Nepedia
Back to Discover
Fluent Reader
🎨

Crime and Punishment

arts Maturity 11-13 religion Next article →

This article covers sensitive topics: religion. Parents can manage visibility in Parental Controls.

*Crime and Punishment* is a famous novel by the Russian writer Fyodor Dostoevsky.

Cover of the first edition of Crime and Punishment
Cover of the first edition of Crime and Punishment

It is often called one of the greatest works of world literature. The story explores the heavy thoughts and hard choices of a young man. This book is part of Dostoevsky's mature period of writing. It follows a character through deep mental pain and moral struggles. Many people study it to understand how guilt affects the human mind.

The story takes place in Saint Petersburg.

Sennaya ploshad PTb
Sennaya ploshad PTb

It follows Rodion Raskolnikov, a former law student living in extreme poverty. He lives in a tiny, rented room and feels very alone. Raskolnikov has a dangerous theory about "extraordinary" people. He believes some people can break rules to reach higher goals. To test this, he plans to kill an old pawnbroker. He thinks her money will help him escape poverty and do great deeds.

Karazin1
Karazin1

After he commits the crime, he feels intense confusion, paranoia, and disgust.

Dostoevsky began writing this work after returning from ten years of exile in Siberia.

Karazin1
Karazin1

He was under a lot of pressure to finish the story on time. At the same time, he was working on another book called *The Gambler*. A woman named Anna Snitkina helped him during this difficult task. She was a stenographer who later became his wife. The story was first shared in monthly parts. It appeared in a journal called *The Russian Messenger* throughout 1866.

Writing the novel was a long and changing process. Dostoevsky first thought of it as a shorter story or novella. In September 1865, he wrote to a publisher named Mikhail Katkov about his ideas. By November 1865, he decided it should be a full novel. He even changed how the story was told to the reader. He moved from using a first-person narrator to a third-person narrator. This change helped him show the deep changes in Raskolnikov's character.

The novel connects to real ideas about how people view laws and morality. Raskolnikov's ideas are linked to a way of thinking called "radicalism." A detective named Porfiry Petrovich investigates the crime in the book. Porfiry studies an article Raskolnikov wrote called "On Crime." In that article, the student argued that certain people could step across moral boundaries. This connection between his writing and his actions drives much of the tension. The book shows how hard it is to live with the consequences of one's choices.

404 words

Where will your curiosity go next?

Keep exploring at your chosen reading level.

🖼️ Images & Media (3)
File:Karazin1.jpg
Karazin1.jpg
File:Sennaya ploshad PTb.jpg
Sennaya ploshad PTb.jpg
File:Cover of the first edition of Crime and Punishment.jpg
Cover of the first edition of Crime and...
More to explore

🔬 Go deeper

More advanced topics to explore

🪜 Step back

Simpler topics to build understanding

What is Nepedia?

A free, ad-free encyclopedia for children. Every article is written at five reading levels, so the same page works for a five-year-old and a fifteen-year-old — use the level switcher above to see this one change. No account needed to read.