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- Dostoevsky
- Raskolnikov's dream about a horse
The dreams that a person sees in a dream convey the psychological state of the person himself. Many writers use this technique in order to more accurately and vividly describe the internal state of the main or secondary characters. The dream about a horse that Raskolnikov sees also carries something mysterious that will help to understand his inner experiences and emotions.
The dream takes Raskolnikov back to his childhood, where he is about 7 years old. Since childhood, the boy could not stand cruelty to animals, and when he saw how horses were beaten with various objects, something could be shoved into their eyes, a cruel anger towards these people flared up in him. Since the dream now returned the young man to childhood, it cannot be said that he is too happy in this period of his life, although he is under the protection of his father, in the most carefree period of his life.
Love for animals can be seen in the scene when little Raskolnikov saw a group of drunken men who really wanted to ride a horse. The horse was very thin, and was not at all able to move, but every minute more and more people wanted to ride it right now.
Because of his inability to help the poor animal and somehow pacify the flayers, the little boy becomes hysterical. He understands perfectly well that he cannot help the horse either physically or mentally.
This dream scene shows Raskolnikov from a completely different side. His soul is very vulnerable and emotional. He is not at all ready to commit illegal actions that he wants to plan and carry out. He is too humane towards people. We can safely say that Raskolnikov wants to find out whether his theory about people “materials” is true, and people who in any situation can not give a damn about their conscience and heart, and go against the law.
In a situation with a downtrodden old woman who was constantly accruing interest on rented housing, Raskolnikov tries for a long time to convince himself and his conscience that the intention in this action was good, because he saved those people who were left to live out their days in rented rooms.
It is very interesting that the dream-memory of a horse from childhood occurs the night before the day when Raskolnikov commits the atrocity. It is this dream that shows him that it is not he who must save this world from such terrible and black people. Someone else, but definitely not him, and especially not with his own hands.
Unfortunately, both childhood memories and the situation after the murder confirm the fact that Raskolnikov is not the kind of person who will step over his conscience.
Raskolnikov's dream about a horse
On the eve of the crime, Raskolnikov has a dream about a horse being beaten to death with a whip. After long wanderings around St. Petersburg and thinking about the benefits of the death of the old pawnbroker, the main character falls asleep in the park after the “test”. Apparently, as a little boy, Raskolnikov saw the killing of a horse live and this memory was preserved in his head:
“Suddenly, laughter erupts in one gulp and covers everything: the little filly could not stand the rapid blows and began to kick in helplessness. Even the old man couldn’t resist and grinned. And indeed: it’s such a kicking little filly, and it kicks too!
Two guys from the crowd take out another whip and run to the horse to whip it from the sides. Everyone runs from their own side.” — Part 1, Chapter V
This is the first dream of Rodion Raskolnikov in the novel “Crime and Punishment” (Part 1, Chapter V).
The meaning of Raskolnikov's dream
The fifth chapter of the first part of the novel describes Raskolnikov's dream about a slaughtered nag . In this episode, the hero shows the reader his true nature. The image of the horse remained in Rodion’s memory, perhaps because he had already seen this scene in reality in his distant childhood.
The hero sees this dream on the eve of committing a murder. Its hidden meaning is a warning to the hero, the discovery of his true feelings. Raskolnikov saw how a man whipped a horse's meek eyes and felt pity for it. He is not really a criminal, his heart is still open to compassion. However, he renounces this and commits a crime.
Raskolnikov's dream with a tortured horse has a special meaning. Its analysis will allow you to see the character's true feelings.
Raskolnikov's dream about a horse - text
“Raskolnikov had a terrible dream. He dreamed of his childhood, back in their town. He is about seven years old and is walking on a holiday, in the evening, with his father outside the city. The time is gray, the day is suffocating, the area is exactly the same as it remained in his memory: even in his memory it has been much more erased than it was now imagined in a dream. The town stands open, clear in the open, not a willow tree around; somewhere very far away, at the very edge of the sky, a forest grows black. A few steps from the last city garden there is a tavern, a large tavern, which always made an unpleasant impression on him and even fear when he passed by it while walking with his father. There was always such a crowd there, they shouted, laughed, cursed, sang so ugly and hoarsely and fought so often; There were always such drunken and scary faces wandering around the tavern... When he met them, he pressed himself closely to his father and trembled all over. Near the tavern there is a road, a country road, always dusty, and the dust on it is always so black. She walks, twisting, then, about three hundred paces, she bends around the city cemetery to the right. Among the cemetery is a stone church with a green dome, to which he went twice a year with his father and mother to mass, when funeral services were served for his grandmother, who had died a long time ago and whom he had never seen. At the same time, they always took kutya with them on a white dish, in a napkin, and the kutya was sugar made from rice and raisins, pressed into the rice with a cross. He loved this church and the ancient images in it, mostly without frames, and the old priest with a trembling head. Near his grandmother’s grave, on which there was a slab, there was also a small grave of his younger brother, who had died for six months and whom he also did not know at all and could not remember; but he was told that he had a little brother, and every time he visited the cemetery, he religiously and respectfully crossed himself over the grave, bowed to it and kissed it. And then he dreams: he and his father are walking along the road to the cemetery and passing a tavern; he holds his father's hand and looks back at the tavern with fear. A special circumstance attracts his attention: this time there seems to be a party, a crowd of dressed-up bourgeois women, women, their husbands and all sorts of rabble. Everyone is drunk, everyone is singing songs, and near the tavern porch there is a cart, but a strange cart. This is one of those large carts into which large draft horses are harnessed and goods and wine barrels are transported in them. He always loved to look at these huge draft horses, long-maned, with thick legs, walking calmly, at a measured pace, and carrying some whole mountain behind them, without getting too tired at all, as if they were even easier with carts than without carts. But now, strangely, harnessed to such a large cart was a small, skinny, shabby peasant nag, one of those who - he often saw this - sometimes work hard with some tall cart of firewood or hay, especially if the cart gets stuck in the mud or in a rut, and at the same time it’s so painful, the men always beat them so painfully with whips, sometimes even in the very face and in the eyes, and he’s so sorry, so sorry to look at it that he almost cries, but mother always used to , takes him away from the window. But suddenly it becomes very noisy: big, drunken men in red and blue shirts, with saddle-backed army coats, come out of the tavern, shouting, singing, with balalaikas. “Sit down, everyone sit down! - shouts one, still young, with such a thick neck and a fleshy, red face like a carrot, “I’ll take everyone, sit down!” But immediately there is laughter and exclamations:
Analysis of Raskolnikov's last dream
In the epilogue of the novel, readers see another dream of Rodion, it is more like semi-delirium. This dream already foreshadowed moral recovery, getting rid of doubts. An analysis of Raskolnikov’s (the latter) dream confirms that Rodion has already found answers to questions about the collapse of his theory. In his last dream, Raskolnikov saw the end of the world approaching. The whole world has plunged into a terrible disease and is about to disappear. There were smart and strong-willed microbes (spirits) all around. They possessed people, making them crazy and insane. Sick people considered themselves the smartest and justified all their actions. People humiliating each other were like spiders in a jar. Such a nightmare completely healed the hero spiritually and physically. He goes into a new life, where there is no monstrous theory.
Raskolnikov's first dream - analysis of the work and characteristics of the characters
The great master of the psychological novel, Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky, used a technique such as a dream to better depict his hero in the work “Crime and Punishment.” With the help of dreams, the writer wanted to deeply touch the character and soul of a person who decided to kill. The main character of the novel, Rodion Raskolnikov, had four dreams. We will analyze an episode of Raskolnikov's dream, which he saw before the murder of the old woman. Let's try to figure out what Dostoevsky wanted to show with this dream, what its main idea is, how it is connected with real events in the book. We will also pay attention to the hero’s last dream, which is called apocalyptic.
Analysis of Raskolnikov's dream about a horse
Rodion Raskolnikov in the novel “Crime and Punishment” is so immersed in himself, in his thoughts, that he does not notice how his essence “splits” into two parts, reality merges with fantasies and reality becomes somehow distant and impossible. Throughout the novel, Rodion Raskolnikov dreams several times. But since the hero experiences apathy, half-sleep - half-delirium, it is impossible to say with great certainty whether it was a dream or another delirium, or just a play of the imagination. But each dream in its own way is considered a key moment in the plot of the work. Without these dreams it is impossible to fully understand the hero’s state of mind. Dreams not only represent an understanding of his life situation, but also foreshadow future changes in life. But the most significant for understanding Raskolnikov’s character and worldview, for understanding his actions, is the first dream - the dream about killing a horse. This episode helps to look into the soul of Raskolnikov the child, not yet disfigured by the terrible “idea”.
As soon as sleep overwhelms Raskolnikov’s consciousness, we find ourselves in his small hometown, finding ourselves far from the bustle and oppressive yellowness of the houses of big cities. Everything around is green, bright, everything is the embodiment of faith in goodness, mercy and compassion for others, that is, the inner world of little Rodya is revealed to us, whose soul is filled with goodness and only positive qualities. The boy experiences “an unpleasant impression and even fear” as soon as he walks with his father past the city tavern, “trembling all over” just from the sounds coming from it and the sight of “drunk and scary faces wandering around.” And when later the hero himself remembers with warmth and love the poor city church and the old priest, then at that moment we see not a person who wants to commit murder, but a person who truly lives, loves life in any of its manifestations, rejoices in every day and believes that there is good.
But the bright colors fade, the sky is clouded with black clouds, when we begin to read lines from a dream about beating a horse: “But the poor horse is in a bad way.” “She gasps, stops, twitches again, almost falls.” We see all this through the eyes of a seven-year-old boy who will forever remember the embodiment of cruelty. Raskolnikov the child at first looks at everything that is happening in horror, then rushes to protect the horse, but is too late: “The nag stretches out his muzzle, sighs heavily and dies.”
Immediately before the dream episode, Raskolnikov, walking along the boulevard, sees how a certain gentleman is trying to seduce a young girl, and then the hero decides to intercede for her, as he later tries to save the horse in his dream. But the incident he saw on the street convinces him even more of the correctness of the theory and the admissibility of “blood according to conscience,” and the beating of an animal once again reminds Raskolnikov of violence and cruelty in the world. He no longer sees any difference between an animal and a person. And this horse becomes the embodiment of the suffering of the insulted and humiliated.
The dream itself quite accurately conveys almost all the details of the upcoming murder of the old woman - the horse is eventually killed with an ax, blood flows down its face, and on Mikolka, we notice, there is no cross, as later on Raskolnikov.
In this dream we see a whole huge crowd, cruel and heartless. The only person who tries to stand up for the horse is an old man, but he alone cannot help the poor animal.
There are still some positive qualities left in Raskolnikov; he hesitates in fulfilling his terrible plan. Having awakened, he turns to God and with his whole being renounces his crazy idea, but despite this, almost a day later he kills the old woman.
And the first dream itself is truly fantastic, largely because the features of Rodion’s invented terrible plan are reflected here. At first we see that these are memories from Raskolnikov’s childhood, but then we understand that much here is implausible, because the horse itself was harnessed to a cart, which has already been called strange, and it is immediately added that it is “one of those big carts in which they harness large draft horses.” Therefore, as a result, thoughts about the worthlessness and helplessness of the poor horse creep into our consciousness, and we understand that its fate is already predetermined.
The dream seems to suggest to Raskolnikov that after completing his terrible plan, he must pretend to be an observer or the same horse that is already suffocating from unbearable living conditions. And Rodion places all the blame on the shoulders of the dyer who turned up, leaving himself one more chance to “fight.”
Therefore, we can say that the episode of the first dream is quite symbolic, it predetermines Raskolnikov’s actions, reflects the struggle of his inner world, but emphasizes the incompatibility of the crime planned by Raskolnikov with such traits of his nature as compassion and tenderness.
It can be noted that after this dream, Rodion does not dream at all for a long time, not counting the vision on the eve of the murder itself - a desert and an oasis with blue water in it. Here the writer uses traditional color symbolism: blue is the color of purity and hope. Water appears in a dream as a symbol of life. But the hero does not listen to his inner self, which strives for life-giving and pure moisture, and not for violence and death.
