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Fyodor Dostoevsky was born on October 30, 1821. Dostoevsky and his brother attended a school in Moscow from 1831 until the death of their mother in 1837. At this point Dostoevsky briefly attended a preparatory school. His father, an army doctor, was murdered by serfs in 1839. At the time of his father's death, Dostoevsky was an army cadet at an Engineering Academy. He was in the army until 1844 when he resigned.
Shortly after resigning from his army commission, Dostoevsky began his career as an author. From this time until shortly before his death, he published numerous influential books. Dostoevsky also became actively involved in political reform organizations. He disagreed with Russian political structures and wanted to adopt Democratic ideas. His active participation in the Petrashevsky Circle and other liberal political organizations was extremely dangerous. In addition, Dostoevsky wrote several essays calling for political reform. For his participation in such activities, Dostoevsky and twenty other members of the Petrashevsky Circle were exiled to Siberia and sentenced to death. Moments before they were shot, they were notified that the death sentence was simply intended to traumatize them and would not be carried out. Instead of death, Dostoevsky faced four years as a prisoner in harsh conditions. After serving his four years as a prisoner, Dostoevsky was forced to serve an additional four years in the Siberian military. In 1857 Dostoevsky married Maria Dmitrievna Isaiv. They returned to St. Petersburg in 1859. His wife, who suffered from tuberculosis, died on April 19, 1864.
Several years later, in 1867, Dostoevsky married Anna Grigorievna Snitkina and they stayed in Germany and Switzerland until 1871. He continued to write for the next decade. His last novel, The Brothers Karamazov, was published in 1880. On January 28, 1881, shortly after The Brothers Karamazov was published, Dostoevsky died. He left behind numerous influential works and is believed by many to be one of the first existentialist writers.
Although Dostoevsky's characters were often existentialists, Dostoevsky himself was not. Many of Dostoevsky's personal beliefs conflicted with the beliefs of his characters. In addition, Dostoevsky was Christian with strong religious beliefs that go against existentialism. Walter Kaufman once said, "I can see no reason for calling Dostoevsky an existentialist, but I do think Part One of Notes from Underground is the best overture for existentialism ever written." (Kaufman, Existentialism, p14).
Among the novels written by Dostoevsky are:
Poor Folk 1846
"The Double" 1846 (short story)
A Novel in Nine Letters 1846
The Landlady 1847
An Honest Thief 1847
A Weak Heart 1848
White Nights 1848
Another Man's Wife 1848
The Insulted and Injured 1861
The House of the Dead 1861
Nasty Story 1862
"Notes from Underground" 1864 (essay)
The Crocodile 1865
Crime and Punishment 1866
The Gambler 1866
The Idiot 1868
The Possessed 1871
The Brothers Karamazov 1880
Dostoevsky's last work, The Brothers Karamazov, is one of the best examples of existentialism. In The Brothers Karamazov, a father struggles with his sons each of whom have a specific universal trait. Ivan possesses intellect, Smerdayakov represents ugliness of mind, body, and spirit, Alyosha represents saintliness, and Dmitri represents passion. The characters in this novel always seem to find themselves in extreme situations. The novel shows men attempting to make rational decisions in an unrational reality. This is also evident in Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are constantly contemplating how they should react to the situations they come across. Their reality is absurd, yet they believe that are making completely rational decisions. Another one of Dostoevsky's existentialist works, "Notes from Underground," also depicts this theme. This set of essays is about the experiences of a bitter recluse from St. Petersburg. The notes are extremely well known and according to Colin Wilbert are "a uniquely great monument of Existentialist thought." The notes are one of the first works to depict an extreme reality. These works, along with Crime and Punishment and others, made Dostoevsky one of the first existentialist writers.