The names of the novel's main characters are given here with diminutives and variants. Russian names are composed of first name, patronymic (from the father's first name), and family name. Formal address requires the use of first name and patronymic; diminutives are commonly used among family and intimate friends; a shortened form of the patronymic (e.g., Romanych instead of Romanovich), used only in speech, also suggests a certain familiarity. Accented syllables are given in italics.
Ras kolnikov, Rodi onRo manovich, or Ro manych (Rodya, Rodka)
---------, Pul cheria Alex androvna
---------, Av dotya Ro manovna (Dunya, Dunechka)
Marme ladov, Sem yonZa kharovich, or Za kharych
---------, Kate rina I vanovna
---------, Sofya Sem yonovna ( Sonya, Sonechka)
---------, Po lina Mi khailovna ( Polya, Polenka, Polechka)
---------, Kolya (Kolka)
---------, Lenya (first called Lida ,or Lidochka)
Svidri gailov, Ar kady I vanovich
---------, Marfa Pe trovna
Razu mikhin (or Vrazu mikhin), Dmitri Pro kofych
Por firy Pe trovich (no family name)
Luzhin, Pyotr Pe trovich
Lebe zyatnikov, An dreiSem yonovich, or Sem yonych
Zam yotov, Alex ander Gri gorievich
Na stasya Pe trovna (no family name; Nastenka, Na stasyushka)
Al yona I vanovna (no family name)
Liza vetaI vanovna (no family name)
Il yaPe trovich, nicknamed “Gunpowder” (no family name)
Lippewechsel, A malia I vanovna (also called Lud wigovna and Fyodorovna) Zos simov (no first name or patronymic) Niko laiDe mentiev (no patronymic; Miko lai,Mi kolka, Niko lashka)
The name Raskolnikov comes from raskolnik,a schismatic, from raskol,schism (the Raskolnikiare members of the sect of Old Believers, who broke away from the Russian Orthodox Church in the seventeenth century); the root verb is raskolot,to split. Razumikhin comes from razum,reason, mind, intelligence. Lebezyatnikov comes from the verb lebezit,to fawn or flatter in an eager, fidgety, tail-wagging manner.
A note on the topography of Petersburg: the city, formally known as Saint Petersburg but normally referred to as Petersburg, was built on the orders of Tsar Peter the Great in the early eighteenth century. It is situated on the marshy delta where the river Neva flows westward into the Gulf of Finland, at a point where the Neva divides into three streams: the Neva, the Little Neva, and the Nevka. The main part of the city is on the south bank of the Neva, and is crisscrossed by canals designed to control flooding. The two smaller streams form the areas of the city known as Vasilievsky Island (between the Neva and the Little Neva), and the Petersburg side (between the Little Neva and the Nevka). Farther down the Neva is the well-to-do residential and amusement area called the Islands.
Often, though not consistently, Dostoevsky blanks out the names of specific streets and other topographical points. Scholars armed with maps have traced Raskolnikov's movements around the city and discovered the missing names, which some translators have then inserted into their versions of the novel. We have consistently followed Dostoevsky's inconsistency here, assuming it had an artistic purpose.
Part One
I
At the beginning of July, during an extremely hot spell, towards evening, a young man left the closet he rented from tenants in S------y Lane, walked out to the street, and slowly, as if indecisively, headed for the K------n Bridge.
He had safely avoided meeting his landlady on the stairs. His closet was located just under the roof of a tall, five-storied house, and was more like a cupboard than a room. As for the landlady, from whom he rented this closet with dinner and maid-service included, she lived one flight below, in separate rooms, and every time he went out he could not fail to pass by the landlady's kitchen, the door of which almost always stood wide open to the stairs. And each time he passed by, the young man felt some painful and cowardly sensation, which made him wince with shame. He was over his head in debt to the landlady and was afraid of meeting her.
It was not that he was so cowardly and downtrodden, even quite the contrary; but for some time he had been in an irritable and tense state, resembling hypochondria. He was so immersed in himself and had isolated himself so much from everyone that he was afraid not only of meeting his landlady but of meeting anyone at all. He was crushed by poverty; but even his strained circumstances had lately ceased to burden him. He had entirely given up attending to his daily affairs and did not want to attend to them. As a matter of fact, he was not afraid of any landlady, whatever she might be plotting against him. But to stop on the stairs, to listen to all sorts of nonsense about this commonplace rubbish, which he could not care less about, all this badgering for payment, these threats and complaints, and to have to dodge all the while, make excuses, lie—oh, no, better to steal catlike down the stairs somehow and slip away unseen by anyone.
This time, however, as he walked out to the street, even he was struck by his fear of meeting his creditor.
“I want to attempt such a thing, and at the same time I'm afraid of such trifles!” he thought with a strange smile. “Hm...yes...man has it all in his hands, and it all slips through his fingers from sheer cowardice...That is an axiom...I wonder, what are people most afraid of? A new step, their own new word, that's what they're most afraid of...I babble too much, however. That's why I don't do anything, because I babble. However, maybe it's like this: I babble because I don't do anything. I've learned to babble over this past month, lying in a corner day in and day out, thinking about...cuckooland. Why on earth am I going now? Am I really capable of that?Is thatsomething serious? No, not serious at all. I'm just toying with it, for the sake of fantasy. A plaything! Yes, a plaything, if you like!”
It was terribly hot out, and moreover it was close, crowded; lime, scaffolding, bricks, dust everywhere, and that special summer stench known so well to every Petersburger who cannot afford to rent a summer house—all at once these things unpleasantly shook the young man's already overwrought nerves. The intolerable stench from the taverns, especially numerous in that part of the city, and the drunkards he kept running into even though it was a weekday, completed the loathsome and melancholy coloring of the picture. A feeling of the deepest revulsion flashed for a moment in the young man's fine features. Incidentally, he was remarkably good-looking, taller than average, slender and trim, with beautiful dark eyes and dark blond hair. But soon he lapsed as if into deep thought, or even, more precisely, into some sort of oblivion, and walked on no longer noticing what was around him, and not wishing to notice. He only muttered something to himself from time to time, out of that habit of monologues he had just confessed to himself. And at the same moment he was aware that his thoughts sometimes became muddled and that he was very weak: it was the second day that he had had almost nothing to eat.