About this audiobook
Can an idea place a person above the moral law? In Fyodor Dostoyevsky's novel, Rodion Raskolnikov, an impoverished former student in Saint Petersburg, persuades himself that exceptional people may commit crimes in pursuit of a greater purpose. He murders a pawnbroker, expecting the act to prove the strength of his convictions. Instead, fear, guilt and isolation begin to undermine the theory he has built.
Against the oppressive atmosphere of the city, Raskolnikov's encounters with others expose the distance between abstract arguments and human suffering. Sonya Marmeladova, who sacrifices her own well-being to support her family, offers a very different understanding of responsibility and compassion. Their relationship brings questions of conscience and spiritual renewal into the heart of the story.
Combining psychological tension with moral debate, the novel examines pride, poverty and the consequences of treating people as means to an end. It invites readers to consider what freedom demands when a person must answer for an irreversible choice.
