Dostoevsky, Fyodor Mikhailovich
Dostoevsky, Fyodor Mikhailovich ( 1821 – 81 ),Russian prose writer. Born in Moscow, he studied from 1838 to 1843 at the St Petersburg Engineering Academy. His first published work, a translation of Balzac 's Eugénie Grandet, appeared in 1844 , followed by his first original work, the short story ‘Poor Folk’ ( 1846 ), ‘The Double’ ( 1846 ), ‘White Nights’ ( 1848 ), and other short prose pieces. In April 1849 Dostoevsky was arrested as a member of the socialist Petrashevsky circle. After a macabre mock execution, he was sent to a Siberian penal settlement for four years, to be followed by four years as a private soldier. During his imprisonment he underwent a religious crisis, rejecting the socialism and progressive ideas of his early years, and replacing them by a belief in the Russian Orthodox Church and the Russian people. His next publication, The Village of Stepanchikovo, appeared...
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