Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment can be read as an ideological novel because it typically represents the social, economic, and political concerns of a culture. Dostoevsky puts an interesting twist on this genre by examining society through the eyes of a criminal and, instead of delving into the ways in which society and culture work, exploring the ways in which they fail. It also refutes many culturally dominant ideologies, including utilitarianism and nihilism, and in doing so, initiates the emergence of a pre-existential novel, in which the antihero Raskolnikov must suffer the consequences of his choice. Raskolnikov is an existential character, above all because, in the chain of choices that make up his life, he has to face only one important decision. In the end, the choice he makes is wrong despite the logic behind it, and the resulting stress and tension causes him great pain. Furthermore, in an attempt to satisfy his worldly desires, he tries to follow the principles of utilitarianism and predetermination, struggling to use them as justifications for his actions, and goes against his own existence by attempting to embrace nihilistic attitudes. Despite his efforts, it is evident through a series of dreams that all these concepts fail him: utilitarianism collapses, he loses faith in predetermination, and nihilism becomes impossible. Ultimately, he finds himself unable to escape the consequences of his actions. In this way, Crime and Punishment becomes one of the first great existential and psychological novels. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay An interesting feature of Crime and Punishment as an ideological novel is that conventional social logic and morality are reversed for Raskolnikov as he is able to justify and commit his crime while at the same time judging and condemning the evils of others personages. Furthermore, the evils he perceives – excluding those of Svidrigalov – are not traditionally considered immoral evils. For example, the sacrifice of Sonya and Dunya would usually be considered a noble characteristic. However, interestingly enough, in terms of Raskolnikov's existential outlook, self-sacrifice becomes the greatest crime of all. Elements of the psychological novel come into play as Dostoevsky traces Raskolnikov's thought process through the conception, perpetration, and repercussions of his crime. Specifically, Raskolnikov's dreams function to reflect his different psychological states in relation to the murder; he fails in his attempts to use popular philosophical, social, and political ideologies to rationalize his crime, and in the end, only his psychological suffering remains. There are a total of three dreams, each involving the violent beating of a person or animal while a crowd watches. In the first dream, a humble drunken farmer beats a horse. The crowd has mixed reactions to the beating; some disapprove, others just watch, and still others participate in the beating; Raskolnikov, although he was only a child in the dream, actively tries to stop the beating. In the second dream the deputy director beats Raskolnikov's landlady. The crowd watches and is uniformly shocked, but no one attempts to intervene, including Raskolnikov. In his third dream, Raskolnikov beats the old woman he killed while bystanders watch and laugh. All three dreams are preceded by the thought or presence of Razumikhin, who can be said to represent honesty, innocence, and morality in the novel. It can be thought that this coincidence comes from the fact that Razumikhin has become the symbol of consciousnessof Raskolnikov protesting his attempts to justify his crime; so Raskolnikov is increasingly annoyed by Razumikhin. Razumikhin's unshakable faith in Raskolnikov's inherent goodness is repugnant to Raskolnikov, especially after committing his crime. Before his first dream, Raskolnikov considers going to Razumikhin, who is described as "remarkable for never taking any of his failures to heart and for never being unduly dejected by any circumstance, however narrow" (70). Raskolnikov initially rejects the idea of ​​going to see him: "The question of why he would now see Razumikhin worried him more than he thought; he anxiously tried to find some disturbing meaning in this, it would seem, a completely normal act" (71). He then decides to postpone his trip to Razumikhin until after he has committed the murder. At the thought of murder he is horrified and decides not to do it. Then Raskolnikov's first dream occurs, after walking around contemplating both murder and the possibility of going to Razumikhin for financial assistance. In the dream, Raskolnikov (as a boy) sees a furious peasant in a crowd whipping an old mare and beating her with an ax until she dies. Young Raskolnikov is horrified, all the more so because the farmer insists that the mare is his "property" and he can do with it what he wants (76). Raskolnikov's reaction to the beating of the mare strongly contradicts his intention to commit murder. After waking up, his horror is reaffirmed at the thought of murder. He says to himself, "Good God!...is it possible that I really take an ax and hit her on the head...is it possible?" (78). In this way, the dream symbolizes Raskolnikov's divided psyche. The stress for Raskolnikov in this situation becomes the conflict between his rather weak moral sense and his idea that, as Porfiry says, "certain people... have the perfect right to commit all sorts of enormities and crimes and that they are, for so to speak, above the law" (275). Porfiry further elaborates Raskolnikov's ideas between the ordinary and the extraordinary. Raskolnikov defends his ideas with utilitarianism: "...the extraordinary man has the right, not a officially sanctioned right, of course, to allow his conscience to overcome certain obstacles, but only if it is absolutely necessary for the realization of his idea on which the well-being of all humanity may very likely depend" (276). However, the attempt of Raskolnikov to use the ideology of utilitarianism to justify the murder is undermined by his horror at the beating of the horse in his dream Although he tries to justify the murder of the old woman using the above-mentioned principles, he cannot escape his horror at the thought of actually having to carry out the actions to commit the crime. His first dream exemplifies this aspect of his psyche, the aspect dominated by Razumikhin's character and his conscience. This conflicts with the dream because the farmer who beats the horse is not an "extraordinary" man and killing a horse serves no greater good. However, the crowd in this dream does not entirely disapprove of the beating of the horse; some even participate. This seems to imply that a portion of society supports crime, even though it is senseless and essentially evil, adding a further layer of confusion. Raskolnikov, in the dream, is horrified that people allow the beating to continue, thus undermining the reasoning for his own murder. When he wakes up he is absolutely convinced that it is impossible for him to commit the crime. After the dream, however, Raskolnikov has an experience that bizarrely combines religiosity and utilitarianism in the justification of the crime. On the way home agoinexplicably a detour and in a "sort of predestined twist of her fate" she learns that Lisaveta Ivanovna will be away from home during the expected period of her sister's murder (79-80). Upon learning this, Raskolnikov "suddenly felt with all his being that he no longer possessed any freedom of reasoning and will, and that everything was suddenly and irrevocably settled" (81). Thus, Raskolnikov, forgetting his dream and Razumikhin, rationalizes the murder by attempting to ignore his free will and instead rely on predetermination. Raskolnikov's second dream occurs after the murder. He returns home after burying the stolen items and visiting Razumikhin. It is important to note that during the visit to Razumikhin, Raskolnikov is overcome with anger, "it had not occurred to Raskolnikov that he should meet him face to face"; he cannot bear to meet Razumikhin face to face because he represents his conscience (130). On his way home, he is beaten in the street by "a carriage driver... [who] struck him very painfully on the back with his whip" (131), just like the mare in his first dream. When he finally arrives home, he "undresses and, trembling like a breathless horse, [lies] down on the sofa...and immediately [falls] into a heavy sleep" (133). Coincidentally, the animal images surrounding the second dream connect it to the first. Then he dreams that his landlady is brutally beaten on the stairs. Like his previous reaction, he is horrified and "could not imagine such brutality, such frenzy" (133). The crowd, representing the company, looks on in shock, but not a single person attempts to intervene. They are too weak to intervene; they simply see the deputy superintendent as a monster, which is what Raskolnikov perhaps fears he has become. After Raskolnikov makes the choice and commits the murder, he must face the negative consequences of his actions. From a utilitarian perspective, the choice made by Raskolnikov may have served the common good; however, the psychological repercussions – the negative consequences and the state of suffering – that the murder brings to Raskolnikov, strongly overshadow any “good” that may have derived from his crime. This is exemplified by his dream, which terrifies him, yet concerns a crime not entirely dissimilar to his own. He cannot see a reason, let alone a greater good, for the beating of his landlady. Raskolnikov's third dream occurs when he returns home after frantically leaving Razumikhin and meeting the craftsman on the street. Raskolnikov's shattered psyche is rampant in this scene. He's afraid of giving himself away, yet he's frustrated that Razumikhin hasn't noticed his guilt, "Razumikhin is here, and yet he doesn't seem to have noticed anything. That innocent fool never notices anything!" (271). Raskolnikov, or at least part of Raskolnikov, wants his conscience to prevail, wants Razumikhin to understand him, and wants to be held accountable for his crime. In the midst of Raskolnikov's contradictory thoughts, behaviors, and anxiety about his crime, there is an ideological debate between Porfiry and Razumikhin. Razumikhin argues: ...Socialists reduce everything to one common cause: the environment. The environment is the root of all evil... Human nature should not exist... That's why they hate the life process so much!... Human nature wants life... Man cannot be bypassed nature only by logic! Logic can only predict three possibilities, but there are a million of them! Ignore the million and reduce everything to a question of convenience? What a simple solution to the problem! So tantalizingly clear and without needing to think at all. (273)Razumikhin advocates the process of life, the embrace of human nature and the human condition, and the, 1976.