I decided to read Crime and Punishment with Alfred Hitchcock's movie, Psycho, playing in the background. As I was reading the first part, I realized how similar Psycho and Crime and Punishment really are. For those of you who are not familiar with the movie, the female lead is killed off about 30 minutes into the movie. This was one of the biggest shocks in a movie that I had ever seen. Crime and Punishment did the exact same thing. The crime was committed in the first part of the book.
Alfred Hitchcock did this so that we would actually relate more to Norman Bates. I feel that Dostoevsky is doing the same, but slightly different. He wants us to be able to see the thoughts that progress through Raskonilkov as he deals with what he has done. We are forced to relate to Raskonilkov now just like Hitchcock wanted us to with Norman Bates. The fact that Psycho was on while I was reading Crime and Punishment is merely coincidental. Maybe this means that I have seen too many horror movies.
P.S. I commented on His Beloved's blog, "No Title"
It is definitely a different style of writing, and one that I'm not familiar with. However, I like it because it's not your run-of-the-mill story where you know the climax is at the end and comes somewhat predictably. I sometimes get bored with the predictability of today's novels and tv shows. The unexpected is a nice change of pace.
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