登陆注册
4771600000209

第209章

At last the news came (Dounia had indeed noticed signs of alarm and uneasiness in the preceding letters) that he held aloof from everyone, that his fellow prisoners did not like him, that he kept silent for days at a time and was becoming very pale. In the last letter Sonia wrote that he had been taken very seriously ill and was in the convict ward of the hospital.

II

He was ill a long time. But it was not the horrors of prison life, not the hard labour, the bad food, the shaven head, or the patched clothes that crushed him. What did he care for all those trials and hardships! he was even glad of the hard work. Physically exhausted, he could at least reckon on a few hours of quiet sleep. And what was the food to him—the thin cabbage soup with beetles floating in it? In the past as a student he had often not had even that. His clothes were warm and suited to his manner of life. He did not even feel the fetters. Was he ashamed of his shaven head and parti-coloured coat? Before whom? Before Sonia? Sonia was afraid of him, how could he be ashamed before her? And yet he was ashamed even before Sonia, whom he tortured because of it with his contemptuous rough manner. But it was not his shaven head and his fetters he was ashamed of: his pride had been stung to the quick. It was wounded pride that made him ill. Oh, how happy he would have been if he could have blamed himself! He could have borne anything then, even shame and disgrace. But he judged himself severely, and his exasperated conscience found no particularly terrible fault in his past, except a simple blunder which might happen to anyone. He was ashamed just because he, Raskolnikov, had so hopelessly, stupidly come to grief through some decree of blind fate, and must humble himself and submit to “the idiocy” of a sentence, if he were anyhow to be at peace.

Vague and objectless anxiety in the present, and in the future a continual sacrifice leading to nothing—that was all that lay before him. And what comfort was it to him that at the end of eight years he would only be thirty-two and able to begin a new life! What had he to live for? What had he to look forward to? Why should he strive? To live in order to exist? Why, he had been ready a thousand times before to give up existence for the sake of an idea, for a hope, even for a fancy. Mere existence had always been too little for him; he had always wanted more. Perhaps it was just because of the strength of his desires that he had thought himself a man to whom more was permissible than to others.

And if only fate would have sent him repentance—burning repentance that would have torn his heart and robbed him of sleep, that repentance, the awful agony of which brings visions of hanging or drowning! Oh, he would have been glad of it! Tears and agonies would at least have been life. But he did not repent of his crime.

At least he might have found relief in raging at his stupidity, as he had raged at the grotesque blunders that had brought him to prison. But now in prison, in freedom, he thought over and criticised all his actions again and by no means found them so blundering and so grotesque as they had seemed at the fatal time.

“In what way,” he asked himself, “was my theory stupider than others that have swarmed and clashed from the beginning of the world? One has only to look at the thing quite independently, broadly, and uninfluenced by commonplace ideas, and my idea will by no means seem so … strange. Oh, sceptics and halfpenny philosophers, why do you halt half-way!”

“Why does my action strike them as so horrible?” he said to himself. “Is it because it was a crime? What is meant by crime? My conscience is at rest. Of course, it was a legal crime, of course, the letter of the law was broken and blood was shed. Well, punish me for the letter of the law … and that’s enough. Of course, in that case many of the benefactors of mankind who snatched power for themselves instead of inheriting it ought to have been punished at their first steps. But those men succeeded and so they were right, and I didn’t, and so I had no right to have taken that step.”

It was only in that that he recognised his criminality, only in the fact that he had been unsuccessful and had confessed it.

He suffered too from the question: why had he not killed himself? Why had he stood looking at the river and preferred to confess? Was the desire to live so strong and was it so hard to overcome it? Had not Svidrigailov overcome it, although he was afraid of death?

In misery he asked himself this question, and could not understand that, at the very time he had been standing looking into the river, he had perhaps been dimly conscious of the fundamental falsity in himself and his convictions. He didn’t understand that that consciousness might be the promise of a future crisis, of a new view of life and of his future resurrection.

He preferred to attribute it to the dead weight of instinct which he could not step over, again through weakness and meanness. He looked at his fellow prisoners and was amazed to see how they all loved life and prized it. It seemed to him that they loved and valued life more in prison than in freedom. What terrible agonies and privations some of them, the tramps for instance, had endured! Could they care so much for a ray of sunshine, for the primeval forest, the cold spring hidden away in some unseen spot, which the tramp had marked three years before, and longed to see again, as he might to see his sweetheart, dreaming of the green grass round it and the bird singing in the bush? As he went on he saw still more inexplicable examples.

同类推荐
  • 唐宋大曲考

    唐宋大曲考

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 维摩经义记卷第四

    维摩经义记卷第四

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 后三国演义

    后三国演义

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 道具赋

    道具赋

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 骨董祸

    骨董祸

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
热门推荐
  • 一念之间,缘来是你

    一念之间,缘来是你

    一念之间,缘起缘灭,一念之间,缘来是你。
  • 一切始于这七大空间

    一切始于这七大空间

    上古末期,冥王被天道所欺,一生挚爱因此而亡,后一怒斩天道,与天道同归于尽。数十万年来,大道消散,法则不显,天地环境越发脆弱。古老而伟大的存在希望熬过这个最差的时代,年轻的强者却想重新打出一片未来……神秘的七大空间领域,这里埋葬了多少的传说与神秘。从发现到现在,没人知道它是如何形成的,也没人知道它存在的意义。但是,总有一天,世界的真相会浮现在所有人面前。
  • 兰家家主

    兰家家主

    父母惨遭陷害的她,成为了青城家族现任家主中唯一的女子,家门衰落,人心不古。那些在黑暗中的蠢蠢欲动,那些步步相逼的乱臣贼子,用这一双手,她誓要逆流而上,揭开一切的真相,重拾家族荣光。而在层层掩盖的面具之下,哪个,才是她值得信赖的面庞?是阳光下温和的笑容?还是角落里无声的庇护?兰家家主,正式出世。本文为鄙人首秀,文笔极烂还望海涵,只是希望能把在脑海里排了很多年的舞台剧用笔写下来,供大家一点娱乐,真诚的谢谢。
  • 大周王姬

    大周王姬

    曾经是学霸,现在是考古研究所的青年骨干,姜沁园智商超高,但是,却从不知“情爱”的滋味。直到她意外得到一面青铜镜,通过青铜镜可以与两千多年前的玄姜沟通,才知道了自己为何会这么奇葩。那么,玄姜又是谁?她也不过是西周末年的一个小小世家女,却撩了三位美男:一个乱世王者、一个开国霸者,还有一个敢于和王者较真儿的“二王”。王者说:“玄姜,失了你,得了天下,又如何?!”霸者说:“玄姜,我愿为你问鼎天下!” 本书宗旨,六个字:?“甜到齁、虐到死!”? (??ω`?)
  • 不是红颜的祸水

    不是红颜的祸水

    “为什么要向左?”“因为向右走有摩托车!”“为什么还向左?”“......”“将军,右边的山上有伏兵!”“你为什么总是向左?”“因为向左,遇到了你!”.......“你好美,却把自己包裹的那么丑!”“就是要找个不以貌取人的老公!”“闭上眼睛,你们那么先进的地方,不懂这个情调吗?”“哈,就这?我们的比这还暧昧还过火还深入还动人心魄!”“耳听为虚,眼见为实!”.....“爱我为什么不见我?”“将军,如果我嫁,你敢娶吗?”舒晴微笑着,心碎着!“现在我想娶你,跟我走吧!”“好,等流星砸到你的头上,我就嫁给你!”啊~不带这样的~“哼,不嫁给我,你试试!”
  • 新零售时代

    新零售时代

    零售业适合不同资金人群的创业者,可以是大型连锁零售商场,也可以是一家低门槛的网店。零售业的每一次变革和进步,都带来了人们生活质量的提高,甚至引发一种新的生活方式。本书主要讲述在国内知名连锁零售企业的管理培训生,将传统的“店商”和“电商”深入联合,完成从线下零售到新零售产业升级的创业励志故事,见证我国新零售时代的到来。
  • 漫道徐行

    漫道徐行

    当我沉沦尘世,浑浑噩噩,嬉笑打闹,懵懵懂懂,不明大道,迷迷茫茫,本心难察,与世同浊,与众同醉。当我醒来,荡清世间,尔等,当奉我为尊!
  • 外挂仙尊

    外挂仙尊

    天资太好,不能修炼?长得太帅,没有女人缘?,明明是弟子,却享受着长老的待遇?富可敌国,却为财力奔波,当起了小白脸?当林琅踏上了修仙的旅途,将会在翻起多大的巨浪?势如破竹,还是寸步难行?
  • 环溪诗话

    环溪诗话

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 连锁企业人力资源管理

    连锁企业人力资源管理

    本书根据高职高专教育的特点和新型人才的培养目标,结合以工作过程为导向的课程改革要求,以连锁企业人力资源管理职能操作流程为主线来组织理论框架。本书基本按照实际工作流程的先后顺序进行内容编写,将连锁企业人力资源管理工作进行过程化的梳理,便于学生感性认知和理性理解连锁企业人力资源管理工作的实际过程。书中包括大量的习题、案例、实训项目,以引导学生“学中做”、“做中学”。每章包括引导案例、职业指导、小知识等栏目。