There are some books you finish and move on from. Then there are books that stay in your head for days.

Crime and Punishment was one of those books for me.

At first, I thought this was going to be a novel about a murder and its consequences. In reality, the murder almost feels like the beginning of the story rather than its main event. Dostoevsky is much more interested in what happens inside a person’s mind after they cross a line they can never uncross.

The story follows Raskolnikov, a poor former student who becomes obsessed with the idea that some people are above ordinary moral rules. He convinces himself that extraordinary people should be allowed to commit extraordinary acts if those acts ultimately benefit humanity.

So he decides to put his theory to the test.

He commits a murder.

And then everything begins to fall apart.

What I found most interesting about Raskolnikov is that he isn’t simply a bad person. He can be arrogant and selfish one moment, and surprisingly compassionate the next. He wants to believe that he is acting according to reason, but his own conscience keeps getting in the way.

And that is where the real punishment begins.

Dostoevsky doesn’t need to constantly remind us that Raskolnikov has done something terrible. We can see it happening inside him. His anxiety, paranoia, isolation and constant mental conflict become a kind of punishment of their own.

The book also made me think about how easily intelligence can become a justification for arrogance. Raskolnikov’s problem isn’t that he doesn’t think. He thinks too much. He creates an entire philosophy that allows him to believe he can stand outside ordinary morality.

But human beings don’t always work according to the theories they create.

That, perhaps, is what makes Raskolnikov so fascinating.

I also liked how Dostoevsky avoids making the characters completely good or completely evil. Almost everyone seems to carry some contradiction within them. Sonya, Porfiry, Svidrigailov and the others each represent different ways of dealing with suffering, guilt, morality and desire.

The novel isn’t always an easy read. Some sections are slow, the conversations can become extremely long, and there were definitely moments when I had to push myself to keep going. But once I got into Raskolnikov’s mind, the book became much more compelling.

What stayed with me most was not the crime itself, but the idea behind it.

Can a person convince themselves that something is morally acceptable simply because they believe they are capable of something greater than everyone else?

Dostoevsky’s answer seems to be that you can convince your mind of many things. Escaping yourself is much harder.

Crime and Punishment is dark, uncomfortable and psychologically intense. But it is also one of those books that makes you question your own ideas about morality, guilt and human nature.

For me, that’s what makes it worth reading.

Rating: 9.5/10.

Crime And Punishment By Fyodor Dostoevsky was originally published in ILLUMINATION on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.