Fyodor Dostoevsky
Fyodor Dostoevsky
Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoyevsky; 11 November 1821 – 9 February 1881), sometimes transliterated Dostoevsky, was a Russian novelist, short story writer, essayist, journalist and philosopher. Dostoyevsky's literary works explore human psychology in the troubled political, social, and spiritual atmosphere of 19th-century Russia, and engage with a variety of philosophical and religious themes...
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth11 November 1821
CityMoscow, Russia
pride greatness men
Man, do not pride yourself on your superiority to the animals, for they are without sin, while you, with all your greatness, you defile the earth wherever you appear and leave an ignoble trail behind you -- and that is true, alas, for almost every one of us!
reality artist shining
An artist must know the reality he is depicting in its minutest detail. In my opinion we have only one shining example of that - Count Leo Tolstoy.
disease consciousness genuine
I swear to you, sirs, that excessive consciousness is a disease--a genuine, absolute disease.
love-life brothers-karamazov
Love life more than the meaning of it?
gratitude praise insisting
It is not possible to eat me without insisting that I sing praises of my devourer?
care sometimes notes-from-the-underground
To care only for well-being seems to me positively ill-bred. Whether it’s good or bad, it is sometimes very pleasant, too, to smash things.
world opinion creation
Since I wasn't consulted at the time of the creation of the world, I reserve for myself the right to have my own opinion about it.
children heart angel
Love children especially, for they too are sinless like the angels; they live to soften and purify our hearts and, as it were, to guide us.
real lying punishment
It is not the real punishment. The only effectual one, the only deterrent and softening one, lies in the recognition of sin by conscience.
heart suffering ease
And though I suffer for you, yet it eases my heart to suffer for you.
hate ideas ambitious
You sensed that you should be following a different path, a more ambitious one, you felt that you were destined for other things but you had no idea how to achieve them and in your misery you began to hate everything around you.
spring writing years
There is something at the bottom of every new human thought, every thought of genius, or even every earnest thought that springs up in any brain, which can never be communicated to others, even if one were to write volumes about it and were explaining one's idea for thirty-five years; there's something left which cannot be induced to emerge from your brain, and remains with you forever; and with it you will die, without communicating to anyone perhaps the most important of your ideas.
execution littles way
Whether one showed you and execution or a little finger, you would extract an equally edifying thought from both of them, and would still be content. That's the way to get on in life.
beautiful children love-you
Do you know I don't know how one can walk by a tree and not be happy at the sight of it? How can one talk to a man and not be happy in loving him! Oh, it's only that I'm not able to express it...And what beautiful things there are at every step, that even the most hopeless man must feel to be beautiful! Look at a child! Look at God's sunrise! Look at the grass, how it grows! Look at the eyes that gaze at you and love you!...