Inquiry: Dostoevsky's engineering feats (?)

[Ken Lantz]

Dear Prof. Monnier,

Here's at least a partial answer to your query.  Dr. Yanovsky,
Dostoevsky's physician and friend in the 1840s, notes in his
recollections that Dostoevsky explained his decision to retire from
military engineering as the result of an error he made in drawing the
plan for a fortress.  When the drawing was presented to Nicholas I for
final approval the emperor noted that Dostoevsky had not included any
access gates in his plan.  Nicholas I wrote on the drawing, Какой дурак
это чертил.

No one has ever located this drawing, though.  You should find this
little anecdote in Yanovsky's memoir as published in the more recent
two-volume edition of "D. v vospominaniiakh sovremennikov."  I don't
have the edition at hand to check on the page number.  It's also
mentioned in "Letopis' zhizni i tvorchestva F.M.D., vol. 1, p. 89.

Sincerely,

Ken Lantz

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