime, and on the other hand, it embodies the most important philosophical idea of ​​the novel, opposing Raskolnikov’s theory, the idea of ​​all-redeeming suffering.

The world of the “humiliated and insulted” in the novel is a world of poverty, brought to the brink of poverty, and therefore offensive to a person, humiliating him, taking him beyond the bounds of normal existence. This world is represented primarily by the Marmeladov family. The first meeting with one of its representatives, Marmeladov, occurs already in the second chapter of the first part of the novel, when Raskolnikov meets him in a tavern: “He was a man of about fifty, of average height, with a yellow, even greenish face swollen from constant drunkenness and with swollen eyelids, from behind which shone tiny, like slits, but animated reddish eyes. But there was something very strange in him, in his gaze there seemed to be even enthusiasm shining - perhaps there was experience and intelligence - but at the same time there seemed to be a flicker of madness.”

From the very first words, Marmeladov expresses one of the truths of this world: “Poverty is not a vice... but poverty is a vice.” This is how this world works. Let us recall the description of Raskolnikov’s closet. “It was a tiny cell, about six steps long, which had the most pitiful appearance with its yellow, dusty wallpaper that was peeling off from the wall everywhere.” Or the Marmeladovs’ apartment, where he brings Rodion from the tavern. “The staircase, the further it went, the darker it became... a small smoky door... A cinder illuminated the poorest room... Waves of tobacco smoke rushed from the interior.”

The world of the “humiliated and insulted” in the novel is a world of loneliness, alienation, “when there is nowhere else to go.” “Do you understand, do you understand, dear sir, what it means when there is nowhere else to go? No! You don’t understand this yet!” - Marmeladov says to Raskolnikov. He has nowhere to go and no one to. At home, he expects insults and resentment from his wife, who does not show him an ounce of respect. That's why he spends his whole days in the tavern, where everyone laughs at him. Marmeladov tells everyone about his life because he has no one who could feel sorry for him. And in Raskolnikov he recognizes a person capable of understanding others.

The world of the “humiliated and insulted” is at the same time a world of complete defenselessness, dependence on the “masters of life”, any unfavorable circumstances, a world of self-humiliation, loss of oneself as people. It is because of this insecurity and dependence that Sonechka Marmeladova becomes a prostitute. But she sins to save her loved ones. Under other conditions, she would not have taken this step.

Raskolnikov's dream at the Nikolaevsky Bridge is to some extent a reflection of centuries-old reality, oppression, enslavement of the “humiliated and insulted,” the cruelty on which the world rests. The dream takes on a symbolic meaning. Killed by the whim of the owner, the old, worn-out nag expresses resigned suffering and submission to his fate.

The owner of the Marmeladovs, Amalia Lyudvigovna, and her visitors are the embodiment of the idea of ​​power. Is this why she declares at every opportunity that she will kick out the Marmeladovs? In the scene of Marmeladov’s death, Dostoevsky says that “the tenants, one after another, walked back to the door with that strange feeling of contentment that is always noticed even in the closest people in the event of a sudden misfortune with their neighbor and from which not a single person, without exception, is spared, despite their most sincere regret and participation.” Luzhin, one of the “those with the right,” actually buys Raskolnikov’s sister. And this is still the same version of Sonya: for her own salvation, even from death, she will not sell herself, but she will sell herself for her brother, for her mother! But these are the laws of this world: the highest love, expressed through the highest selflessness, becomes the subject of buying and selling, turns into dishonor.

At the same time, the world of the “humiliated and insulted” is a world of great feelings, where self-sacrifice takes place, the ability to sacrifice oneself for the sake of others. Marmeladov, as soon as he met Katerina Ivanovna and learned about her plight, immediately asked her to marry him, “because he could not look at such suffering.” Raskolnikov, leaving the Marmeladovs, “grabbed as much copper money as he could and discreetly put it on the window.” At that moment he did not care that maybe tomorrow he himself would have nothing to eat. He was motivated by a feeling of pity and compassion for people. Let's remember how he stands up for a girl on the boulevard who is being pestered by some dandy. He gives almost his last twenty kopecks so that the policeman will escort the girl home. Raskolnikov gives Katerina Ivanovna twenty rubles so that she can arrange her husband’s funeral. The height of dedication is Sonechka Marmeladova. Her image is the embodiment of kindness and compassion. Dostoevsky accompanies her name with the epithet “eternal.” It has a certain meaning and denotes the order in which the world hated by Raskolnikov stands, dooming the majority to the role of victim in the name of loved ones. This is the “eternal” order of things.

The humanity of the “humiliated and insulted” and the inhuman living conditions in which they find themselves lead to insoluble contradictions and spiritual dead ends.

Marmeladov loves Katerina Ivanovna and wants her to at least treat him with respect. But she can't overcome her pride. Marmeladov's drunkenness is not only an expression of despair, but it is also a gesture of a person unable to get used to suffering and injustice. Katerina Ivanovna also cannot get used to such a life. After all, she was of noble birth, “born a staff officer’s daughter.” She “slipped” to the social bottom “from above”, from a previously prosperous family. And such people feel injustice more keenly. She constantly tries to prove the nobility of her origin, the nobility of her feelings and is offended by the slightest disrespect for herself. Katerina Ivanovna arranges a magnificent funeral for her husband because she wants everything to be “like other people.” She cannot come to terms with her poverty: she spends all day washing and ironing the children’s clothes so that they look neat, teaching them French. The madness and death of Katerina Ivanovna is the highest peak of the tragedy of the “little people” due to the insolubility of all contradictions. The words with which Katerina Ivanovna dies: “The nag has gone away! I'm overextended!" - echo that image from Raskolnikov’s dream.

Drunkenness, prostitution and crime are the consequences of an incorrectly organized life. The profession of a prostitute plunges Sonya into shame and baseness, but the motives and goals that prompted her to take this path are selfless, sublime, and holy. Dostoevsky finds in her, in a defenseless teenager thrown onto the panel, perhaps in the most downtrodden, very last person of a large capital city, the source of his own beliefs, his own actions, dictated by his conscience and his own will. That is why she was able to become a heroine in a novel where everything is built on confrontation with the world and on the choice of means for such a desperate confrontation; it is from among the “little people” that Dostoevsky draws one of the most important philosophical ideas of the novel. Sonechka lives by it. For her, man is the crown of creation. “Is this man a louse?” - She is shocked by the assessment given by Rodion Raskolnikov to the murdered pawnbroker. Sonya lives in suffering, hopes for atonement for sin, for “resurrection.” In the novel, Raskolnikov is resurrected by her kindness, and she herself is supported by it. About such people we can say: “And the light shines in the darkness...”

The world of the humiliated and insulted in F. M. Dostoevsky’s novel “Crime and Punishment”

Sample essay text

Dostoevsky's first work, which brought him fame and glory as a great writer, was the epistolary novel "Poor People", in which the young author decisively defended the "little man" - a poor official who led a meager, miserable life, but retained kindness and nobility. This theme will subsequently become the leading one in the entire work of the writer.

And in the ideological novel “Crime and Punishment” it is of great importance, because Raskolnikov’s theory is organically connected with the living conditions that surround this poor student. The first pages of the novel immerse the reader in the wretched environment of the St. Petersburg slums, in one of the alleys of which Rodion Raskolnikov lives, struggles with poverty, creates a theory and commits murder. The author describes in great detail his miserable, stuffy closet, located right under the roof, more reminiscent of a closet than an apartment. This tiny cell, six steps long, with dusty yellow wallpaper peeling off the walls and a low, oppressive ceiling, recreates an atmosphere of crampedness and hopelessness, which is intensified by the description of a stuffy July day in St. Petersburg. The figure of a remarkably handsome young man, dressed in rags, strangely harmonizes with the disgusting and sad coloring of the craft quarter, with the unbearable stench from the taverns in which poor officials and shop workers whiled away their time. Everywhere there is cramped space, stuffiness, overcrowding of people forced to huddle in squalid apartments, which further aggravates the feeling of spiritual loneliness in the crowd. People are divided and angry, suspicious and distrustful. They lose the ability to pity and compassion, and this is clearly manifested in the reaction of visitors to the drinking establishment to the drunken confession of the poor official Marmeladov. In his story about his fate, the terrible life drama of a man who was crushed and crippled by a cruel world unfolds. The soul of a normal, intelligent, conscientious person cannot endure the daily humiliation of being a silent witness to the insult of his own wife, seeing hungry children, knowing that his daughter, a pure, honest girl, lives on a yellow ticket. Overwhelmed with suffering, Marmeladov demands nothing from his listeners except simple human participation. But his sincere, excited confession evokes only giggles and mocking curiosity, in which contempt clearly appears.

In general, it is through the example of the Marmeladov family that the theme of humiliated and insulted people, their numerous disasters in “this magnificent capital adorned with numerous monuments” is largely revealed. This is how the image of St. Petersburg appears in the novel, a cold, deathly city, indifferently looking at the grief and suffering of people. The magnificent panorama of the Russian capital further emphasizes the poverty and hopelessness of the situation of the inhabitants of the St. Petersburg slums. The strict, refined lines of the luxurious buildings set off the squalid, smoky rooms with holey sheets and a tattered sofa, in one of which the Marmeladov family huddles. The world of the humiliated and insulted in the novel is many-sided and diverse. The fate of Katerina Ivanovna, an extremely exhausted and tormented woman, trying to clean up a squalid apartment, not knowing how to feed her hungry children, is unlike the fate of her stepdaughter Sonya, who goes to work to help her family. The life of Raskolnikov’s sister, the beautiful Dunya, is dramatic, who is forced to endure bullying and undeserved shame, having the pride and pride of her brother. Everywhere there are crippled, broken destinies, the cause of which is constant, hopeless need, terrible living conditions, unworthy of man.

All these examples naturally lead to the conclusion that in this cruel world it is impossible to live according to the norms of universal morality. Poverty, lack of rights, and humiliation push people to violate Christian commandments. The hero of Dostoevsky's novel sooner or later faces a choice: to die or to live at the cost of deals with his conscience. Generally accepted moral laws do not apply to this world. If Sonechka Marmeladova had not started living on a yellow ticket, her family would have died of hunger. When Raskolnikov, in a conversation with her, talks about suicide as the only worthy way out, his words are suddenly interrupted by Sonya’s quiet remark: “What will happen to them?” This means that love for one’s neighbor deprives it of even such a way out as death. To help the stepmother and her children. Sonya actually kills herself as a person, but amazingly retains purity, integrity, and high morality. Her crime is justified by Christian love for people and readiness for self-sacrifice.

Rodion Raskolnikov's sister Dunya is ready to marry the successful businessman Luzhin, not loving him, which means deliberately dooming herself to a life devoid of joy. She decides to take this step for the same reason as Sonya - to pull her family out of poverty, to help her brother complete his education at the university. This means that in a world of humiliated and insulted people, despite the appalling living conditions, people are able to maintain nobility, love, compassion, and generosity. Depicting the world of St. Petersburg slums, the writer not only feels pity and sympathy for the disadvantaged and humiliated people, but also admires their remarkable human qualities, which are most difficult to preserve in unbearable conditions.

Thus, the theme of the humiliated and insulted is organically connected with Raskolnikov’s theory, not only because it is generated by the cruelty of the surrounding world and is a kind of rebellion against it. In this same world there is love, compassion, and the desire to help one’s neighbor. And this fills the writer with faith in the possibility of building a society in which people will be “exhausted with love for each other.” Only love, not violence, is the only possible way to achieve a humane, just society. This, in my opinion, is the meaning of the novel by the great Russian writer.

Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky entered literature as a defender of the “humiliated and insulted.” His novels show terrible pictures of poverty, loneliness, abuse of man, and the unbearable “stuffiness” of life.

The favorite place of action in Dostoevsky's works is St. Petersburg. This is a city of slums in which petty officials, artisans, townspeople, and students live. And the author constantly draws attention to the stuffiness and stench that reigns in the city: “The heat outside was terrible, and besides, it was stuffy, crowded, there was lime everywhere, scaffolding, bricks, dust.”

“humiliated and insulted” is of great importance for revealing the idea of ​​the novel. It helps to understand, on the one hand, one of the reasons for Rodion Raskolnikov’s crime, and on the other hand, it embodies the most important philosophical idea of ​​the novel, opposing Raskolnikov’s theory, the idea of ​​all-redeeming suffering.

The world of the “humiliated and insulted” in the novel is a world of poverty, brought to the brink of poverty, and therefore offensive to a person, humiliating him, taking him beyond the bounds of normal existence. This world is represented primarily by the Marmeladov family. The first meeting with one of its representatives, Marmeladov, takes place

Already in the second chapter of the first part of the novel, when Raskolnikov meets him in a tavern: “He was a man over fifty, of average height, with a yellow, even greenish face swollen from constant drunkenness and with swollen eyelids, from behind which tiny eyes shone. like slits, but animated reddish eyes. But there was something very strange in him, in his gaze there seemed to be even enthusiasm shining - perhaps there was experience and intelligence - but at the same time there seemed to be a flicker of madness.”

From the very first words, Marmeladov expresses one of the truths of this world: “Poverty is not a vice... but poverty is a vice.” This is how this world works. Let us recall the description of Raskolnikov’s closet. “It was a tiny cell, about six steps long, which had the most pitiful appearance with its yellow, dusty wallpaper that was peeling off from the wall everywhere.” Or the Marmeladovs’ apartment, where he brings Rodion from the tavern. “The staircase, the further it went, the darker it became... a small smoky door... A cinder illuminated the poorest room... Waves of tobacco smoke rushed from the interior.”

The world of the “humiliated and insulted” in the novel is a world of loneliness, alienation, “when there is nowhere else to go.” “Do you understand, do you understand, dear sir, what it means when there is nowhere else to go? No! You don’t understand this yet!” - Marmeladov says to Raskolnikov. He has nowhere to go and no one to. At home, he expects insults and resentment from his wife, who does not show him an ounce of respect. That's why he spends his whole days in the tavern, where everyone laughs at him. Marmeladov tells everyone about his life because he has no one who could feel sorry for him. And in Raskolnikov he recognizes a person capable of understanding others.

The world of the “humiliated and insulted” is at the same time a world of complete defenselessness, dependence on the “masters of life”, any unfavorable circumstances, a world of self-humiliation, loss of oneself as people. It is because of this insecurity and dependence that Sonechka Marmeladova becomes a prostitute. But she sins to save her loved ones. Under other conditions, she would not have taken this step.

Raskolnikov's dream at the Nikolaevsky Bridge is to some extent a reflection of centuries-old reality, oppression, enslavement of the “humiliated and insulted,” the cruelty on which the world rests. The dream takes on a symbolic meaning. Killed by the whim of the owner, the old, worn-out nag expresses resigned suffering and submission to his fate.

The owner of the Marmeladovs, Amalia Lyudvigovna, and her visitors are the embodiment of the idea of ​​power. Is this why she declares at every opportunity that she will kick out the Marmeladovs? In the scene of Marmeladov’s death, Dostoevsky says that “the tenants, one after another, walked back to the door with that strange feeling of contentment that is always noticed even in the closest people in the event of a sudden misfortune with their neighbor and from which not a single person, without exception, is spared, despite their most sincere regret and participation.” Luzhin, one of the “those with the right,” actually buys Raskolnikov’s sister. And this is still the same version of Sonya: for her own salvation, even from death, she will not sell herself, but she will sell herself for her brother, for her mother! But these are the laws of this world: the highest love, expressed through the highest selflessness, becomes the subject of buying and selling, turns into dishonor.

At the same time, the world of the “humiliated and insulted” is a world of great feelings, where self-sacrifice takes place, the ability to sacrifice oneself for the sake of others. Marmeladov, as soon as he met Katerina Ivanovna and learned about her plight, immediately asked her to marry him, “because he could not look at such suffering.” Raskolnikov, leaving the Marmeladovs, “grabbed as much copper money as he could and discreetly put it on the window.” At that moment he did not care that maybe tomorrow he himself would have nothing to eat. He was motivated by a feeling of pity and compassion for people. Let's remember how he stands up for a girl on the boulevard who is being pestered by some dandy. He gives almost his last twenty kopecks so that the policeman will escort the girl home. Raskolnikov gives Katerina Ivanovna twenty rubles so that she can arrange her husband’s funeral. The height of dedication is Sonechka Marmeladova. Her image is the embodiment of kindness and compassion. Dostoevsky accompanies her name with the epithet “eternal.” It has a certain meaning and denotes the order in which the world hated by Raskolnikov stands, dooming the majority to the role of victim in the name of loved ones. This is the “eternal” order of things.

The humanity of the “humiliated and insulted” and the inhuman living conditions in which they find themselves lead to insoluble contradictions and spiritual dead ends.

Marmeladov loves Katerina Ivanovna and wants her to at least treat him with respect. But she can't overcome her pride. Marmeladov's drunkenness is not only an expression of despair, but it is also a gesture of a person unable to get used to suffering and injustice. Katerina Ivanovna also cannot get used to such a life. After all, she was of noble birth, “born a staff officer’s daughter.” She “slipped” to the social bottom “from above”, from a previously prosperous family. And such people feel injustice more keenly. She constantly tries to prove the nobility of her origin, the nobility of her feelings and is offended by the slightest disrespect for herself. Katerina Ivanovna arranges a magnificent funeral for her husband because she wants everything to be “like other people.” She cannot come to terms with her poverty: she spends all day washing and ironing the children’s clothes so that they look neat, teaching them French. The madness and death of Katerina Ivanovna is the highest peak of the tragedy of the “little people” due to the insolubility of all contradictions. The words with which Katerina Ivanovna dies: “The nag has gone away! I'm overextended!" - echo that image from Raskolnikov’s dream.

Drunkenness, prostitution and crime are the consequences of an incorrectly organized life. The profession of a prostitute plunges Sonya into shame and baseness, but the motives and goals that prompted her to take this path are selfless, sublime, and holy. Dostoevsky finds in her, in a defenseless teenager thrown onto the panel, perhaps in the most downtrodden, very last person of a large capital city, the source of his own beliefs, his own actions, dictated by his conscience and his own will. That is why she was able to become a heroine in a novel where everything is built on confrontation with the world and on the choice of means for such a desperate confrontation; it is from among the “little people” that Dostoevsky draws one of the most important philosophical ideas of the novel. Sonechka lives by it. For her, man is the crown of creation. “Is this man a louse?” - She is shocked by the assessment given by Rodion Raskolnikov to the murdered pawnbroker. Sonya lives in suffering, hopes for atonement for sin, for “resurrection.” In the novel, Raskolnikov is resurrected by her kindness, and she herself is supported by it. About such people we can say: “And the light shines in the darkness...”

The novel “Crime and Punishment” is one of those works of world classics whose value does not decrease over time.
In his novel, Dostoevsky raises the question of the place of the little man in a bustling, constantly moving forward world.
“Crime and Punishment” shows bourgeois Petersburg. Not that bright, colorful one, with a sea of ​​lights, but a city in which the Raskolnikovs, Marmeladovs, ruthless pawnbrokers live, a city of street girls and numerous drinking establishments.
There is no place in this city for a poor person. He has one way out of the situation: either repeat the fate of Marmeladov, crushed by a rich stroller, or the fate of Sonya, who sells her body to save her children.
That's why Raskolnikov commits a crime. His crime is a cry from the soul, it is a response generated in response to all the oppression and troubles of the people. Raskolnikov is a victim of bourgeois society. He himself is “humiliated and insulted,” although he considers himself a “strong personality.” He left the university because he had nothing to pay for his studies; he lives in some small room, more like a coffin than a home. Raskolnikov is painfully looking for a way out of the situation. But he's not there! Society itself is to blame for his situation!
Not only Raskolnikov, as Dostoevsky shows, but also thousands of other people are inevitably doomed under the existing order to early death, poverty and lack of rights.
A striking example of this is the Marmeladov family. Marmeladov himself is a complete loser. A former official, he seeks the truth in a tavern. The dirt and stench of this tavern are turning against Marmeladov. What can he do? He is beyond the threshold of human honor and pride. Marmeladov understands his position. He says: “In poverty you will still retain your nobility of innate feelings, but in poverty no one will ever. For poverty... they are swept out of human company with a broom.” Poverty is when there is no one to go to, no one to complain to, no one to trust. Marmeladov is worthy and unworthy of compassion. On the one hand, we understand that he is not to blame for his situation, but on the other hand, we cannot stoop to such a degree when everything human is already alien. With his drunkenness, he brought his family to hopeless poverty. Everyone suffers, and first of all, Katerina Ivanovna.
The daughter of an officer, she is getting married for the second time, thereby saving her children. But what did this marriage give her? The fact that she, sick with consumption, did not sleep at night to wash the children’s clothes! Did she deserve this? What could she do? After Marmeladov's death, Katerina Ivanovna finds herself thrown out onto the street. She forces her children to beg. What could be done? The hopelessness of the situation is what Dostoevsky shows.
Dunya's fate is also tragic. Because of her love for her brother, she goes to work as a governess in Svidrigailov’s house. Because of him, she suffers humiliation and shame. And then Luzhin appears, who wants to marry Duna. The girl understands that by marrying Luzhin, she will become completely dependent on her “savior”. And she does all this for the sake of her brother, for the sake of his future. Raskolnikov cannot accept this sacrifice; he does everything to prevent Dunya from getting married. And Dunya begins to understand Luzhin’s true intentions and begins to fight for her pride.
Sonya Marmeladova is also deeply unhappy. But Sonya is “a ray of light in a dark kingdom.” She acts as the bearer of the moral values ​​of the “humiliated and insulted.” Sonya, like the Marmeladovs, is a victim of an unjust order. Her father’s drunkenness, the suffering of Katerina Ivanovna, doomed to hunger and poverty, forced her to “transgress” her “I”, to give her soul and body to be desecrated by the world around her. But unlike Raskolnikov, Sonya is full of an indestructible consciousness that even the most humane goals cannot justify violence.
All of Dostoevsky's heroes end their lives by death. There is no way out of the situation, only death remains. Through the fates of his heroes, Dostoevsky proves that there is no place in the bourgeois world for the “little” man. All the “humiliated and insulted” have only one way out - to be crushed by a rich carriage, that is, by the living conditions in which these people are placed by capitalist society.