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The Possessed (Barnes & Noble Classics)
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About The Possessed
Product Description &&LDIV&&R&&LDIV&&R&&LI&&RThe Possessed&&L/I&&R, by &&LSTRONG&&RFyodor Dostoevsky&&L/B&&R&&L/B&&R, is part of the &&LI&&RBarnes & Noble Classics&&L/I&&R&&LI&&R &&L/I&&Rseries, which offers quality editions at affordable prices to the student and the general reader, including new scholarship, thoughtful design, and pages of carefully crafted extras. Here are some of the remarkable features of &&LI&&RBarnes & Noble Classics&&L/I&&R: &&LDIV&&R New introductions commissioned from today's top writers and scholars Biographies of the authors Chronologies of contemporary historical, biographical, and cultural events Footnotes and endnotes Selective discussions of imitations, parodies, poems, books, plays, paintings, operas, statuary, and films inspired by the work Comments by other famous authors Study questions to challenge the reader's viewpoints and expectations Bibliographies for further reading Indices & Glossaries, when appropriate All editions are beautifully designed and are printed to superior specifications; some include illustrations of historical interest. &&LI&&RBarnes & Noble Classics &&L/I&&Rpulls together a constellation of influences―biographical, historical, and literary―to enrich each reader's understanding of these enduring works.&&L/DIV&&R&&L/DIV&&R&&LP style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"&&R &&L/P&&R&&LP style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"&&RFamous for accurately predicting twentieth-century totalitarianism, &&LB&&RDostoevsky&&L/B&&R’s &&LI&&RThe Possessed&&L/I&&R is an emphatic howl of protest against the fervor of revolution and terrorism that gripped Russia toward the end of the nineteenth century.&&LBR&&R&&LBR&&RBased on a true event, in which a young revolutionary was murdered by his comrades,&&LI&&R The Possessed&&L/I&&R provoked a storm of controversy for its harsh depiction of a ruthless band of Russian intellectuals, atheists, socialists, anarchists, and other radicals who attempt to incite the population of a small provincial town to revolt against the government. In contrast to Dostoevsky’s savage portrait of these radicals and the violent ideas that have possessed them like demons, the author expresses great sympathy for workers and other ordinary people ill-served by those who presume to speak in their name.&&LBR&&R&&LBR&&ROften regarded as the greatest political novel ever written, &&LI&&RThe Possessed&&L/I&&R showcases Dostoevsky’s genius for characterization, his amazing insight into the human heart, and his shattering criticism of the desire to sway and control the thought and behavior of others.&&LBR&&R&&L/P&&R&&LP style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"&&R&&LSTRONG&&RElizabeth Dalton&&L/B&&R&&L/B&&R is Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Barnard College. She is the author of &&LI&&RUnconscious Structure in The Idiot&&L/I&&R, a psychoanalytic study of Dostoevsky’s novel. &&L/P&&R&&L/DIV&&R About the Author Elizabeth Dalton is Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Barnard College. She is the author of Unconscious Structure in The Idiot, a psychoanalytic study of Dostoevskys novel. Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved. From Elizabeth Dalton’s Introduction to The Possessed The Possessed is the greatest novel ever written about the politics of revolution. It prefigures the political novels of Conrad, Malraux, and Koestler, as well as the work of Camus. Published in 1871, Dostoevsky’s novel foretold with uncanny prescience events that would occur almost fifty years later during the Bolshevik Revolution and the Communist tyranny that followed. Its “possessed” characters, unleashed on a sleepy provincial town, wreak destruction as if in the grip of demonic possession, thereby foretelling what will happen in real life when, as one of them says, “Russia will be overwhelmed with darkness, the earth will weep for its old gods.” The novel’s relevance, however, is not limited to Russia and its revolution. With its cast of idealistic murderers and suicides, seductive madm
