term paper 2

Wendell Pfeffer

4/13/14

Term paper – part 2

           

            After Raskolnikov committed the murders his character completely changes as he thinks over the consequences to his actions. He recounts over the whole process from the beginning to the end of the murder and even obsesses over the incredibly small details. This is to make sure that he didn’t leave a trace of evidence that can directly be brought back to him. Still though even after making sure that everything was okay he enters a state of paranoia as he makes up wrong occurrences in his head that never even happened. This is when Raskolnikov really begins to fear for his freedom as an individual. He does not want to spend the rest of his life in a Siberian prison and thus out becomes delirious, sick and mentally ill. This forces him to spend the next few days in bed. At the time when I was reading Crime and Punishment I was a little bit perplexed to find out how people were not realizing that Raskolnikov was the one responsible for committing the murders. I mean two people are killed and on the same day a well-known client of the victim becomes sick and lies on a bed incapable of functioning, it’s evident that there was something wrong here. People simply were just helping him and hoping that he would get better. I mean I understand the people’s point of view and how they must of thought that Raskolnikov would never do such a thing, but it’s obvious! Instead of realizing and putting Raskolnikov under bars they blamed the entirety of the crime on the painter. Porfiry on the other hand in my opinion did become suspicious of Raskolnikov. While he was sleeping he searched his whole apartment for clues or anything that might lead to the crime. Unfortunately he found nothing, but the main point here is that out of everyone he was the only one that was able to determine who was the actual person responsible for the crime. 

            The internal remorse and fear of being punished is really taking a toll on Raskolnikov. His character, physical appearance, and state of mind have all degraded immensely. Every time he hears information about the murder his face turns pale and becomes extremely insecure. He also begins to act in a strange manner making it seem really obvious that he did something wrong. His mind and body cannot seem to rest until he truly believes that he is safe from prosecution.