POLEMIC WITH DOSTOEVSKY ON “DEMONS”: THE PROBLEM OF MISUNDERSTANDING OF THE NOVEL IN THE LIFETIME CRITICISM (1871?1873)

The criticism that Dostoevsky's Demons attracted in his lifetime is relatively unpopular with modern scholars. The reason for this is clear: the critics did not understand Dostoevsky's novel. Our article provides an analysis of the reviews of both the journal and the book versions of Demons (1871?1873). The earliest responses to the novel appeared immediately after the publication had begun in 1871. For two years, the author had been reading the critics' opinions which in this or that way could have influenced his creative process. Dostoevsky could have accepted or rejected these contributions, but the criticism definitely did leave a mark on his writing. Among those who took part in the critical discussion of Demons were the reviewers from the Sankt-Peterburgskie Vedomosti, Golos and Iskra newspapers, as well as the magazines Otechestvennye Zapiski and Delo: V. Burenin, L. Paniutin, A. G. Kovner, M. G. Vil'de, A. M. Skabichevsky, D. Minayev, N. Mikhailovsky, N. Demetr, P. Tkachev, etc. Common for all of them was the claim that the novel is a phantasmagory and thus has little artistic merit. On the whole, critics did not react positively to Demons, attacking their author as a reactionary, a renegade, obscurantist, or deranged epileptoid. Dostoevsky was accused of slandering the youth. We make a special focus on the Christian aspects of the novel and the earliest critics' discussion of these aspects, including negative responses.