Misuzu Shobo, translated by Toyofusa Kinoshita, Gorosovkel, "Dostoevsky and Kant: Reading 'The Brothers Karamazov'".
Gorosovker's "Dostoevsky and Kant: Reading 'The Brothers Karamazov'" was translated by Toyofusa Kinoshita and published by Misuzu Shobo in 1988.
We begin with a profile of the author.
Я.Э. Gorosovkel (1890-1968)
Born in 1890 in Kiev. Graduated from the Faculty of History and Literature of Kiev University in 1913. Studied in Germany in 1923. After his return to Japan, he taught history and theory of Greek literature, ancient aesthetics, and philosophy at the Moscow University branch of the Bryusov Higher School of Literature and Art. In 1931, he published a translation of Hölderlin's "The Death of Empedgrace," with articles and commentaries. Published a translation of Ancient Greek and Roman Lyric Poets in 1955. He was unhappy during the Stalin era and apparently spent five years in the Gulag. The full extent of his literary activity is not yet fully known, and a collection of articles entitled "Logic of Mythology" (Moscow Nauka Press), part of his unpublished work, appeared in 1987.
Misuzu Shobo, Gorosovkel, translated by Toyofusa Kinoshita, "Dostoevsky and Kant: Reading 'The Brothers Karamazov'".
Then let's take a look at the book's overview from the back cover.
The author Gorosovkel focuses on the mystery novel-like theme of who is the murderer of his father in his novels, while raising the question from the level of an Idea. Could the real culprit be the "devil" lurking in Ivan's dichotomous intellect?
The process of reasoning is full of thrills and riddles. The author says. Dostoevsky, in the figure of Ivan the Devil, depicted the tragedy and vaudeville fatal to the theoretical intelligence of Western critical philosophy, and fought a duel with Western critical philosophy, as represented by Kant.
It is an ambitious work that throws a fresh stone at the study of Dostoevsky.
Misuzu Shobo, Gorosovkel, translated by Toyofusa Kinoshita, "Dostoevsky and Kant: Reading 'The Brothers Karamazov'".
The book focuses on Ivan in "The Brothers Karamazov" and describes the duel between Kant's ideas and Dostoevsky, a representative of Western thought.
The author uses Kant's ideas as a clue as to why Ivan had to blame himself and go insane, and what meaning Dostoevsky had in mind there.
The translator's commentary at the end of the book states
This book has a different style and flavor from the usual research books, and focuses on solving the mystery of who is the real murderer of the father in the novel "The Brothers Karamazov".
The modest subtitle of this book, "A Reader's Thoughts," could be taken as a reflection of the author's modest position as a specialist neither in Russian literature nor in German philosophy, but in Greek and Roman classical literature, while at the same time it could also be seen as an expression of the author's confident and paradoxical attitude toward the ambitious comparative theme of "Dostoevsky and Kant. On the other hand, it can also be seen as a confident and paradoxical expression of the author's attitude toward the ambitious comparative theme of "Dostoevsky and Kant.
Gorosovkel focuses on the mystery novel-like theme of who is the real murderer of the father in "The Brothers Karamazov," but he does so not at the level of the usual mystery novel plot, but at the level of an Idea. In other words, who is the ideological culprit, and through the process of painstakingly reading the novel, the author approaches the deepest and most mysterious essence of the novel.
Misuzu Shobo, Gorosovkel, translated by Toyofusa Kinoshita, "Dostoevsky and Kant: Reading 'The Brothers Karamazov'" p182
Some line breaks have been made.
Kinoshita then outlines the book as follows
To paraphrase the author's convoluted reasoning, the real murderer of Old Karamazov is the "devil" lurking in Ivan's dichotomous intellect. The devil appears in the guise of Smerzhakov and commits the crime in accordance with Ivan's Kantian antithesis (atheism).
After Smerzhakov's suicide, the devil himself appears in Ivan's hallucination as a gentleman, taunting him and driving him mad. Ivan is Kant's antithetical protagonist, swinging without a pause on the balance bar consisting of the two ends of the thesis and antithesis, having a strong craving for the thesis (morality, faith) to the same extent that he leans toward the antithesis.
If the figure linked to the aspect of Ivan's antithesis is the demon-Smerzhakov as a phantom of his arrogant intellect, on the other hand, it is Alyosha and Elder Zosima who act on the aspect of his thesis.
Kant attempted to escape from this endless back-and-forth between the two poles by the categorical imperative of the theoretical intellect in the role of moral judge, while Dostoevsky tried to resolve it by making Ivan (the intellect) go mad, while at the same moment accepting in Dmitrii the two abysses of thought and feeling In Dmitrii, he attempted to resolve the two abysses of thought and feeling by making them be accepted at the same moment. In other words, he tried to break through formal logic by means of the knowledge of feelings.
The author concludes with the above clarification of the ideological core of the novel. Dostoevsky fought a duel with Western critical philosophy, represented by Kant, by thoroughly depicting the tragedy and vaudeville fatal to the theoretical intelligence of Western critical philosophy in the figures of Ivan the Terrible, Smerzhakov the Devil, and the Grand Inquisitor.
Misuzu Shobo, Gorosovkel, translated by Toyofusa Kinoshita, "Dostoevsky and Kant: Reading 'The Brothers Karamazov'" p182-183
Some line breaks have been made.
After all, Kant may be an unavoidable path for Western literature.
I must confess, however, that I am not very good at Western philosophy, including Kant, Hegel, and Plato. I have tried and bounced back easily and still have not been able to read them properly.
But this book gives some idea of what it is trying to say. Perhaps it is best to read this book after knowing Kant, but even if you don't, you can still read it.
It was an interesting piece that gave me a different perspective on Dostoevsky.
The above is "Gorosovkel, "Dostoevsky and Kant: Reading 'The Brothers Karamazov'".
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