Nov 11, 2025
In 1849, Dostoyevsky was arrested for participating in a political discussion group. Just minutes before his execution, his sentence was commuted to hard labour in Siberia, a moment that changed his life forever.
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Dostoyevsky suffered from epilepsy throughout his life. His first hand experiences with the illness influenced his portrayal of characters like Prince Myshkin in The Idiot, who also experiences seizures.
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Anna Grigoryevna, his stenographer and later wife, was instrumental in helping him overcome debt, stabilize his life, and self publish his works, a rare move for the time.
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Nietzsche, Freud, Kafka, and Camus all cited Dostoyevsky as a major influence. Nietzsche famously said, “Dostoyevsky was the only psychologist from whom I had anything to learn.”
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At the time of his death in 1881, Dostoyevsky was planning The Life of a Great Sinner, a novel that was never completed but was meant to unite his lifelong philosophical ideas into one work.
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Long before Freud, Dostoyevsky explored human consciousness, guilt, morality, and inner conflict, laying the foundation for modern psychological fiction.
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After years in Siberia, Dostoyevsky’s faith deepened, but his writings often wrestled with the tension between belief and skepticism, a hallmark of his philosophical depth.
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Dostoyevsky’s gambling addiction left him financially ruined. To repay debts, he often wrote novels under strict deadlines, including The Gambler, which he dictated in just 26 days.
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