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| “ | You spoke of outrage just now, Avdotya Romanovna. In that case you may be sure I've taken measures. Sofya Semyonovna is not at home. The Kapernaumovs are far away -- there are five locked rooms between. I am at least twice as strong as you are and I have nothing to fear, besides. For you could not complain afterwards. You surely would not be willing actually to betray your brother? Besides, no one would believe you. How should a girl have come alone to visit a solitary man in his lodgings? So that even if you do sacrifice your brother, you could prove nothing. It is very difficult to prove an assault, Avdotya Romanovna. | „ |
| ~ Svidrigailov threatening to rape Dounia if she doesn't fold under his blackmail. |
Arkady Ivanovich Svidrigailov, simply known as Svidrigailov, is the main antagonist of Fyodor Dostoevsky's 1866 masterpiece Crime and Punishment. He is a wealthy and depraved sensualist and the former employer of Dounia, the protagonist Raskolnikov's sister, whom he spends the entire novel trying to win over with manipulation, promises of wealth and blackmail.
History[]
Past[]
Not much is known about Svidrigailov's past other than he was born in the 1810's, served in the calavary for two years and "knocked about" in Saint Petersburg before marrying his wife Marfa. He then moved to live in the country. His nasty gambling habits led to him briefly being thrown into debtor's prison, before Marfa bailed him out.
In the country[]
Svidrigailov quickly realizes he can't be faithful to his wife due to his insatiable lust for women, so he makes an unwritten contract with her that he can sleep with whomever he wants, so long as he keeps her in the know and stays romantically commited to her.
He lives with her in a mansion in the country, and has many maids (many of whom he shows a ravenous sexual appetite for) and serfs keeping the place clean. One day, he rapes a mute and deaf 15-year old girl, leading her to commit suicide. He also continually abuses a male servant until the latter takes his own life in shame.
Eventually Svidrigailov takes note of Dounia, a young woman in her early twenties and the hired governess of his family, and immediately realizes his attraction to her is stronger than anything he's ever experienced, so chooses to ignore her at first. Marfa however catches on to this and feels immensely jealous, not only because her husband is being dishonest with her in spite of their agreement, but also because she herself has fallen in love with Dounia.
At some point in time, Dounia confronts Svidrigailov for beating and raping a girl by the name of Parasha (described as a 'black-eyed wench' by Svidrigailov himself), and Svidrigailov, seeing an opportunity, fakes regret and throws himself onto Dounia, begging her to help him better himself. They form a sort of bond on the basis of this, but when Dounia begins to grasp Svidrigailov's true sinister intentions, she bluntly rejects him, scared by the glow in his eyes. Svidrigailov immediately turns vindictive and twists the situation, telling the already tense Marfa that Dounia has been attempting a sexual relationship with him. This causes Marfa to utterly condemn and publicly shame Dounia which promptly turns the entire town against her.
Svidrigailov however, not quite being over his lust for Dounia, decides to lay the truth bare, encouraging Marfa to show around a letter which Dounia had written to him, reproaching him for his atrocious actions with clear hatred. Marfa then arranges for a distant relative of hers, rich counsellor Pyotr Luzhin , to meet and discuss marriage with Dounia, in recompense for all the damage dealt to her life. Shortly after this, Svidrigailov kills Marfa, most likely by way of poison as he had previously hinted in an obsessive conversation with Dounia.
In Saint Petersburg[]
At some time in the story, Svidrigailov travels back to Saint Petersburg to return to his base ways, and just as importantly continue to creep on Dounia, who with her mother Pulcheria and Luzhin go there to meet with Raskolnikov. Svidrigailov develops secret designs to get Luzhin out of the way so he can once more claim Dounia as his. However, in the intervening days before this plot, Svidrigailov begins flaunting his wealth in the most morally abhorrent ways, offering a down-on-her-luck single mother dance training and education for her 13-year old child, and flagrantly arranging an imminent marriage with a 15-year old girl, quite clearly revelling in their monstrous age gap.
Eventually, he learns Rodya (Raskilnikov)'s address and goes to visit him, currently unaware that the latter is suffering through periods of severe panic and delirium after having murdered an old pawnbroker and her little sister who sadly was a witness. Rodya asks what his business is here, radiating with animosity. Svidrigailov states he's here for two reasons, one being that he simply wanted to meet Rodya, the other that he's heard of Luzhin and doesn't consider him a proper match for Dounia. He offers to pay her ten thousand rubles so she doesn't have to depend on the counsellor, but Rodya instantly accuses Svidrigailov of working toward his own ulterior motives. Svidrigailov denies this, revealing he is engaged (though not detailing the age of his bride). Rodya never warms up to Svidrigailov, but still participates in a conversation where the latter goes on an litany of eerie theories, musing that the afterlife might just be a tiny stuffy room full of spiders, and purporting to have been visited by the ghost of both Marfa and his dead male serf (whom he drove to suicide) on multiple occassions. He eventually leaves, absenting himself from the story for a while.
Rodya later decides to reveal the ten thousand rubles to Dounia and Pulcheria, despite not trusting Svidrigailov. This exasparates Luzhin, who picked Dounia as his bride expressly due to her porverty, revealing his true colors and getting him evicted from the family. During the funeral of briefly known friend of Rodya, Marmeladov, Luzhin intrudes, trying to frame the daughter of the deceased man, 18-year old prostitute Sonia (Sofya Semyonovna) as a thief to soil Rodya's reputation (as he supports her family and has formed a personal connection with her). However, Luzhin is outed as the perpetrator, and this causes a massive commotion, causing Sonya's mother Katerina to be evicted from the apartment along with all of her younger kids.
Rodya goes to Sonya (who lives in her own apartment separate from Katerina) and continues to vent his deepest feelings to her. At last he confesses his homicides to her, claiming that he was doing it due to his theory of great men being permitted to commit acts of evil in order to advance the world in a way that, by and large, benefits its people. He immediately backs down on this though, and Sonya encourages the pitiful man to confess, which he refuses to to at the moment, but might consider. Unbeknownst to both of them, Svidrigailov happens to have booked the apartment next door, and has overheard the entire thing.
A little later in the story, after Katerina tragically perishes in the streets, Svidrigailov emerges to financially support Sonya and her siblings with an exorbitant amount of rubles. In private, Rodya asks what his incentive is. Svidrigailov doesn't answer, but goes on to insult the deceased Katerina, wielding the exact same vocabulary Rodya had used to vilify the pawnbroker and justify his own crimes. Rodya now realizes Svidrigailov is aware he's the murderer and plunges into a bout of delirious episodes.
When he comes to, he is confronted by the investigator Porfiry who also reveals he has figured him out and suggests he turn himself in before he's arrested by the investigator himself in a couple of days, as this might lighten his prison sentence. Rodya goes for a walk and, seemingly by chance, encounters Svidrigailov in a sordid tavern. However, the nobleman reveals he had given Rodya the location as he was lapsing in and out of consciousness. The young Russian indignantly asks what Svidrigailov wants to tell him, if anything, but Svidrigailov maintains he has no evil plans that he is waiting to actuate. However, he goes on a series of monologues, relaxed by the wine he's been drinking, divulging the true sickness of his characters, here under his pedophilic tendencies and his sadistic joy in Rodya's appalled reactions. He claims his bottomless heinousness is irredeemable, and so he sees no point in not committing to it. Svidrigailov strides out onto the streets, but when he notices Rodya trailing after him with obvious hostility, he sneers that Rodya had better shoot himself.
Rodya walks off, and Svidrigailov is met by Dounia, whom he sent a letter to off-screen. While still distrustful of him, she has come to Svidrigailov because he claimed he knows Rodya has committed a huge crime. Svidrigailov offers to discuss the situation further in his apartment along with Sonya, who turns out not to be present when they get there. Svidrigailov begins to recount what he heard, and while Dounia at first brushes it off, she finds the truth more and more undeniable as Svidrigailov goes over Rodya's theory of the normal man and the extraordinary man. Disturbed, she attempts to exit the room but finds that the door is locked. Svidrigailov pathetically pleads with her, vowing that he will help them all leave the country with heavy wallets if only she says yes to him. When she continues to say no, his demeanor changes. He emphatically informs her that no one is home or will be for a long time, that he is stronger than her and that if she were to accuse him of rape, no one would believe her, as she had followed him all the way into his lodgings. Terrified, Dounia whips out a revolver from her pocket. Svidrigailov at first recognizes it as his, but Dounia stresses it was Marfa's, and that he killed her. Svidrigailov smirks that if he really did kill his wife, he would've done it for Dounia. Dounia fires the revolver once, grazing Svidrigailov's scalp. He barks at her to try again, but at length she gives up. Svidrigailov, apprehending that she will never submit to him, lets her go.
He pays Sonya a bunch of rubles and checks in at a lousy motel where he has horrific nightmares including floods, mouses, his previous child victims and a little 5-year old girl who beckons him like a demented harlot. The next morning, he marches out in public and commits suicide by shooting himself.
Personality[]
Svidrigailov is an awful man who follows his whims, caprices and monstrous desires with zero regard for the well-being of everyone else, at various instance expressing glee at the sight of their suffering. He has a predilection for little girls, and a general fixation on power dynamics. It also seems he is genuinely aroused by Dounia's justified disgust for him, until of course it turns out she can never be broken or tamed. In some sense, he can be seen as a grotesque parody of the "extraordinary man", a creature on which Rodya has many times pondered. He rejects the norms of society, considers moral ties a farce and is evidently absolutely honest with himself when it comes to the depravity of his character, as seen when he chides Rodya for being hypocritical in calling out his immorality of Svidrigailov's crimes while simultaneously being torn up inside by the hidden crimes of his own. Indeed, Svidrigailov plays an imperative part in Rodya's abdication of his cynical world view.
His most ostensibly redeeming qualities are often secretly his most depraved. He has a record of financially supporting impoverished children, but to the nefarious end of exploiting them in some way or the other. He also vehemently rejects his old evil ways, but he only does this to his advantage, such as when he attempts to cozy up to Rodya as part of his grand plan, or when he manipulates Dounia into feeling she has to 'save' him, using and abusing her undying sense of morality and forming a bond on the basis of a false wish for personal betterment.
However, as rare as they are, Svidrigailov shows signs that could genuinely be interpreted as remorse. These include apparently seeing the ghostly apparitions of those he took the lives of, his horrid nightmares, his paying Sonya even as he plots to kill himself and of course, the suicide itself. It seems that the moment Svidrigailov's delusions of grandeur crumbled, the partition between him and the world of humans with hopes, feelings and dreams, he found himself entirely too incompatible with it all to keep on existing.
Trivia[]
- Svidrigailov is the one of the five characters other than Rodya to get a chunk of the narrative told from his perspective, along with Luzhin, Razumihin, Dounia and Sonya.
- Svidrigailov effectively serves as the overarching antagonist of the first two thirds of the book, with Luzhin filling the role of the Heavy, before finally appearing to the characters (Luzhin exits the narrative shortly after this).
- Svidrigailov was named after Svitrigaila, a fourteenth-century duke of Lithuania.