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Dostoevsky's last and greatest novel, The Karamazov Brothers (1880),is both a brilliantly told crime story and a passionate philosophical debate. the dissolute landowner Fyodor Pavlovich Karamazov is murdered; his sons - the atheist intellectual Ivan, the hot-blooded Dmitry, and the saintly novice Alyosha - are all at som elevel involved.Bound up with this intense family drama is Dostoevsky's exploration of many deeply felt ideas about the existence of God, the question of human freedom, the collective nature of guilt, the disastrous consequences of rationalism. The novel is also richly comic: the Russiam Orthodox Church, the legal system, and even the author's most cherished causes and beliefs are presented with a note of irreverence, so that orthodoxy and radicalism, sanity and madness, love and hatred, right and wrong areno longer mutually exclusive. Rebecca West considered it "the allegory for the world's maturity", but with children to the fore. This new translation does full justice to Dostoevsky's genius, particularly in the use of the spoken word, which ranges over every mode of human expression. the disastrousconsequences of rationalism. The novel is also richly comic; the Russian Orthodox Church, the legal system, and even the author's most cherished characters and causes are presented in an irreverent light, so that there appears no sharp distinction between health and disease or right or wrong. Cover -- Contents -- Introduction -- Translator's Note -- Texts Used -- Select Bibliography -- A Chronology of Dostoevsky -- Principal Characters -- Time Chart -- THE KARAMAZOV BROTHERS -- From the Author -- PART ONE -- BOOK ONE: THE STORY OF A FAMILY -- 1. Fyodor Pavlovich Karamazov -- 2. The eldest son is packed off -- 3. Second marriage, second brood -- 4. The third son, Alyosha -- 5. Startsy -- BOOK TWO: AN UNSEEMLY ENCOUNTER -- 1. They arrive at the monastery -- 2. The old buffoon -- 3. Devout peasant women -- 4. Lady of little faith -- 5. Amen, amen! -- 6. A man like him doesn't deserve to live! -- 7. The careerist seminarian -- 8. A scandalous scene -- BOOK THREE: SENSUALISTS -- 1. In the servants' quarters -- 2. Lizaveta Smerdyashchaya -- 3. Confessions of a passionate heart. In verse -- 4. Confessions of a passionate heart. In anecdotes -- 5. Confessions of a passionate heart. 'In free fall' -- 6. Smerdyakov -- 7. Controversy -- 8. Over a glass of brandy -- 9. Sensualists -- 10. Both together -- 11. One more ruined reputation -- PART TWO -- BOOK FOUR: CRISES -- 1. Father Therapon -- 2. At his father's -- 3. An encounter with some schoolboys -- 4. At the Khokhlakovas' -- 5. Crisis in the drawing-room -- 6. Crisis in the tenement -- 7. And in the fresh air -- BOOK FIVE: PROS AND CONS -- 1. Betrothal -- 2. Smerdyakov with a guitar -- 3. The brothers get to know each other -- 4. Rebellion -- 5. The Grand Inquisitor -- 6. Still very unclear -- 7. 'It's always interesting to talk to an intelligent person' -- BOOK SIX: A RUSSIAN MONK -- 1. Starets Zosima and his visitors -- 2. From the life of the Schemahieromonk Father Zosima, resting in the Lord, in his own words, as recorded by Aleksei Fyodorovich Karamazov -- 3. Concerning the discourses and teachings of Starets Zosima -- PART THREE -- BOOK SEVEN: ALYOSHA -- 1. Odour of putrefaction.
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