Dostoevsky quote

[Brewer, Michael]

All,



Here is the quote (thanks to the online concordance
<http://netra.karelia.ru/bin/concor.orig?t=_k.html&f=karamaz/main>
http://netra.karelia.ru/bin/concor.orig?t=_k.html&f=karamaz/main ) I tried
to send this mulitple times, but SEELANGS kept saying it had images in it
and wouldn't allow it.  You can find it for yourself at the above address,
just search under pozvoleno.  It is from Brothers Karamazov Part 1, second
book, Neumestnoe sobranie VII.



mb



Michael Brewer

German & Slavic Studies and Media Arts Librarian

University of Arizona Library, A210

1510 E. University

P.O. Box 210055

Tucson, AZ 85721-0055

Fax 520.621.9733

Voice 520.621.9919

brewerm at u.library.arizona.edu





-----Original Message-----
From: Russell Valentino [mailto:russell-valentino at UIOWA.EDU]
Sent: Friday, November 07, 2003 12:08 PM
To: SEELANGS at LISTSERV.CUNY.EDU
Subject: [SEELANGS] Dostoevsky quote



Dear Colleagues,



A student question brought to my attention a website,

http://www.tassos-oak.com/extras/soundbite.html, which is devoted to

showing the benefits of the internet in demonstrating how Dostoevsky never

actually wrote the phrase, "If God does not exist, everything is

permitted." Since most "great books" can now be found online, the argument

goes, "it is no longer necessary to propagate such errors, and writers of

honesty should no longer do so." There are many problems with this line of

argument, of course, but I'm more interested in the attribution of the

phrase itself.



As I understand it, the statement is not a quote but a paraphrase of Ivan's

claims (as relayed by Miusov) in Book II, Chapter 6 ("Zachem zhivet takoi

chelovek!") of the Brothers K: "... unichtozh'te v chelovechestve veru v

svoe bessmertie, v nem totchas zhe issiaknet ne tol'ko liubov', no i

vsiakaia zhivaia sila, chtoby prodolzhat' mirovuiu zhizn'. Malo togo: togda

nichego uzhe ne budet beznravstvennogo, vso budet pozvoleno, dazhe

antropofagiia" (pp. 64-5 of Vol. 14 of the 30 vol. Nauka ed.).



I am wondering, however, whether there is a more direct statement somewhere

else, not in the book as published perhaps, but in one of the notebooks or

drafts or in another source altogether.



Can anyone help with this?



Thanks in advance.



Russell Valentino



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