The Bolshevik Revolution and its Relation to Crime and Punishment

The Bolshevik Revolution and its Relation to Crime and Punishment The novel, Crime and Punishment, written by Fyodor Dostoyevsky follows an ex-student, Raskolnikov, through his mental struggles in great psychological detail after he commits murder without reason. Raskolnikov’s mental instability is a parallel to Russia’s long history of unstable and poorly designed government systems. To better understand the events that led up to radical and Slavophile movements in Russia, and to better understand how Raskolnikov came to be mentally ill, background knowledge on the history of Russia is needed. In the thirteenth century, Mongols from Asia invaded Russia, and the Mongols remained in Russia for several centuries. The Mongols had a great influence on Russian culture and society; in the 16th century, the Mongols returned to Asia, and the Russian people were able to develop their own form of government. The Russians modeled their government very similar to that of the Mongols. The Russians established that a czar, or emperor, was the main political figure who was in charge of Russian government, schools, churches, and farmland. This led to the exploitation of peasants and serfs by the government for several hundred years, which caused great anger among the lower class. In Dostoyevsky’s time, there were over 500 peasant uprisings between 1850 and 1855. Crime and Punishment really opens up the readers’ eyes as to the very harsh and poor conditions peasants lived in. Crime and Punishment was written right after Dostoyevsky’s imprisonment in Siberia. Before Dostoyevsky was sentenced to eight years in Siberia, he was a very radical thinker and flamboyantly expressed radical and liberal ideas, which went against the grain of the Russian government during that time. Russian officials were disgruntled by Dostoyevsky’s views, so they sentenced Dostoyevsky, and other people affiliated with him, to death. Right before the Russian officials raised their guns to murder him,

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