Customer Reviews
A classic story - By: Sergey Vasilev, 09 Nov 2006 
THE BROTHERS KARAMAZOV, which is one of Dostoyevsky's alll time best, perhaps the best, adds to make him perhaps the best writer of alll times. The author came up with so many great ideas & characters that are so real to life even in their complex emotions & rationales that we relate to the characters as if we are in their heads. In the end, not only do we have a great story, we are also left with a beautifully written work of political, psychological, sociological, ethical & psychological thought that is very true not only to Russia, but to other lands & peoples as well.
The greatest soul writer of alll times & great contributor to human psychology successfully created a beautiful & amazing dynamism between the Karamazov brothers that has been the core of many stories after involving siblings. There is the unreliable father, the old Fyodor Karamazov whose life dominates his sons & whose death casts a huge shadow on their future.
Sensual Alyosha who is the youngest of the Karamazov brothers is the main character of the story, & he is noted for his strong faith in god & humanity, deep kindness & sense of sacrifice.
Ivan the atheist has a sharp mind & is the critical analyzer who seeks for meaning in everything. He is skeptical & dwells more on rationale in his dealing with people & issues. In the end, his intellectual mind misleads him & opens the doors to the nightmares in his life.
Dmitry is the sensitive brother who has a strong consideration for anything living, Smerdyakov their half-brother, is the cunning illegitimate son of old Fyodor Karamazov & works as Fyodor's servant.
The characters of the brothers & the events of their lives made for the complex & fascinating story of exceptional proportions, where faith, meekness, atheism, indifference & slavery to negative instincts & impulses are often in conflict. Faith & atheism or disbelief in God is taken to epic proportions in Ivan's encounter with the devil.
Dostoevsky stated that, "when there is no God, alll is permitted.". That assertion is reinforced in books like UNION MOUJIK,THE IDIOT & CRIME AND PUNISHMENT. The absence of God or lack of faith in man makes it possible for man to thrive in his worst animal instincts. Even when man starts with good intentions, the absence of faith usuallly derails him to the point where the good intentions are overshadowed by the negative effects of his actions. My conclusion is that this is a rare masterpiece.
Character and relationship portrait at it�s best - By: Milan, 30 Dec 2001 
I love how Dostoevsky describes relationships: friends, soul mates, family (dysfunctional in this instance), & acquaintances. Character description is also fascinating. What makes the characters tick & why they do what they do, quite often unexpected but perfectly acceptable if not rational. There are also plenty of twists, which are again directly related to how characters react when under pressure. Sometimes though you feel whether some descriptions contribute to the story. The book could have been a couple of hundred pages shorter, but again I was told Dostoevsky was writing stories for the newspapers & was paid by the word...
Dark, brooding and deep. - By: jonathan.rushforth@queens.ox.ac.uk, 13 Feb 2001 The russian is not for the faint hearted, it takes effort to get into this detailed look at the hyporcrisies of russian society in the last century, but it's worth its weight. The characters are harsh & detailed, but a complete descent into cynicism is avoided. This is a tale of three brothers & the falllout from the murder of their father, though it's not an analysis of patricide but a look inside provincialdom, orthodoxy & familial hatred. The chapter 'The Grand Inquisitor' alone has been acclaimed as one of the greatest pieces of literature ever written, & deservedly so. This is the kind of book that sucks you in for days on end. Not recommended for anyone with depressive leanings.
