Fyodor Dostoevsky: Crime and Punishment

Not mind-blowing, but good and, no doubt, important to have read. It feels so much more sophisticated than other books that were being written at that time. Take Dickens, for instance, since I also just finished The Pickwick Papers, and it is still fresh in my mind. Compared to the effort Dostoevsky puts into characterization, even the most sophisticated of Dickens' characters seem cheap and flat. By the end of Crime and Punishment, we know more about Raskolnikov than his own mother, whereas the workings of Pickwick's or Sam's mind by the end of their adventures are still a bit of a mystery.

The question remains whether this is a virtue or not. Is Dickens primitive compared to Dostoevsky? Or elegant? Our relative unfamiliarity with Dickens' characters does not make them less memorable or less literary. I think it is a matter of what each was trying to do. Dickens was trying to sell books; Dostoevsky to uncover the mysteries of the human mind. I think it safe to say that each succeeded, though neither perhaps to his ultimate satisfaction.