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Abstract:

The article is devoted to various aspects of the Napoleonic myth in the literature, culture and public life of Russia in the first two thirds of the 19th century and their reflection in Fyodor Dostoevsky’s novel Crime and Punishment (1866), whose main character, Rodion Raskolnikov, regards the murder of an old pawnbroker as his path to becoming a new Napoleon. The first section of the article analyzes the hero’s theory about the great legislators and founders of humanity, who, according to him, “were all criminals.” The names of great people mentioned by Raskolnikov (Lycurgus, Solon, Mohammed, Kepler, Newton and Napoleon) are considered in the context of the Napoleonic myth, since it is fundamental to the hero’s self-awareness. In the second section of the work, special attention is paid to the historical and cultural fusion of Napoleon and Mohammed, since these two images merge together in Raskolnikov’s mind: Bonaparte is depicted by him in the clothes of the prophet of Muslims. It is shown what stands behind this fusion, and how a stable perception of Napoleon as the “Mahomet of Modern Time” arose in world culture. In the third section the author for the first time explores the image and role of the English scientist Sir Isaac Newton in the novel, whom Napoleon in his youth was guided by, in the same way as Raskolnikov himself is guided by Napoleon. In the fourth section, Raskolnikov’s Napoleonism is analyzed through immersion in the history of the wars between Russia and France and the Russian sectarian movement, in which one or more sects of schismatics who worshipped Napoleon stood out in the 1820s and 1840s. The latter, according to reports from secret police agents, secretly gathered in Moscow and worshipped the bust of Emperor Napoleon, believing that he was not dead, but alive, and would soon appear to “command the Orthodox regiments to restore the destroyed order.” The fifth section examines the perception of the Second Italian Campaign of the First Consul of the French Republic, Napoleon Bonaparte, in the works of Fyodor Dostoevsky. In the sketches for the novel Crime and Punishment, the writer twice mentioned the Battle ofMarengo, which took place on June 14, 1800, and laid the foundation for Napoleonic power, and in an unclear context. For the first time, a possible historical source of Dostoevsky’s record “to spend 100,000 at Marengo” has been established. An attempt is also made to analyze Rodion Raskolnikov’s mistake in the main text of the novel Crime and Punishment about Napoleon’s crossing the Alps, which was not noticed by any of the previous commentators. The sixth section is devoted to the symbiosis of the Napoleonic and solar myth. The call by investigator Porfiry Petrovich to Rodion Raskolnikov during their third conversation to “become the sun” affects not only the Christian side of the hero’s personality, as researchers have already written about, but also the Napoleonic one. Special attention is paid to the evolution of the concept of “Austerlitz’s Sun,” which is usually understood as Napoleon’s greatest triumph in his entire military career, and the centuries-old tradition of identifying great rulers with the Sun (Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, Louis XIV, Napoleon, etc.). The seventh section presents an analysis of the paradoxical juxtaposition of “Napoleon” and “the louse” in the novel Crime and Punishment. Raskolnikov, who dreams of becoming the new Napoleon of St. Petersburg, considers the murder of Alyona Ivanovna as his path to greatness, and at the same time repeatedly and consistently calls her a “louse.” The nature of Raskolnikov’s mysterious illness—repeatedly described in the novel as a “fever”—is examined. It is demonstrated that, for the protagonist, “Napoleon” and “the louse” are not truly antagonistic concepts but instead exist in a state of cannibalistic symbiosis. The eighth section is devoted to the analysis of the presence in the novel Crime and Punishment of off-stage characters with symbolic surnames: the student Pokorev and General Kobelev, who had not previously attracted the attention of researchers. The surname Pokorev, who gives Raskolnikov the address of the old Alyona Ivanovna, is explained through the verb “to conquer / submit” and in connection with a reference to the history of Napoleon. It is also hypothesized that the prototype of General Kobelev for the novel is the real Lieutenant General Pavel Denisovich Kobelev (1793–1877). The final ninth section of the article describes a specific socio-cultural phenomenon, which the author calls the “Napoleonic” St. Petersburg. In the late 1830s to 1860s, the Napoleonic myth manifested itself in many aspects of the social and cultural life of the capital of the Russian Empire: the names of public institutions, restaurant menus, apartment decorations, museum curiosities, monuments, street performances, theatrical productions, literary works, psychological emulation of Napoleon, and so on. It is proved that without considering these urban realities, it is impossible to thoroughly understand the Napoleonic idea of Raskolnikov and other St. Petersburg Napoleonic heroes of Dostoevsky.

Keywords: Dostoevsky, Crime and Punishment, Napoleon, Napoleonic myth, Rodion Raskolnikov’s theory, Lycurgus, Solon, Mohammed, Kepler, Newton, Napoleonism, sects of Napoleon’s admirers, solar myth, Austerlitz’s Sun, Dostoevsky’s Petersburg, louse, typhus epidemic in the war of 1812, characters’ prototypes, surnames of literary characters, the main character’s mistake, the Battle of Marengo, Bonaparte’s crossing of the St. Bernard.