demons

(cw 4 suicide)

this is very much a work in progress. i will work on this more once i reread it because my memory sucks.

behold!

a shrine (an actual neocities shrine not just a miscellanous directory) of my favorite piece of literature ever! demons (also called "the posessed" or "devils" depending on the translation) by fyodor dostoyevsky. (fun fact the original name of the original english translation by constance garnett "the posessed" is inaccurate because the tite in russian (Бесы) means the ones who are doing the posessing.) its a critique (and satire) of russian nhilism based on the murder of ivan ivanovich ivanov in 1860 (or 1861 i forgot) by a bunch of utopian socialist revolutionaries.

"erm i thought you are a socialist why do you like the book critiquing socialism" cuz i can like books not exacty corresponding to my political views. i dont even like utopian socialism. nuance is a thing yknow. (this is just a weirdly worded disclaimer. and its me arguing with strawmen in my head. because i can.)

(thats my crusty kinda falling apart copy. i have a copy of tbk that literally broke in half while i was reading it lol. it smells like undried glue and it better get that yummy book smell eventually.) for character images ill be using the ones from the 2014 miniseries because those are the ones ive seen the most. (ive never watched the miniseries. i might in a few years if i remember.) i might as well summarize the whole plot (or what i can remember of the whole plot because my memory sucks.)

so theres this old french dude (hes not actually french hes russian but just speaks french alot to sound pretentious or something idk ill probaby elaborate on him after i get this out of the way) named stephan trofimovich verkhovensky and he has a friend named varvara petrovna stavrogin whos late husband was a general or something. they have this club of a bunch of randos who meet and discuss liberalism and atheism and stuff. (theyre pretentious i dont really like them) varvara has a son named nikolai vseldovovich or something who was tutored by stephan and spent a few years going around europe and drinking a bunch and whatever happens in his confession (more on that later.) stephan has a son named pyotr stephanovich who was raised by varvara petrovna or something. he leads this revolutionary group of 5 (its called that cuz it has five people mostly from the pretentious liberalism club. also there are a bunch more of them across russia but more on that later.) theres this weird dude named shatov whos in the liberalism club (no one really likes him) and he used to be in the group of 5 but he left (against the will of pyotr stephanovich i might add. (those who know.)) and he had a printing press idk. he lives with this dude called kirillov (i love kirillov more on him later). turns out im too lazy to actually summarize the whole plot. so theres a meeting in varvara petrovna's house where some annoying girl faints, a bunch of high society rumors, a lot of politics, a gala, a lot of insanity, and a bunch of murders. (i shant spoil it all because that wouldnt be very nice.)(but i might in later sections who knows.) the whole part about varvara petrovna and stephan trofimovich isnt that important anyways.

characters (ordered somewhat based on importance)

	pyotr stephanovich verkhovensky the leader of the group of 5; utopian socialist; idolizes stavrogin and thinks hes the pinnacle of beauty or something even though stravogin is an absolute loser. (you are the sun and i am your worm). he represents the idea that socialism (and nihlism) were born out of liberalism cuz he is stephan trofimovich's offspring.
	nikolai vseldovovich stavrogin very troubled. unweaponized nihlism (kirillov and pyotr stephanovich are weaponized nihlism)
	alexey kirillov civil engineer; thinks that commiting suicide will kill god and cause the self-killer to become the new god cuz they beat the fear of the pain and death (abridged, i will write a whole thing about kirillov eventually)
	ivan pavlovich shatov a weirdo; lives with kirillov; used to be in the group of 5 but left.

kirillov - suicide as revolution (wip)

(here it finally is) kirillov first appears in part 1 when liputin (group of 5) brought him to stephan trofimovich's house or something cuz kirillov was visiting to design a bridge. there he expressed the (aforementioned) idea that god is the fear of the pain of death and killing oneself would kill god because suicide is the ultimate defiance of the fear of the pain of death. he emphisized that it was the fear of the pain of death instead of the actual pain or the death. (kirillov or someone else said that if a rock or a house or something was to fall on you, you would feel the most distress thinking about it falling on you (or watching it) instead of when it actually smushes you.)

shigaylovism

somewhere in the book the group of 5 host a secret meeting with a bunch of other revolutionaries. (theyre not very revolutionary thought; they just argue.)(see the last cover in the critiquing demons covers sidebar as of 9/27/05.) and this rando named shigaylov (not in the group of five) espoused this ideology where the intellectual elite (10% of the population) would run the government and do all of the science and stuff while the other 90% would be designated as mindless slaves/sheeple. and the 90% would be happy. he said (as i perhaps incorrectly recall) that the sheeple would be happy because they didnt have to have the responsibility of intellect/governing and would thus be relegated to the extistential reasoning capacity of livestock. (yes i know livestock have feelings and are happier when they are on freerange grass instead of a feedlot and what not but its just a susincct metaphor or something. the peeps in the book used the cow metaphor too sooo yeah.) anyways everyone eventually rejected that idea because it was stupid.