Laura Hughes (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
lauraredcloud) wrote2009-11-20 11:28 am
lauraredcloud) wrote2009-11-20 11:28 am
Entry tags:
Crime and Punishment 5.1-5.3: Luzhin's Plan
So, I've finished the book, which may make it more difficult for me to get up the energy to finish the recaps. Still, here's a three-chapter set forming a complete incident. Only two and a half more volumes and an epilogue to go!!!!
5.1
That same morning, as Raskolnikov is visiting the police station, Luzhin is getting angry because his German landlord won't return the deposit on his new marital apartment. He wishes he hadn't been "such a Jew" with Dunia, because it was "false economy": it would have been harder for her to break the engagement if she had to return a lot of baubles and things. Luzhin curses Raskolnikov for causing the rupture. He's really good at missing the point, isn't he?
Luzhin returns to the apartment where he's staying. It seems to be in the same building as Katerina Ivanovna's family. He passes the ladies preparing for Marmeladov's memorial luncheon on his way home. He got an invite on account of being a (relatively) bigshot lodger, but he didn't dream of going at the time. Luzhin thinks about how Raskolnikov is also invited to the memorial luncheon. Eeeenteresting.
Luzhin's roommate is this uppity socialist youth whom I will call Andrey because his last name, Lebeziatnikov, takes too long to type (and because he FEELS like an Andrey). I guess Luzhin scored an invite because he supported Andrey in his school days, and he thought it would be a good idea to take him up on it because he had heard that the kid was making a name for himself as a leading thinker; but now that Luzhin is there, he is filled with comically intense, silent rage at Andrey's constant talk about how we should all live on communes.
Luzhin picks a fight with Andrey, accusing him of hitting Katerina Ivanovna, and then mocking him for being offended--doesn't he believe men and women are equal, and therefore might equally be punched? Andrey agrees that in the future society, sure, both men and women will be able to be punched, but also, in the future society, there will be no fighting, so, um, right. Wait. Query, were comically left-wing hippies stoners back then, too, or is he just dumb? He tells Luzhin he doesn't plan on going to the memorial dinner except possibly to laugh at it. Oh, he's not a hippie, he's a hipster.
Luzhin asks if it's true what they say about Sonia. Andrey goes off on a rant about free love and declares that Sonia has a beautiful character. Luzhin giggles that he's sure Andrey loves her "beautiful" "character." Andrey insists that all of his interactions with Sonia are pure.
Luzhin asks Andrey, if he's such good friends with Sonia, to ask her in for a moment, as he has something he wants to discuss with her. Andrey complies and is about to leave them alone, but Luzhin asks him to remain present. Andrey says this is unnecessary as he totally believes Luzhin's intentions are honorable, but Luzhin insists for appearance's sake. Andrey sees his point. I wouldn't be so sure, Andrey; I don't know what Luzhin's intentions are, but they won't be good.
While Sonia sits in confusion and mild alarm, Luzhin brings the subject to Katerina Ivanovna's poverty in a really annoying way (does he know any other?), by basically informing Sonia that her stepmother's problems are her own fault and that it's so unwise of her to be giving this dinner she can't afford. Dude, her husband died. Which is basically what Sonia says. Luzhin finally gets to the point and offers Sonia ten rubles. Sonia refuses at first, but is eventually persuaded to take the money to help with Katerina's expenses.
After Sonia leaves, Andrey gazes at Luzhin with embarrassing admiration. He goes on at length about how fine and wonderful it was. Luzhin tries to brush it off as nothing. Andrey tries to rope Luzhin into his plan for the Future Society, to which Luzhin refuses. When Andrey asks why, he's sufficiently sick of humoring him that he snaps, "Because I don't want in your free marriage to be made a fool of and to bring up another man's children." A fair point, which only launches Andrey into a tangent about the raising of children in the future society. Luzhin tunes out and starts rubbing his hands together and twirling his moustache and Mwa-ha-ha-ing to himself so obviously that even Andrey notices.
5.2
Okay, this chapter seems like mostly filler. Katerina Ivanovna is going all out on the banquet, fueled by equal parts shame in her own poverty and brain-addledness. Description of the preparations as assisted by a dumb Pole. Oh, great, more racism. Various lodgers and clerks and things come to the dinner. Katerina gives Raskolnikov pride of place by her side because he's polite to her, and because he's such a respectable future professor (IF ONLY SHE KNEW etc etc). She stage-whisper kvetches to him all evening. She is upset that:
The evening devolves from there. Katerina begins casting aspersions on the parentage of her landlady. Now, that is just uncalled for. Just as the landlady is beginning to bring up the dreaded "yellow ticket," the door opens, and Luzhin arrives.
5.3
Katerina asks Luzhin to help her defend Sonia against the landlady's accusations, but Luzhin isn't interested: he's come to speak of his "own affairs." Luzhin, commanding the attention of the room, asks Sonia to explain why a hundred-ruble note is missing from his desk. Urg. Of course. He explains that he innocently counting his money (which is how he knows so precisely how much there was) when, "at that moment you entered (at my invitation)- and all the time you were present you were exceedingly embarrassed; so that three times you jumped up in the middle of the conversation and tried to make off. Mr. Lebeziatnikov can bear witness to this." When she left, he says, he discovered he was 100 rubles short.
Sonia, of course, is shocked and frightened by the accusation, and insists she only has the ten rubles which he gave her. She tries to give even that back. Luzhin gets into his role as the wronged party, and yells at Sonia for her "black ingratitude." Katerina rushes to defend Sonia, saying she would never steal, and turns out Sonia's pockets to prove it. The hundred-ruble note is there. Sensation. Sonia wails that she didn't take the money, she doesn't know how it got there. The landlady yells that Sonia and Katerina should both be sent to Siberia. Katerina gets mad at everyone.
Luzhin speechifies that Katerina obviously had no part in the matter, or she wouldn't have gone for the pockets; it's all Sonia; and, in spite of the "personal insult lavished upon" him, he is willing to be the big hero man and not press charges in light of the poverty and horribleness which drove the weak awful whore to such a terrible act. So, all this was just to discredit Raskolnikov's taste in friends?
Suddenly:
The one thing Andrey doesn't understand is why he did it. It's pretty convoluted, Andrey, so I don't blame you.
Anyway, Raskolnikov explains Luzhin's reasons for wanting to discredit him via Sonia and thus prove to his ex-fiance that he was right all along about her scummy brother. Sensation. Yelling at Luzhin. The drunk clerk throws a glass at Luzhin, but before things can get too riotous, the landlady throws them all out. Permanently. Katerina wails and clutches at her shawl, which seems pretty apropos for getting kicked out of your house on the day of your husband's funeral. The children huddle and tremble. "Now it's time for me to go," thinks Raskolnikov. Ha lump. Sonia has slipped out some time earlier in the riot, so Raskolnikov heads to her house.
Raskolnikov Like-O-Meter: 4. Raskolnikov sat alone in a boggy marsh, totally motionless except for his heart.
Andrey Like-O-Meter: 73. Loved him as a dumb idealist with bad ideas, loved him even more as hero of Sonia's honor. Even if Raskolnikov got the credit.
5.1
That same morning, as Raskolnikov is visiting the police station, Luzhin is getting angry because his German landlord won't return the deposit on his new marital apartment. He wishes he hadn't been "such a Jew" with Dunia, because it was "false economy": it would have been harder for her to break the engagement if she had to return a lot of baubles and things. Luzhin curses Raskolnikov for causing the rupture. He's really good at missing the point, isn't he?
Luzhin returns to the apartment where he's staying. It seems to be in the same building as Katerina Ivanovna's family. He passes the ladies preparing for Marmeladov's memorial luncheon on his way home. He got an invite on account of being a (relatively) bigshot lodger, but he didn't dream of going at the time. Luzhin thinks about how Raskolnikov is also invited to the memorial luncheon. Eeeenteresting.
Luzhin's roommate is this uppity socialist youth whom I will call Andrey because his last name, Lebeziatnikov, takes too long to type (and because he FEELS like an Andrey). I guess Luzhin scored an invite because he supported Andrey in his school days, and he thought it would be a good idea to take him up on it because he had heard that the kid was making a name for himself as a leading thinker; but now that Luzhin is there, he is filled with comically intense, silent rage at Andrey's constant talk about how we should all live on communes.
Andrey Semyonovitch was an anaemic, scrofulous little man, with strangely flaxen mutton-chop whiskers of which he was very proud. He was a clerk and had almost always something wrong with his eyes. He was rather soft-hearted, but self-confident and sometimes extremely conceited in speech which had an absurd effect, incongruous with his little figure. He was one of the lodgers most respected by Amalia Ivanovna, for he did not get drunk and paid regularly for his lodgings. Andrey Semyonovitch really was rather stupid; he attached himself to the cause of progress and "our younger generation" from enthusiasm. He was one of the numerous and varied legion of dullards, of half-animate abortions, conceited, half-educated coxcombs, who attach themselves to the idea most in fashion only to vulgarise it and who caricature every cause they serve, however sincerely.Also he is great.
Luzhin picks a fight with Andrey, accusing him of hitting Katerina Ivanovna, and then mocking him for being offended--doesn't he believe men and women are equal, and therefore might equally be punched? Andrey agrees that in the future society, sure, both men and women will be able to be punched, but also, in the future society, there will be no fighting, so, um, right. Wait. Query, were comically left-wing hippies stoners back then, too, or is he just dumb? He tells Luzhin he doesn't plan on going to the memorial dinner except possibly to laugh at it. Oh, he's not a hippie, he's a hipster.
Luzhin asks if it's true what they say about Sonia. Andrey goes off on a rant about free love and declares that Sonia has a beautiful character. Luzhin giggles that he's sure Andrey loves her "beautiful" "character." Andrey insists that all of his interactions with Sonia are pure.
"We had a debate lately on the question: Has a member of the community the right to enter another member's room, whether man or woman at any time... and we decided that he has!"Yeah, I'm pretty sure that debate was Andrey v. Andrey. With Sonia looking on with a fixed encouraging smile.
Luzhin asks Andrey, if he's such good friends with Sonia, to ask her in for a moment, as he has something he wants to discuss with her. Andrey complies and is about to leave them alone, but Luzhin asks him to remain present. Andrey says this is unnecessary as he totally believes Luzhin's intentions are honorable, but Luzhin insists for appearance's sake. Andrey sees his point. I wouldn't be so sure, Andrey; I don't know what Luzhin's intentions are, but they won't be good.
While Sonia sits in confusion and mild alarm, Luzhin brings the subject to Katerina Ivanovna's poverty in a really annoying way (does he know any other?), by basically informing Sonia that her stepmother's problems are her own fault and that it's so unwise of her to be giving this dinner she can't afford. Dude, her husband died. Which is basically what Sonia says. Luzhin finally gets to the point and offers Sonia ten rubles. Sonia refuses at first, but is eventually persuaded to take the money to help with Katerina's expenses.
After Sonia leaves, Andrey gazes at Luzhin with embarrassing admiration. He goes on at length about how fine and wonderful it was. Luzhin tries to brush it off as nothing. Andrey tries to rope Luzhin into his plan for the Future Society, to which Luzhin refuses. When Andrey asks why, he's sufficiently sick of humoring him that he snaps, "Because I don't want in your free marriage to be made a fool of and to bring up another man's children." A fair point, which only launches Andrey into a tangent about the raising of children in the future society. Luzhin tunes out and starts rubbing his hands together and twirling his moustache and Mwa-ha-ha-ing to himself so obviously that even Andrey notices.
5.2
Okay, this chapter seems like mostly filler. Katerina Ivanovna is going all out on the banquet, fueled by equal parts shame in her own poverty and brain-addledness. Description of the preparations as assisted by a dumb Pole. Oh, great, more racism. Various lodgers and clerks and things come to the dinner. Katerina gives Raskolnikov pride of place by her side because he's polite to her, and because he's such a respectable future professor (IF ONLY SHE KNEW etc etc). She stage-whisper kvetches to him all evening. She is upset that:
- Germans are so stupid, natch.
"And have you noticed, Rodion Romanovitch, that all these Petersburg foreigners, the Germans especially, are all stupider than we! Can you fancy any one of us telling how 'Karl from the chemist's pierced his heart from fear' and that the idiot instead of punishing the cabman, 'clasped his hands and wept, and much begged.' Ah, the fool! And you know she fancies it's very touching and does not suspect how stupid she is!"
I don't understand this xenophobia! No, I mean, I really don't understand it. Karl from the chemist's did what now? - A clerk co-worker of Marmeladov's drunkenly disrespects Marmeladov, which, you know, is a legitimate reason for Katerina to be upset. Hey, dude: time and place to make fun of a guy: not at his funeral, to his wife! Katerina argues with him snappily. "Raskolnikov sat in silence, listening with disgust." Raskolnikov is a big lump.
- A lot of respectable people have failed to respond to the invite, and Katerina feels snubbed. Sonia defends Luzhin, reporting that he very nicely made his excuses to her and promised to come by soon.
The evening devolves from there. Katerina begins casting aspersions on the parentage of her landlady. Now, that is just uncalled for. Just as the landlady is beginning to bring up the dreaded "yellow ticket," the door opens, and Luzhin arrives.
5.3
Katerina asks Luzhin to help her defend Sonia against the landlady's accusations, but Luzhin isn't interested: he's come to speak of his "own affairs." Luzhin, commanding the attention of the room, asks Sonia to explain why a hundred-ruble note is missing from his desk. Urg. Of course. He explains that he innocently counting his money (which is how he knows so precisely how much there was) when, "at that moment you entered (at my invitation)- and all the time you were present you were exceedingly embarrassed; so that three times you jumped up in the middle of the conversation and tried to make off. Mr. Lebeziatnikov can bear witness to this." When she left, he says, he discovered he was 100 rubles short.
Sonia, of course, is shocked and frightened by the accusation, and insists she only has the ten rubles which he gave her. She tries to give even that back. Luzhin gets into his role as the wronged party, and yells at Sonia for her "black ingratitude." Katerina rushes to defend Sonia, saying she would never steal, and turns out Sonia's pockets to prove it. The hundred-ruble note is there. Sensation. Sonia wails that she didn't take the money, she doesn't know how it got there. The landlady yells that Sonia and Katerina should both be sent to Siberia. Katerina gets mad at everyone.
"Merciful heavens! Defend her, why are you all standing still? Rodion Romanovitch, why don't you stand up for her? Do you believe it, too? You are not worth her little finger, all of you together! Good God! Defend her now, at least!"Nobody is worth Sonia's fingers. Sonia's fingers are great. Also, Katerina, give Raskolnikov a break. What do you expect a lump to do?
Luzhin speechifies that Katerina obviously had no part in the matter, or she wouldn't have gone for the pockets; it's all Sonia; and, in spite of the "personal insult lavished upon" him, he is willing to be the big hero man and not press charges in light of the poverty and horribleness which drove the weak awful whore to such a terrible act. So, all this was just to discredit Raskolnikov's taste in friends?
Pyotr Petrovitch stole a glance at Raskolnikov. Their eyes met, and the fire in Raskolnikov's seemed ready to reduce him to ashes.Thanks, Rodya, nice work. Nice LOOKING. LOOKING WHEN YOU ARE LOOKED AT. What a lump.
Suddenly:
"How vile!" a loud voice cried suddenly in the doorway. Pyotr Petrovitch looked round quickly.YESS!!!! Hippie roommate to the rescue! So much was made of how dumb and gullible he is that I was sure he was going to be useless and this was just going to be a bad situation. Luzhin accuses Andrey of being drunk, and Andrey says he never drinks, "it's against my convictions." Ha ha of course. Andrey explains to the crowd that he saw Luzhin put the hundred rubles into Sonia's pocket, but at the time, he thought it was an anonymous donation designed to secretly help her. That's why he was so in awe at the time. Now he's disi-"Luzhin"-ed!!!! (Sorry.)
"What vileness!" Lebeziatnikov repeated, staring him straight in the face.
Pyotr Petrovitch gave a positive start- all noticed it and recalled it afterwards. Lebeziatnikov strode into the room.
"And you dared to call me as witness?" he said, going up to Pyotr Petrovitch.
"What do you mean? What are you talking about?" muttered Luzhin.
"I mean that you... are a slanderer, that's what my words mean!" Lebeziatnikov said hotly, looking sternly at him with his shortsighted eyes.
The one thing Andrey doesn't understand is why he did it. It's pretty convoluted, Andrey, so I don't blame you.
"I can explain why he risked such an action, and if necessary, I, too, will swear to it," Raskolnikov said at last in a firm voice, and he stepped forward.FINA FRIGGIN LY. What was Raskolnikov going to do if Andrey had taken just a little longer taking the "General Treatise on the Positive Method" to Madam Kobilatnikov? Just let Sonia be disgraced? Sure, he doesn't have the information Andrey has, but he could have at least said SOMETHING. But I guess he's not exactly the person to expect to jump in with the "Oh no that person would NEVER commit a CRIME!" defense.
Anyway, Raskolnikov explains Luzhin's reasons for wanting to discredit him via Sonia and thus prove to his ex-fiance that he was right all along about her scummy brother. Sensation. Yelling at Luzhin. The drunk clerk throws a glass at Luzhin, but before things can get too riotous, the landlady throws them all out. Permanently. Katerina wails and clutches at her shawl, which seems pretty apropos for getting kicked out of your house on the day of your husband's funeral. The children huddle and tremble. "Now it's time for me to go," thinks Raskolnikov. Ha lump. Sonia has slipped out some time earlier in the riot, so Raskolnikov heads to her house.
Raskolnikov Like-O-Meter: 4. Raskolnikov sat alone in a boggy marsh, totally motionless except for his heart.
Andrey Like-O-Meter: 73. Loved him as a dumb idealist with bad ideas, loved him even more as hero of Sonia's honor. Even if Raskolnikov got the credit.