Crime and Punishment

About the book

Rodion Raskolnikov has left the university, owes his landlady, and lies for days in a coffin-sized garret thinking about an idea: that some people have the right to step over the law. He kills an old pawnbroker and her sister, and the rest of the novel follows what the crime does to him, through fever, a drunken clerk’s confession, a mother’s letter, Sonya’s faith, and an examining magistrate who seems to know everything and waits.

This complete English translation is made directly from Dostoevsky’s Russian, not from earlier English versions. It keeps his hurried, feverish style, his ellipses and repetitions, each character’s voice, and the Russian names, money, and ranks, with 47 short notes.