Fyodor Dostoevsky is considered to be an unrivaled expert on the human soul. This writer, like no one else, realized that each person is a separate world of passions, beliefs and hopes. And therefore, his characters make up the palette of the most striking and diverse images of not only Russian, but world literature. One of them is Sonya Marmeladova. This article is devoted to the characterization and analysis of the heroine of the greatest psychological novel.
Unique female look
The Marmeladov family occupies a special place in the Dostoevsky novel. Each of its members is experiencing its tragedy. The theme of “humiliated and offended” is also disclosed in this work, however, the image of the main character is incomparable in strength of suffering with anything else, even in the work of the great Russian writer. Therefore, it is unique in the literature.
Life story
Who is Sonya Marmeladova? Its characteristic is reduced to the following qualities: sincerity, mercy, kindness. The strength of each of them is extraordinary. And only the owner of the best human qualities is able to survive the tragedy that fell on her fate, and at the same time not to become hardened in her soul, not to lose her moral foundation.
The protagonist of the novel once meets in a tavern a tipsy drunken man whose stories evoke laughter from those around him. Sonya Marmeladova is the daughter of this man. The life story of these people amazes Raskolnikov. And having met a girl, an idealist student is no longer able to be away from the misfortune that affected this family. Poverty is not a vice, but poverty is a different matter. It humiliates a person and makes him commit a crime against morality. This is the tragedy of Marmeladov. His daughter went to the panel in order to feed the family. He at that time somewhere "lay drunk." And from now on, he began to drink even more fiercely, almost to the point of madness, infuriating his sick and exhausted wife and hurting her daughter’s already tormented heart. But the girl has an unusually loving and open soul. Otherwise, it is impossible to survive the torment experienced by Sonya Marmeladova.
Characteristic
Fallen women in society cause contempt. Sonya Marmeladova did not escape this fate. The fact that prostitution was the only possible way for her to feed her father, stepmother, and their small children is of no interest to anyone. And few people are able to comprehend the depths of other people's suffering. To do this, you must have either the detached idealism of Raskolnikov, or the loving heart of his father. The sister of the protagonist is also imbued with sympathy for Sonya. However, such unsightly personalities as Luzhin and Lebezyatnikov are only capable of condemnation. And it should be said that these characters are collective images. There are plenty of such personalities at all times. But both those and others, as well as Sonia Marmeladova herself, understand that she committed the greatest sin, transgressed the law of morality. And to wash off the traces of a terrible vice she would not be easy.
Raskolnikov
The image of Sonya Marmeladova is surprising in that, despite her grief and contempt of others, she is capable of true love. This is not about that earthly feeling, which is more reminiscent of a selfish passion, but about another, true, Christian. The girl did not lose her ability to sympathize. Perhaps the fact is that she was at the bottom of social society for long? Or is it that nothing can kill noble spiritual qualities? The author points out another reason.
That evening, when Raskolnikov confesses to Sonya his crime, she decides to share fate with him. But first he must repent and confess to the investigator. And before leaving, Rodion Romanovich receives from the girl a cross that once belonged to Lizaveta. The same one whose life turned out to be on the conscience of an ambitious student by accident, the murder of which shattered the already untenable idea of the “right of those having”. And from this act we can conclude that faith gave strength to survive and not lose herself. Only the Christian idea can save humanity. Only she has the right to exist.
In the epilogue
At the end of the work, the role that Sonya Marmeladova played in the fate of Raskolnikov becomes completely clear. “Crime and Punishment” is a novel that does not end with the recognition of the main character as a perfect crime. After all, this is still not a detective story, but a work that has the deepest idea, relevant at all times.
Raskolnikov confesses everything. But even in hard labor for a long time he blames himself only for not being able to carry out his grandiose plans. Sonya accompanies him. It arouses sympathy among the prisoners, while a strange student is only hostility. His soul is filled with suffering in its own failed fate. Her - love for him. And the day comes when Raskolnikov realizes guilt, understands to the end the meaning of those words that she once told him. Until the release of another long seven years. But from the day of Raskolnikov's repentance, a new story begins - "the gradual renewal of man."