March 8, 2025 The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

R.E.A.D. (Read Enrich Advise Discuss) We meet in the library meeting space. All welcome to come listen even if you have not yet had a chance to read the book.

The Brothers Karamazov is the story of the murder of Fyodor Pavlovich Karamazov, whose four sons are all to some degree complicit in the crime. Fyodor is a contemptible man who during his two marriages has three sons, Dmitri, Ivan, and Alexei. A fourth, Pavel, whom he employs as a servant, is suspected to be the illegitimate product of a union with “Reeking Lizaveta,” a mute woman of the street who died in childbirth. Fyodor takes little interest in the raising of his children and as a result finds himself in a contentious relationship with them. Within the context of this crime story evolves a brilliant philisophical debate of religion, reason, liberty, and the nature of guilt in a modernizing society. Considered by Sigmund Freud as “the most magnificent novel ever written,” Dostoyevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov, remains to this day to be regarded as one of the finest accomplishments of literature in any language. Through the lives and loves of the Karamazovs, Dostoyevsky presents a compelling examination of Russian life in the 19th century.