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Crime and Punishment

by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Crime and Punishment is a novel by the Russian author Fyodor Dostoyevsky. It was first published in the literary journal The Russian Messenger in twelve monthly installments during 1866. It is the second of Dostoyevsky's full-length novels following his return from 5 years of exile in Siberia and is considered the first great novel of his "mature" period of writing. The novel is often cited as one of the supreme achievements in literature.

Read more about Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Crime and Punishment
Sonia looked uneasily at him. There was something peculiar in this
hesitating question, which seemed approaching something in a roundabout
way.

“I felt that you were going to ask some question like that,” she said,
looking inquisitively at him.

“I dare say you did. But how is it to be answered?”

“Why do you ask about what could not happen?” said Sonia reluctantly.

“Then it would be better for Luzhin to go on living and doing wicked
things? You havent dared to decide even that!”

“But I cant know the Divine Providence.... And why do you ask what
cant be answered? Whats the use of such foolish questions? How could
it happen that it should depend on my decision--who has made me a judge
to decide who is to live and who is not to live?”

“Oh, if the Divine Providence is to be mixed up in it, there is no doing
anything,” Raskolnikov grumbled morosely.

“Youd better say straight out what you want!” Sonia cried in distress.
“You are leading up to something again.... Can you have come simply to
torture me?”

She could not control herself and began crying bitterly. He looked at
her in gloomy misery. Five minutes passed.
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"Imitate then innovate", an article by David Perell