Dostoevsky relies on a fairly traditional device for the telling of his story: an unnamed and unidentified narrator (a townsman who relates what he sees and hears, much of which is what "everyone is saying," but who also knows and speaks with several characters) who tells of "the recent and strange incidents in our town" in a retrospective manner. The strategy works well, especially in its way of summarizing events and the behavior of characters at the opening of the plot.
The tone of the novel is imposed slowly and deliberately, as the narrator speaks calmly of the background of the Stavrogins, Stepan, and their strange relationships (the narrator is not averse to making convenient, for the author, judgments of characters; he speaks of the "friendship" of Varvara and Stepan in terms of peculiarity: "There.....
This is a free excerpt of 135 words. This section contains 572 words. This
Short Guide contains 4,298 words (approx. 14 pages at 300
words per page).
Read the rest of this Short Guide with our The Possessed Access Pass.
