Before writing of the usual impressions a book has left on me, I must recount a recent exchange with a friend whose unexpected and plain statement impinged significantly on my appreciation for literature and other art forms, even though he was only speaking of a certain film director whom he admired. When asked what I thought of the director’s works, I replied without thought and declared the most palpable quality – that they were not too conservative. His answer was simple: “That is not the point.”

When Russian literature is spoken of, the word “depressing” is never far off. Most of my reading acquaintances, including myself,  have said this especially of Dostoevsky, and it is true. But although Dostoevsky may be the greatest poet of grief and torment, what if that is not the point? By reading The Brothers Karamazov, I have come to the awareness that “depressing” as the book truly is, that is verily not the point, and also perhaps in other works of art, the most barefaced aspect is indeed, not the point.

Within the covers of The Brothers Karamazov, I have alighted upon spiritually illuminating passages that not even Marcel Proust nor Thomas Mann could offer. Mann being influenced by Russian literature may have adapted the personification of ideologies in The Magic Mountain from The Brothers Karamazov, but Dostoevsky even went as far as incarnating the spiritual.

It was my goal to read the lifeworks of Proust, Mann, and Dostoevsky, in that arrangement before the year ended. Initially, the choices sprang forth from the eagerness to experience French, German, and Russian literature in the same year, but something more powerful than fancy led me to these three particular authors, and despite my previous worry that I may have picked Dostoevsky at the wrong time of the year, I do not regret these choices and their order, nor the circumstances in which I read these books… and fortunately, the order was to my great satisfaction. Proust stirs the artistic parts in us, Mann rouses the intellect, and Dostoevsky awakens the spirit.

“Certainly we shall all rise again, certainly we shall see each other and shall tell each other with gladness all that has happened!” Alyosha answered, half laughing, half enthusiastic.

This passage is taken from the last page of The Brothers Karamazov, and as much as this novel speaks of human suffering, vice, and weaknesses, if we look closer, it does not end there. Certainly it speaks of emancipation from all these, a life not of this world, and above all, Hope.

“Hurray for Karamazov!”

Happy Holidays, Everyone! =)

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