Promising Regeneration: Religious Symbolism in Dostoevsky\u27s Crime and Punishment

Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky\u27s Crime and Punishment is a work whose timeliness increases rather than diminishes with the years, and whose artistic power has scarcely been matched since it was first published in 1866 ( Crime vi). The novel evolved from the original title of The Drunkards into a seven-part story depicting the decline of a murderer in the days following his crime. Rodion Romanovich Raskolnikov struggles with the mental implications of killing an old, heartless pawnbroker and her innocent sister who stumbles into the murder scene. The heinous axe-murder results from Raskolnikov\u27s philosophy he created while lazily despising his poverty. His theory destines some men (himself included) to be free from the moral laws of humanity