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Ilse's Reviews > Devils
Devils
by
by
The mystery of the appearance of a new being; it’s a great and inexplicable mystery', Shahtov mumbled incoherently, stupefied and enraptured. ‘There were two people, and all of a sudden there’s a third being, a new spirit, whole and complete, such that no human hands could ever create; new thought and new love; it’s frightening, actually…There’s nothing greater on earth!
Thoughts and notes in the meantime got lost in the chaos of life, but not the imprint this masterpiece left on me, nor the truth of this observation on the miracle that is the birth of a child.
Thoughts and notes in the meantime got lost in the chaos of life, but not the imprint this masterpiece left on me, nor the truth of this observation on the miracle that is the birth of a child.
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Devils.
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Reading Progress
January 18, 2022
–
Started Reading
January 18, 2022
– Shelved
January 18, 2022
–
0.65%
"And yet Stefan Trofimovich was a very intelligent and talented man, even, so to say, a scholar, although, in fact, his his scholarship�.well, in a word, his scholarship had accomplished very little , in fact, it seems, it had accomplished nothing at all. But then that happens all the time with men of learning in Russia."
page
5
January 19, 2022
–
3.12%
"what grief and bitterness envelop your entire soul when a great idea that you've long regarded as sacred is suddenly seized upon by ignorant people and dragged into the street before other fools,just like themselves,and you suddenly encounter it in the marketplace in an unrecognizable form,covered with mud,presented from an absurd angle,without proportion or harmony,a mere plaything in the hands of stupid children!"
page
24
January 22, 2022
–
4.68%
"With us everything is the consequence of idleness, including what’s fine and what is good. Everything is the consequence of our nice, aristocratic, well-educated, whimsical idleness."
page
36
January 23, 2022
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10.53%
"Petrusha, c’est une si pauvre tête! He's kind, generous, and very sensitive. In Petersburg I was very happy to compare him to other modern young people. It's all a result of that same immaturity and sentimentality They’re all bewitched, not by realism, but by the emotional and idealistic aspects of socialism, so to speak, by its religious overtones , its poetry...all second-hand, of course."
page
81
January 23, 2022
–
15.73%
"Life is pain, life is fear, and man is unhappy. Everything now is pain and fear. Life is given in return for pain and fear now, and that's the whole deception. But man is still not really man. There will come a new man, happy and proud. He who doesn’t care whether he lives or dies, he’ll be the new man. He who conquers pain and fear- will become God. And then the old God will no longer exist."
page
121
January 25, 2022
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17.04%
"Oh, I wish the day after tomorrow, Sunday, would never come!� he exclaimed suddenly, already in total despair. ‘Why couldn't this one week be without a Sunday � si le miracle existe? What would it cost Providence to eliminate just one Sunday from the calendar, if only to demonstrate its power to an atheist, et que tout soit dit!"
page
131
January 28, 2022
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27.7%
"And surely such unmistakable genuine grief, even in a phenomenally frivolous man, is capable of making him solid and resolute, if only for a very short time. What's more, real, genuine grief can sometimes make even fools smarter, though, of course only for a little while; it's characteristic of this kind of grief."
page
213
January 29, 2022
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29.52%
"Don't you see that if you place the guillotine in the foreground and are so enthusiastic about it, it's merely because it's so easy to chop off people's heads , while it's so much more difficult to have an idea ! Don't you understand, in addition to happiness mankind needs unhappiness just as much?"
page
227
January 30, 2022
–
36.28%
"Apparently it's true that the second half of a man's life consists entirely of habits acquired during the first half."
page
279
January 31, 2022
–
37.19%
"Your umbrella... do I deserve it, sir?� The captain asked in an ingratiating way.
“Everyone deserves an umbrella.�
“In one little phrase you've defined the minimum of human rights..."
page
286
“Everyone deserves an umbrella.�
“In one little phrase you've defined the minimum of human rights..."
February 1, 2022
–
Finished Reading
February 4, 2022
–
42.65%
"Yulia Mikhailovna possessed some two hundred serfs; what’s more, she had powerful friends. On the other hand, von Lembke was handsome, and she was already over forty . Remarkable as it is, he gradually fell genuinely in love with her as he became more and more used to the idea of being her betrothed. On his wedding day he sent her some verses. She liked every bit of it ,even the verses : being forty is no joke."
page
328
February 5, 2022
–
57.87%
"Why are you staring at me? I need you, you are necessary to me. Without you, I am nothing. Without you, I am a fly, an idea in a glass bottle, Columbus without America."
page
445
February 10, 2022
–
71.52%
"Don’t you know mankind can survive without your Englishman, without Germany, and certainly without Russians, without science, without bread - but not without beauty, for then there'd be nothing left to do on earth! The whole secret, the whole of history lies in that! Science itself won't stand up for one minute without beauty � it will turn into a vulgar charade. You’ll not even be able to invent so much as a nail!"
page
550
February 15, 2022
–
86.48%
"The mystery of the appearance of a new being; it’s a great and inexplicable mystery', Shahtov mumbled incoherently, stupefied and enraptured. ‘There were two people, and all of a sudden there’s a third being, a new spirit, whole and complete, such that no human hands could ever create; new thought and new love; it’s frightening, actually…There’s nothing greater on earth!�"
page
665
February 18, 2022
–
91.94%
"No, the highway was much better; he’d just set off and go along without thinking about anything for as long as he could. The highway very, very long, with no end in sight � just like human life, human dreams."
page
707
February 22, 2022
–
96.36%
"And what’s more precious than love? Love is higher than being, love is the crown of being; how is it possible that being should not be subordinate to love?"
page
741
March 6, 2022
–
98.05%
"My desires are too weak; they can't be a guide to me. It maybe possible to cross a river on a log but not on a splinter of wood."
page
754
Comments Showing 1-16 of 16 (16 new)
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message 1:
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Nate
(new)
Feb 05, 2022 02:10PM
amazing quote
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I must read this book again.
Nate wrote: "amazing quote"Glad it spoke to you as well, Nate - it is quite poignant that these are the words of a man who wants to integrate the addressee in his destructive plans.
Stephanie B wrote: "I love this quote."Happy to hear that you loved this as well, Stephanie, it comes from a very moving sequence in the book, D showing the reader the last days of Stepan Trofimovitch Verhovensky, a character with despite his flaws I couldn't but love.
Hadrian wrote: "I must read this book again."Hadrian, it is one of those books that merit several revisits - it makes me wish to re-read the other big novels of D that I read decades ago too. So many voices D creates here, many worth reading more about linking them to Russia's history of thought and real thinkers who inspired D's characters. I loved it!
Stab heart with love love love nevver love agin.
This is one of my favorite books, and a beautiful quote. Thank you.
Simon wrote: "Stab heart with love love love nevver love agin."Perhaps there is nothing that hurts as much as love, Simon - because it makes us feel alive more than anything else in the world?
I think I'll explode soon if I don't read Dostoyevsky, Ilse! He is by far my most anticipated author but I have placed so many all-too-arbitrary prerequisites before him, it feels I'll never get there! The bible being one! 😆 So glad to see your confirmation of his brilliance! :)
Old Dog wrote: "This is one of my favorite books, and a beautiful quote. Thank you."Old Dog Diogenes, thank you same here, I would be hard pressed to name my favourite by D but maybe this is the one, (perhaps because it was the one that I read the most recently). Glad to connect to another D admirer here! Reading your stellar reviews on his books, I truly want to revisit the ones I read aeons ago. I picked the quote because we used part of it on the birthcard of our son, 20 years ago - I hadn't read the novel at that moment yet, but his father had, so it was quite a moving moment when I came across it so many years later.
Jonathan wrote: "I think I'll explode soon if I don't read Dostoyevsky, Ilse! He is by far my most anticipated author but I have placed so many all-too-arbitrary prerequisites before him, it feels I'll never get there, the bible being one..."Jonathan, I admire your thoroughness and the seriousness bracing yourself for D but if I were you I would just go for it, plunge in and swim! I have set mysef similar prerequisite reading tasks for Ulysses, the Divina commedia and Don Quichote, which means they are collecting dust on the shelves since decades because I'll probably never get to them, and if I were you I wouldn't risk that happening to you by missing the treat that D is in your life :)!
Ilse wrote: "Old Dog wrote: "This is one of my favorite books, and a beautiful quote. Thank you."Old Dog Diogenes, thank you same here, I would be hard pressed to name my favourite by D but maybe this is the o..."
I still have a few to read, so it would be more accurate for me to say that out of the Dostoevsky that I have read up to now, this one is my favorite. I still need to read The Brothers K. I have very high hopes. For those of us with children, the quote your husband chose is very touching.
Looking forward to your thoughts on The Brothers K - one I definitely would like to re-read, because the first time I was so unwise to read it in hospital with concussion when I was 17. Reading Coetzee’s fictional biography on D last year The Master of Petersburg and a biography (in Dutch) approaching his oeuvre chronologically makes me eager to fill in more of the gaps, like The Dream of a Ridiculous Man.
Ilse wrote: "Looking forward to your thoughts on The Brothers K - one I definitely would like to re-read, because the first time I was so unwise to read it in hospital with concussion when I was 17. Reading Coe..."I'm really looking forward to reading more Dostoevsky this year. Thank you for those recommendations. I'll check them out.
You are very welcome, O - I hope you'll enjoy the journeys you will take, I hope to read another biography on D as well this year...
