Atiq Rahimi. (2014). A Curse on Dostoevsky: A Novel. Other Press.

Atiq Rahimi. 2014. A Curse On Dostoevsky: A Novel. Other Press.

Atiq Rahimi, A Curse On Dostoevsky: A Novel. Other Press, 2014.

Atiq Rahimi. A Curse On Dostoevsky: A Novel. Other Press, 2014.

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1. • role: Author
   • fileAs: Rahimi, Atiq
   • bioText: Atiq Rahimi was born in Afghanistan in 1962 and fled to France in 1984, where he has become an award-winning author (2008 Prix Goncourt) and filmmaker (2004 Prix un certain regard, Cannes). The film adaptation of his novel The Patience Stone, which he co-wrote and directed, was selected as the Afghan entry for the 2012 Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film. In recent years, he has returned to Afghanistan many times to set up a writers’ house in Kabul and offer support and training to young writers and filmmakers. He lives in Paris.
      
     Polly McLean is a freelance translator from Oxford, England. Winner of the 2009 Scott Moncrieff Prize, she has translated titles by Catherine Deneuve and Sylvia Kristel,
     as well as the award-winning Secret by Philippe Grimbert.
   • name: Atiq Rahimi

publishDate

2014-03-04T00:00:00-05:00

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title

A Curse on Dostoevsky

fullDescription

Reading Dostoevsky in Afghanistan becomes “crime without punishment”
Rassoul remembers reading Crime and Punishment as a student of Russian literature in Leningrad, so when, with axe in hand, he kills the wealthy old lady who prostitutes his beloved Sophia, he thinks twice before taking her money or killing the woman whose voice he hears from another room. He wishes only to expiate his crime and be rightfully punished. Out of principle, he gives himself up to the police. But his country, after years of civil war, has fallen into chaos. In Kabul there is only violence, absurdity, and deafness, and Rassoul’s desperate attempt to be heard turns into a farce.
This is a novel that not only flirts with literature but also ponders the roles of sin, guilt, and redemption in the Muslim world. At once a nostalgic ode to the magic of Persian tales and a satire on the dire reality of now, A Curse on Dostoevsky also portrays the resilience and wit of Afghani women, an aspect of his culture that Rahimi never forgets.

reviews

1. • premium: False
   • source: Electric Literature
   • content:

     "Rahimi turns his attention to Crime and Punishment and juxtaposes literature against the Muslim world in Kabul, the themes of civil war, chaos, sin, guilt and redemption for Afghani women again being the theme. 'Crime without punishment?'"

2. • premium: False
   • source: Publishers Weekly
   • content: "A darkly comic meditation on life in a lawless land...In restrained prose, Rahimi explores both the personal and the political; it's both in dialogue with a classic and is daringly outspoken."
3. • premium: False
   • source: Khaled Hosseini, author of The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns
   • content: "Atiq Rahimi brilliantly re-imagines Crime and Punishment and, in a daring feat of creative panache, transplants Dostoevsky's classic morality tale to modern-day Afghanistan. This is easily Rahimi's most imaginative and complex work yet, and should cement his reputation as a writer of great and unique vision."
4. • premium: False
   • source: Booklist (Starred) Review
   • content: "In a rare imaginative feat, Rahimi renews many of Dostoevsky's original psychological insights and opens piercing new ones. Unforgettable."
5. • premium: False
   • source: Qais Akbar Omar, author of A Fort of Nine Towers: An Afghan Family Story
   • content: "Atiq Rahimi, like the great story tellers of Afghanistan, is a master of using a small moment to tell the sweeping story of the pain and loss of war. In A Curse on Dostoevsky he yet again imprints images in the memory, as he captures both the unspeakable absurdity of the Afghan civil war and the ingenious ways Afghans have found to move beyond it."
6. • premium: False
   • source: Kirkus
   • content: "Rahimi does a masterful job both in echoing Dostoevsky and in updating the moral complexities his protagonist both creates and faces."
7. • premium: False
   • source: Le Point
   • content: "Here, Atiq Rahimi sings an incandescent, raging story, which dissects, in a highly sensitive way, the chaos of his homeland and the contradictions of his people." --L'Express "In the light of the Russian writer, [Rahimi] describes his country so that we may understand it like we never have before. His latest novel isn't only breathless, beautiful, and strong, it is indispensable...He dared--and succeeded."
8. • premium: True
   • source:
   • content:

     December 9, 2013
     “The moment Rassoul lifts the axe to bring it down on the old woman’s head, the thought of Crime and Punishment flashes into his mind.” And so begins and ends Rahimi’s (The Patience Stone) hallucinatory tale. Rassoul, an aimless young Afghan man in Kabul, who, inspired by Dostoyevski, murders Nana Alia, a wealthy old woman who prostitutes Sophie, the woman he loves (Sonia to his Raskolnikov). While Rassoul thinks Crime and Punishment “is best read in Afghanistan,” the country’s chaos turns this retelling of a classic into a darkly comic meditation on life in a lawless land. Like Raskolnikov, Rassoul suffers moral pangs and stumbles around Kabul mute and existentially broken, puffing on cigarettes and hashish as he finds them. When he turns himself in to absolve his guilt, he faces the Kafkaesque absurd: “In our dear legal system, killing a madam is not murder... So... so something else must be causing you this distress.” Rassoul’s quest for punishment is rebuffed, and we are free to ponder the purgatory of unpunished sin. In restrained prose, Rahimi explores both the personal and the political; it’s both in dialogue with a classic and is daringly outspoken.

9. • premium: True
   • source:
   • content:

     February 1, 2014
     In war-torn Kabul, an admirer of Dostoevsky imitates Raskolnikov's murder of Alyona Ivanovna in Crime and Punishment--and suffers similar moral torment and self-loathing. At the beginning of Rahimi's narrative, Rassoul, the "new" Raskolnikov, kills Nana Alia. But before he can steal her money, he is scared off by the sound of a voice. As he runs away, he injures his ankle and curses Dostoevsky for having his "perfect crime" hindered by this unforeseen event. Like Raskolnikov, Rassoul is highly intelligent, self-reflective and morally conflicted. He also has a woman he's in love with--Sophia--who might in fact have been the voice he heard the night he murdered Nana Alia. (In Crime and Punishment, Raskolnikov is morally "rescued" by Sonia, whose real name is Sofia.) Rassoul makes the difficult decision to return to the scene of the crime, something he knows he should not do. Also, as a result of his traumatic experience, he loses his voice and is forced to communicate by writing down notes. And while Rahimi frames Rassoul's experiences through a third-person recounting, Rassoul also keeps a journal of his activities and thoughts, and Rahimi offers generous glimpses into Rassoul's mind with this first-person account. The parallels to Dostoevsky's novel are striking, as, like Raskolnikov, Rassoul has issues with his landlord; he first confesses his crime to Sophia; and he has a relatively clueless mother. One irony is that, in Kabul, violence is so pervasive that people are being killed almost indiscriminately, so one more "murder" shouldn't make a difference, right? But it does. Rahimi does a masterful job both in echoing Dostoevsky and in updating the moral complexities his protagonist both creates and faces.

     COPYRIGHT(2014) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

10. • premium: True
    • source:
    • content:

      December 1, 2014
      

      Afghan-born, Paris-based Rahimi, who's won the Prix Goncourt for his fiction and numerous awards for his films, daringly references Crime and Punishment from the first page of this page-turning novel. Rassoul takes an axe to the wealthy dowager who has prostituted his beloved Sophia and, true to Dostoyevsky, wishes to expiate his sin by surrendering to the police. But he's in war-torn Kabul, where absurdity reigns, and his efforts become ever more frantic and darkly hilarious.

      Copyright 2014 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

11. • premium: True
    • source:
    • content:

      Starred review from February 1, 2014
      A subtle English translation delivers a French novel written by an Afghan novelist inspired by a Russian masterpiece. In a rare imaginative feat, Rahimi re-creates the superman-murderer Raskolnikov in the passionate Rassoul, a tortured soul living out his own tale of crime and punishment on the streets of Kabul. As he lifts an axe against the madam who has prostituted his beloved Sophia, this introspective protagonist recognizes that he has plunged into the same turbid depths he previously contemplated as a student of Dostoevsky. Rahim indeed deftly plays off Dostoevsky's themes as he probes not only the killer's individual conscience but also the collective moral and spiritual dilemmas of his native land. These dilemmas reflect the tragic consequences of protracted war pitting Soviet invaders galvanized by Communist ideology against native mujahideen steeped in ancient tradition and fired by Islamic zeal. In his quest for expiation and forgiveness, Rassoul finds hope in Sophia, just as Raskolnikov does in Sonja. In his hero's searing self-examination, Rahimi renews many of Dostoevsky's original psychological insights and opens piercing new ones. Unforgettable.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)

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Reading Dostoevsky in Afghanistan becomes “crime without punishment”
Rassoul remembers reading Crime and Punishment as a student of Russian literature in Leningrad, so when, with axe in hand, he kills the wealthy old lady who prostitutes his beloved Sophia, he thinks twice before taking her money or killing the woman whose voice he hears from another room. He wishes only to expiate his crime and be rightfully punished. Out of principle, he gives himself up to the police. But his country, after years of civil war, has fallen into chaos. In Kabul there is only violence, absurdity, and deafness, and Rassoul’s desperate attempt to be heard turns into a farce.
This is a novel that not only flirts with literature but also ponders the roles of sin, guilt, and redemption in the Muslim world. At once a nostalgic ode to the magic of Persian tales and a satire on the dire reality of now, A Curse on Dostoevsky also portrays the resilience and wit...

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