4 ms·

Dostoyevsky was truly great and could see the true and important things about the world, while Nabokov's contribution to literature will not be remembered past

Dostoyevsky was truly great and could see the true and important things about the world, while Nabokov's contribution to literature will not be remembered past this century. One foresaw what the death of absolute good would do to the world—the casual mass murders of millions in places such as Germany, Cambodia, Stalinist Russia. The other is famous for Lolita. “Don’t be afraid of anything, ever. And do not grieve. As long as your repentance does not weaken, God will forgive everything. There is not—there cannot be—a sin on earth that God will not forgive the truly repentant. Why, a man cannot commit a sin so great as to exhaust the infinite love of God. How could there be a sin that would surpass the love of God? Think only of repentance, all the time, and drive away all fear. Have faith that God loves you more than you can ever imagine. He loves you, sinful as you are and, indeed, because of your sin. It was said long ago that there is more joy in heaven over one repentant sinner than over ten righteous men. Go now, and fear nothing. Do not be offended if people treat you badly. Do not hold it against them. And forgive your departed husband all the harm he did you. Become truly reconciled with him. For if you repent, you love, and if you love, you are with God. Love redeems and saves everything. If I, a sinner like yourself, am moved and feel compassion for you, how infinitely much more will God! Love is such an infinite treasure it can buy the whole world and can redeem not only your sins, but the sins of all people. So go and fear no more.” Dostoevsky, Fyodor. The Brothers Karamazov (pp. 64-65). Random House Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

bowsamic 2y ago
If you think the point of your work is what you end up being famous for, then you have no moral ground to stand on
- alangou 2y ago
  How should one decide what to read?
- nkmskdmfodf 2y ago
  Huh? If you're going to write a book, for other people to read, you ultimately want people to understand and recognize your ideas/the point of your work. It has nothing to do with morality.
  - bowsamic 2y ago
    I'm talking of the poster, judging the Lolita author for being famous for Lolita. Thinking that judgement is through fame is a morally depraved, evil outlook
    - alangou 2y ago
      How should one judge a writer if not by the body of their work?
      - bowsamic 2y ago
        You didn't judge the writer by their body of work. You judged the author by which works are famous.
      - michaelt 2y ago
        If I write a cautionary tale about the seductive evils of fascism, with an unreliable narrator who's a cog in the evil machine, and obviously deluded about it, and deeply unpleasant detailed descriptions of the awful cruelty perpetuated by the nazi regime, and some fascists really like my book, because detailed descriptions of awful nazi cruelty are their jam, and they really identify with my evil, unreliable, deluded narrator and a lot of people haven't read my book, but they know the kind of person who like my book - fascists should I be judged by the popular reception of my work?
        Yossarrian22 2y ago
        Yes if your work encourages there to be more fascists
        watwut 2y ago
        With this chain of events, at minimum you should be judged as someone who failed and accidentally created a fascist book. But also, it is a bit suspect chain of events. Because it is quite unlikely that your books describe Jews in much sympathetic human way. Fascists would not like that. You wrote a book about suffering fascist and per your book ideology, fascism is bad when the fascists themselves suffer. That is just critique of concrete fascist regime from the point of view of the fascist.
jibbers 2y ago
Wow. Your quote was the first time I’ve read any Dostoyevsky and it had tears welling in my eyes. I will absolutely find more to read. Thank you.
giraffe_lady 2y ago
It's a good quote for orthodox christians, I'm not sure it would make anyone else want to read dostoevsky though. I'm a dostoevsky liker and orthodox christian myself so this isn't an issue for me but in this venue I feel like you could have made a better choice for representing him.
- alangou 2y ago
  What would you have chosen to represent him? I think it's important you choose what affects you most. I was deeply moved reading this when I was atheist, so who am I to say what will and will not move others?
  - giraffe_lady 2y ago
    I'm not sure, I think the strength of his writing isn't well captured in quotes. But it seems like this one resonates with more people than I expected so I concede I was wrong about this.
- boothby 2y ago
  It's interesting what people take from this passage. I was primed by alangau's statement that Dostoevsky predicted the death of absolute good, and the mass slaughter of millions, when I read > There is not—there cannot be—a sin on earth that God will not forgive the truly repentant. To me, this sends a horrifying message. A self-righteous individual can kill millions, wake up to the terrible reality of their act, repent, and be bathed in the joy of a loving god's forgiveness. They need suffer only a moment's guilt, before proceeding fearlessly back into the world. And yet, according to alangau's sibling comment, the passage was deeply moving to him. Perhaps my horrified response is a deep motion of sorts, but that isn't a typical usage of the phrase "deeply moved."
  - giraffe_lady 2y ago
    That is an interesting view of it. I mentioned this elsewhere but I happen to share a religion with dostoevsky so this idea is familiar to me and no longer jarring. It does violate a certain idea of fairness or consequence that most people subscribe to, and that contradiction is all over the gospels so it really is one of the original ideas of christianity. And ultimately this view of repentance is kind of unhelpful in a practical way when dealing with incredibly damaging behavior. We can't really judge the sincerity of someone's repentance, ultimately it is between them and god. We can restrain them from being in a situation where they could commit that act again though, just in case. Something I think about often is an event that occurred in my home town when I was a young adult. A child, 12 or 13, old enough to know better, was playing with the stove and set the house on fire. One of their siblings died in the fire. How do you react to that as a parent? You love the child, have to go on raising them. No punishment even makes sense, the idea of taking away the nintendo or whatever is simply grotesque, and what could be accomplished by anything proportional to the consequence? The only thing left is forgiveness. I think this is how it is with god and your hypothetical monster.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
neffy 2y ago
There was no shortage of casual mass murder before the 20th century, not infrequently perpetrated by religious orders. The Mongol invasions in the 13th century, An Lushan rebellion in China in 750, Albigensian Crusade in the 12th century... it´s a long list I´m afraid - we are not a tame species.
drdaeman 2y ago
The quote is truly the quintessence of Dostoevsky's works. A classic orthodox christian hodgepodge base, served with heaviest spicing of obligatory suffering of all kinds - both physical and mental, all perversely portrayed as a virtue. It's kinda like alcohol, and if we go with this comparison - Dostoevsky promotes drowning in it as a salvation. Put bluntly, that shit ruins lives, not mends them. But Dostoevsky does not just write about it, he carefully designs the whole narrative to make it look like the only logical choice and wholeheartedly promotes it. And that's why I just can't stand his works, despite all their psychological, artistic and linguistic/literary merits. This insane cultural gap is simply too big to cross for me. It all makes sense in historical and cultural context, of course, but that's exactly what puts an expiration date on Dostoevsky's works. They're a product or a very specific culture, and thus will no longer be relevant when their parent culture will finally wither away (and, personally, I sincerely hope it naturally does, for I see it as way more harmful than positive). There are literature works that would remain relevant for a long while, but Dostoevsky is not one of those. Just my own personal opinion.
- matrix87 2y ago
  suffering can reflect virtue if it's a reaction to guilt, it just shows that people have capacity for moral self reflection
- NateEag 2y ago
  In my experience, people often conflate forgiveness, reconciliation, and redemption. They are distinct things. People also often do not understand the role repentance plays (evangelical Christians are _especially_ prone to miss it entirely). We can forgive someone for horrific things they've done, even when they are utterly unrepentant. Forgiving them is changing our attitude about the harms the offender did from anger and hatred to acceptance and peace. This does not mean saying "what they did was okay," but rather accepting that they chose to do something horrible, learning to make peace with their hurtful choices, and focusing on healing the damage to ourselves and others rather than seeking to injure the injurer. Reconciliation is mending a damaged relationship between two (or more) people, as much as it can be. Unlike forgiveness, true reconciliation requires that all parties make an effort - the injured party must put in the work of forgiving the offender, and the offender must do the work of repenting. "Repent" now means "make a show of acting sorry" in evangelical Christian circles, but genuine repentance is very different. It is recognizing the harmful choices you have made and truly regretting them, and as a natural outgrowth of that regret, choosing to do what you can to heal the damage you have done. It means accepting the consequences of your choices; a repentant offender expects to be distrusted and treated differently for their crimes, and does not resent it, realizing the shattered relationships (emotional, familial, civil, and otherwise) are part of what they chose. Without repentance, others may forgive an offender, but reconciliation is not possible - if the injured continue a relationship with the aggressor, it is necessarily a stilted, broken, fragmented one. Redemption is rarer and harder to achieve than either forgiveness or reconciliation. It is when reconciliation succeeds and goes beyond success, giving birth to something fuller and more beautiful than what was first broken. Adapting the words of my lost-yet-beloved faith, "He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain. Behold, He is making all things new." This is not, in my experience, how conservative Protestant evangelicals use these words. However, in the decades I practiced Christianity, I slowly found these ideas in the Bible, despite the ludicrously-wrong exegesis practiced in US churches, by reading the texts many, many times. I find a great deal of truth and wisdom in them, considered this way. I hope perhaps my explanation can help you understand why so many people resonate with the message recorded in the Gospels, and the one that Dostoevsky so loved.

bowsamic 2y ago

If you think the point of your work is what you end up being famous for, then you have no moral ground to stand on

alangou 2y ago
How should one decide what to read?
nkmskdmfodf 2y ago
Huh? If you're going to write a book, for other people to read, you ultimately want people to understand and recognize your ideas/the point of your work. It has nothing to do with morality.
- bowsamic 2y ago
  I'm talking of the poster, judging the Lolita author for being famous for Lolita. Thinking that judgement is through fame is a morally depraved, evil outlook
  - alangou 2y ago
    How should one judge a writer if not by the body of their work?
    - bowsamic 2y ago
      You didn't judge the writer by their body of work. You judged the author by which works are famous.
    - michaelt 2y ago
      If I write a cautionary tale about the seductive evils of fascism, with an unreliable narrator who's a cog in the evil machine, and obviously deluded about it, and deeply unpleasant detailed descriptions of the awful cruelty perpetuated by the nazi regime, and some fascists really like my book, because detailed descriptions of awful nazi cruelty are their jam, and they really identify with my evil, unreliable, deluded narrator and a lot of people haven't read my book, but they know the kind of person who like my book - fascists should I be judged by the popular reception of my work?
      - Yossarrian22 2y ago
        Yes if your work encourages there to be more fascists
      - watwut 2y ago
        With this chain of events, at minimum you should be judged as someone who failed and accidentally created a fascist book. But also, it is a bit suspect chain of events. Because it is quite unlikely that your books describe Jews in much sympathetic human way. Fascists would not like that. You wrote a book about suffering fascist and per your book ideology, fascism is bad when the fascists themselves suffer. That is just critique of concrete fascist regime from the point of view of the fascist.

jibbers 2y ago

Wow. Your quote was the first time I’ve read any Dostoyevsky and it had tears welling in my eyes. I will absolutely find more to read. Thank you.

giraffe_lady 2y ago

It's a good quote for orthodox christians, I'm not sure it would make anyone else want to read dostoevsky though. I'm a dostoevsky liker and orthodox christian myself so this isn't an issue for me but in this venue I feel like you could have made a better choice for representing him.

alangou 2y ago
What would you have chosen to represent him? I think it's important you choose what affects you most. I was deeply moved reading this when I was atheist, so who am I to say what will and will not move others?
- giraffe_lady 2y ago
  I'm not sure, I think the strength of his writing isn't well captured in quotes. But it seems like this one resonates with more people than I expected so I concede I was wrong about this.
boothby 2y ago
It's interesting what people take from this passage. I was primed by alangau's statement that Dostoevsky predicted the death of absolute good, and the mass slaughter of millions, when I read > There is not—there cannot be—a sin on earth that God will not forgive the truly repentant. To me, this sends a horrifying message. A self-righteous individual can kill millions, wake up to the terrible reality of their act, repent, and be bathed in the joy of a loving god's forgiveness. They need suffer only a moment's guilt, before proceeding fearlessly back into the world. And yet, according to alangau's sibling comment, the passage was deeply moving to him. Perhaps my horrified response is a deep motion of sorts, but that isn't a typical usage of the phrase "deeply moved."
- giraffe_lady 2y ago
  That is an interesting view of it. I mentioned this elsewhere but I happen to share a religion with dostoevsky so this idea is familiar to me and no longer jarring. It does violate a certain idea of fairness or consequence that most people subscribe to, and that contradiction is all over the gospels so it really is one of the original ideas of christianity. And ultimately this view of repentance is kind of unhelpful in a practical way when dealing with incredibly damaging behavior. We can't really judge the sincerity of someone's repentance, ultimately it is between them and god. We can restrain them from being in a situation where they could commit that act again though, just in case. Something I think about often is an event that occurred in my home town when I was a young adult. A child, 12 or 13, old enough to know better, was playing with the stove and set the house on fire. One of their siblings died in the fire. How do you react to that as a parent? You love the child, have to go on raising them. No punishment even makes sense, the idea of taking away the nintendo or whatever is simply grotesque, and what could be accomplished by anything proportional to the consequence? The only thing left is forgiveness. I think this is how it is with god and your hypothetical monster.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

neffy 2y ago

There was no shortage of casual mass murder before the 20th century, not infrequently perpetrated by religious orders. The Mongol invasions in the 13th century, An Lushan rebellion in China in 750, Albigensian Crusade in the 12th century... it´s a long list I´m afraid - we are not a tame species.

drdaeman 2y ago

The quote is truly the quintessence of Dostoevsky's works. A classic orthodox christian hodgepodge base, served with heaviest spicing of obligatory suffering of all kinds - both physical and mental, all perversely portrayed as a virtue. It's kinda like alcohol, and if we go with this comparison - Dostoevsky promotes drowning in it as a salvation. Put bluntly, that shit ruins lives, not mends them. But Dostoevsky does not just write about it, he carefully designs the whole narrative to make it look like the only logical choice and wholeheartedly promotes it. And that's why I just can't stand his works, despite all their psychological, artistic and linguistic/literary merits. This insane cultural gap is simply too big to cross for me. It all makes sense in historical and cultural context, of course, but that's exactly what puts an expiration date on Dostoevsky's works. They're a product or a very specific culture, and thus will no longer be relevant when their parent culture will finally wither away (and, personally, I sincerely hope it naturally does, for I see it as way more harmful than positive). There are literature works that would remain relevant for a long while, but Dostoevsky is not one of those. Just my own personal opinion.

matrix87 2y ago
suffering can reflect virtue if it's a reaction to guilt, it just shows that people have capacity for moral self reflection
NateEag 2y ago
In my experience, people often conflate forgiveness, reconciliation, and redemption. They are distinct things. People also often do not understand the role repentance plays (evangelical Christians are _especially_ prone to miss it entirely). We can forgive someone for horrific things they've done, even when they are utterly unrepentant. Forgiving them is changing our attitude about the harms the offender did from anger and hatred to acceptance and peace. This does not mean saying "what they did was okay," but rather accepting that they chose to do something horrible, learning to make peace with their hurtful choices, and focusing on healing the damage to ourselves and others rather than seeking to injure the injurer. Reconciliation is mending a damaged relationship between two (or more) people, as much as it can be. Unlike forgiveness, true reconciliation requires that all parties make an effort - the injured party must put in the work of forgiving the offender, and the offender must do the work of repenting. "Repent" now means "make a show of acting sorry" in evangelical Christian circles, but genuine repentance is very different. It is recognizing the harmful choices you have made and truly regretting them, and as a natural outgrowth of that regret, choosing to do what you can to heal the damage you have done. It means accepting the consequences of your choices; a repentant offender expects to be distrusted and treated differently for their crimes, and does not resent it, realizing the shattered relationships (emotional, familial, civil, and otherwise) are part of what they chose. Without repentance, others may forgive an offender, but reconciliation is not possible - if the injured continue a relationship with the aggressor, it is necessarily a stilted, broken, fragmented one. Redemption is rarer and harder to achieve than either forgiveness or reconciliation. It is when reconciliation succeeds and goes beyond success, giving birth to something fuller and more beautiful than what was first broken. Adapting the words of my lost-yet-beloved faith, "He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain. Behold, He is making all things new." This is not, in my experience, how conservative Protestant evangelicals use these words. However, in the decades I practiced Christianity, I slowly found these ideas in the Bible, despite the ludicrously-wrong exegesis practiced in US churches, by reading the texts many, many times. I find a great deal of truth and wisdom in them, considered this way. I hope perhaps my explanation can help you understand why so many people resonate with the message recorded in the Gospels, and the one that Dostoevsky so loved.