PHIL-424 Philosophy and Literature: Feodor Dostoevsky and the Great Philosophical Novel
A study of the nineteenth-century Russian novelist Feodor Dostoevsky and his contribution to world philosophy and literature. Dostoevskys stories, which weave together philosophical reflections, unique personalities and gripping plots, earned the author numerous superlative titles. Dostoevsky has been praised as a literary genius, a prophetic political thinker, a keen psychologist, and an expert on human condition. His work inspired generations of intellectuals, among them prominent European thinkers: Nietzsche, Freud, Heidegger, Sartre, Camus, Hesse, and many others. In addition to a detailed study of Dostoevskys writings, the course explores the socio-political, literary, and intellectual contexts in which he developed as a thinker, introducing students to both his opponents and admirers.