Dostoevsky and Poe: Conceptions of the Fantastic

In any case, we see why Burnett, along with most other critics mentioned in this survey, find striking similarities between Poe and Dostoevsky's respective artistic techniques in the above-quoted passage, causing them to speculate that Poe served as a model for Dostoevsky's discovery of fantastic realism at this crucial juncture in the latter's development as a writer, indeed at the very time (1861) that Frank insists was when Dostoevsky first developed this approach. We quote from Burnett's commentary on Kent's analysis:

"by stating that `the supernatural is relegated to the demands of reality', Kent would imply that this is a failure (it is `relegated' not, for instance, `subordinated') rather than acknowledge that the hierarchy of values that places reality above the supernatural is one that is common to Poe and Dostoevsky. In similar vein, he turns what for Dostoevsky constituted praise into censure by identifying Poe as one who `details what Lewis and Radcliffe only suggest', regarding this characteristic as a restriction, a treatment of `psychological' statesin a conventional, romanticized way', whereas the `conventional, romanticized way' (allowing such a way to exist) is surely to suggest rather than to detail. Far from being a restriction, Poe's presentation of abnormal, psychological states with the power of specific detail was to Dostoevsky a model for the `fantastic realism' that came to characterize the Russian novelist's later fiction." Burnett, Leon. “Dostoevsky, Poe and the Discovery of Fantastic Realism.” F.M. Dostoevsky (1821-1881): A Centenary Collection. Ed. Leon Burnett. Oxford: Holdan Books, 1981, 60..

Finally, to Kent's assertion that "Poe usually describes his personal nightmares and fantasies. His failure to express a meaningful, depersonalized, mature vision or point of view, may account, in part, for his limitation," Kent, Keaonard J. The Subconscious in Gogol' and Dostoevskij, and Its Antecedents. The Hague: Mouton, 1969, 42. Burnett argues that it "is an outdated misappraisal that requires no further repudiation after the masterly annotated edition of Mabbott." Burnett, Leon. “Dostoevsky, Poe and the Discovery of Fantastic Realism.” F.M. Dostoevsky (1821-1881): A Centenary Collection. Ed. Leon Burnett. Oxford: Holdan Books, 1981, 61. (Thomas Ollive Mabbott (1898-1968) wrote what is widely considered the most authoritative collection of Poe's poetry and tales, which is a standard reference for Poe scholarship.)

One of the most important critical studies on the question of Poe and Dostoevsky is a relevant section of J. D. Grossman's book Edgar Allan Poe in Russia: A Study in Legend and Literary Influence, published in 1973. In the beginning of "Chapter III, Poe and the Romantic Realists," J. D. Grossman notes that Poe's influence can be felt during the "great period of the Russian realistic novel" --that is, from the 1850s to the 1880s--and particularly in two of the great novelists--Dostoevsky and Turgenev. J. D. Grossman also highlights the fact that the Symbolists associated Dostoevsky with Poe: "The Symbolists without hesitation joined the names of Dostoevskij and Poe. With the advantage of hindsight and a changed literary atmosphere they saw in Dostoevskij the `first decadent' and linked him with Poe through their treatment of the perverse." Grossman, J. D. Edgar Allan Poe in Russia: A Study in Legend and Literary Influence. Wurzburg: Jal Verlag, 1973, 44.

However, contemporaries of Dostoevsky also made a similar connection between Poe and Dostoevsky, as J. D. Grossman illustrates with a quotation from an obituary of Dostoevsky published in 1881 in The Academy, a London weekly: "He stood unrivalled in the analysis of feeling, but it was nearly always feeling of a morbid tinge which characterised his productions. This has full scope in the delineation of the murderer's remorse in Crime and Punishment, but reaches a still greater height in The Brothers Karamazov The somber hues with which he invests his stories and the spell with which he enthrals the reader remind one forcibly of Edgar Poe." Ibid., 44-45.

We note in passing that it is not only "the somber hues" and "the spell" Dostoevsky casts on his readers that remind us of Edgar Allan Poe, but the the theme of murderers' anguish and repentance as well, which is present in two of the three short stories of Poe's that Dostoevsky published in Vremya.

J.D. Grossman concludes that Dostoevsky's 1961 introduction to Poe's three stories in Vremya is the logical starting point for a "modest investigation." Modesty is prescribed because, "It should be clear at once that there is no intimation here of a powerful influence, however hidden. For one thing, the disproportion is too large. While Dostoevskij himself said that Poe's talent was a great one, the term is elastic, and Dostoevskij's use of it suggests fascination with but not absorption in the American's writings. Furthermore, Dostoevsky's article is after all brief and not totally favorable." Ibid., 45.

It is worth noting that J.D. Grossman's assessment about Poe's possible influence on Dostoevsky is somewhat more reserved and circumspect than one of her primarily predecessor in relation to this question L.P. Grossman's evaluation. As we have already seen, the Russian critic claimed that, "Быть можетъ, изъ вс?хъ писателей, когда либо прочитанныхъ Достоевскимъ, самымъ родственнымъ ему оказался Эдгаръ По." Ibid., 115. Furthermore, he located several instances in which Dostoevsky most likely borrowed from his American kindred spirit. S.B. Purdy concluded similarly that Poe was "perhaps one of Dostoevsky's most important literary sources." Purdy, S. B. “Poe and Dostoyevsky.” Studies in Short Fiction, 4 (1967), 171.

However, J. D. Grossman notes that "The Tell-Tale" and "The Black Cat" should be analyzed and cites Alfred Bern's statement that Dostoevsky was particularly receptive and susceptible to literary influence, and that it is within the ideas hidden in the Russian novelist's works that traces of his influences can be found. It is largely in the "circle of ideas hidden" in Dostoevsky's works that we will attempt to locate traces of Poe's influence later in this investigation. Moreover, we believe that this approach at least somewhat mitigates L. P. Grossman's cautionary note about the vast difference in scale between Poe and Dostoevsky's works and artistic achievements. J. D. Grossman, proceeding along similar lines, begins her analysis with the features of Poe's art that Dostoevsky himself highlights and the work of Dostoevsky's that most clearly reflects these features, Crime and Punishment (1866).

Reminding us that Dostoevsky characterized his own novel as "the psychological account of a crime," Grossman, J. D. Edgar Allan Poe in Russia: A Study in Legend and Literary Influence. Wurzburg: Jal Verlag, 1973, 45. J. D. Grossman also draws our attention to Philip Rahv's comment that it is distinguished from Dostoevsky's other works in that it concentrates so exclusively on this theme. J. D. Grossman continues, "The entire work is marked by a cohesiveness and economy not typical of Dostoevskij's novels, with its central theme being detection, but of the motive rather than the crime itself. The motive is never finally determined. And indeed, Rahv holds that "the indeterminacy is the point. Dostoevskij is the first novelist to have fully accepted and dramatized the principle of uncertainty or indeterminacy in the presentation of character, aware as he is "of the problematical nature of the modern personality and of its tortuous efforts to stem the disintegration threatening it." Ibid., 46.

Indeed, we believe that this indeterminacy that Rahv and J. D. Grossman note is related to the notion of perversion, the symptoms of which include extreme moral ambivalence extending to paralysis, a weakened will, and self-destructive behavior. Furthermore, we recall that Purdy posited Dostoevsky's exploration of the perversion of human nature "either take up where Poe left off or provide an astonishing coincidence in literary thought" (Purdy 171).

Working with this observation about indeterminacy in Crime and Punishment, J.D. Grossman addresses the question of Rakolnikov's apparent lack of a clear motive for murdering the pawnbroker. She muses about what combination of Raskolnikov's Napoleon complex, pecuniary reward, and a subconscious compulsion may have played part in his crime, citing a passage in which Raskolnikov's state of mind just prior to conceiving of the idea of murdering the pawnbroker takes shape. The excerpt J.D. Grossman provides, reduced to the elements that most remind us of Poe, especially the gradual buildup to murder as well as the enjoyment found in vexing oneself that are present in "The Tell-Tale Heart" and "The Black Cat": "So he tortured himself, fretting himself with such questions [about his family] and finding a kind of enjoyment in itLong, long ago his present anguish had its first beginnings; it had waxed and gather strength, it had matured and concentrated, until it had taken the form of a fearful, frenzied and fantastic question, which tortured his heart and mind, clamouring insistently for an answer ( our emphasis). Ibid., 47

J.D. Grossman, after quoting another passage from Crime and Punishment in which the narrator describes Raskolnikov's idea of murder as a dream and then as a sort of feverish hallucination, notes that from the very first page of Crime and Punishment the theme of Raskolnikov's psychological illness that goes together with his crime is made clear. This occurs in "The Tell-Tale Heart" as well, indeed in the very first sentence: "True!--nervous--very, very dreadfully nervous I had been and am; but why will you say that I am mad?" Ibid., 47 Furthermore, he discusses his apparent auditory hallucinations. Thus the question of the protagonist's sanity as well as his hallucinations are strikingly similar in both texts.

The mystery of a motiveless crime--rather than a traditional mystery story in which the identity of the murderer provides the dramatic tension--is another moment of parity between the two texts under examination. As J. D. Grossman states, "The motivation, or lack of it, is flaunted in Poe's tale. It is pure obsession and as such reaches down for its real roots in the unconscious." Ibid. From Poe's text we read, "It is impossible to say how first the idea entered my brain; but once conceived, it haunted me day and night. Object there was none. Passion there was none. I loved the old man. He had never wronged me. He had never given me insult. For his gold I had no desire. I think it was his eye!" Ibid.

Grossman observes that Raskolnikov is no more sure of "what he killed in the old pawnbroker Alena Ivanovna" (he eventually decides that it was himself, or his soul, that he killed) than he is really sure of why. "And while Raskol'nikov is complex and self-doubting from the start, Poe's character is rescued from a two-dimensional form by the very fact of the irrational character of his act, suggesting a third dimension, downward into psychic depths." Ibid.

Indeed, especially considering the "compression" required by Poe's chosen form that J. D. Grossman mentions, it is a strikingly efficient mechanism for transforming the narrator into a complex character. Furthermore, J.D. Grossman notes that in Dostoevsky's first, unfinished draft of Crime and Punishment was in the form of a murderer's confession made in a diary, which is much closer to the first-person, confessional narration of "The Tell-Tale Heart." She speculates that Dostoevsky abandoned the first-person format when it became "too economical for a novel." Ibid., 48.

Like L. P. Grossman did in his Dostoevsky's Library, J. D. Grossman touches upon the superman concept as another moment of similarity between Poe and Dostoevsky. However, whereas L. P. Grossman ascribes superman-complex type qualities to Poe's heroes, J.D. Grossman, is, once again, more reticent, noting that the concept of the superman, while featured frequently in Dostoevsky's works, was unformulated in Poe's time, although she allows that Poe's murderer "surely considers himself a species of `exceptional man,' as evidenced by the proclamations with his own supposed cleverness of the narrator of "The Tell-Tale Heart." This, in turn, could have been assimilated by Dostoevsky.

J. D. Grossman also claims that the moral aspect of this concept doesn't play out in "The Tell-Tale Heart." While it is certainly true that the moral question of the protagonist's actions is less pronounced than in Crime and Punishment, nonetheless, the narrator's own preoccupation with his inexplicable motivation for killing the old man, as well as the general format of "crime and punishment" in Poe's tale, and the consistency of Poe's moral universe to be gleaned from his other works, especially "William Wilson," and, finally, the fundamentally moral nature of the Imp of the Perverse in general--which has certainly bitten the mad narrator of "The Tell-Tale Heart"--all suggest that a moral component to the tale is not entirely absent.

Moreover, the "dress rehearsals" that both Poe and Dostoevsky's murderers go through before actually committing their crimes lead J. D. Grossman to speculate that the Russian novelist may have used the procedures of the narrator of "The Tell-Tale Heart" as a model. Each plans his crime with cunning and attention to detail: Raskol'nikov knows that the steps from his lodging to the pawnbroker's house number "exactly seven hundred and thirty. He had counted them once when he had been lost in dreams." Poe's assassin moves with caution and superb control, as precisely at midnight every night he beams the lantern's ray at the hateful eye. The chief difference is perhaps that the latter is always on top of his task, reveling in his sagacity, taking a sadistic pleasure in his victim's terror, while the saner Raskol'nikov goes through the agonies of indecision. "Possibly it is no accident that the pounding of a heart figures in Raskol'nikov's crime as well, though it is his own heart, thumping so violently that he fears it may alarm his victim." Ibid., 48-49.

We would only add that in both cases, all of these preparations and calculations are ultimately futile, a fact that is hinted at by the titles of both works. There is certainly a note of irony in the fact that there is something intrinsic to the psychologies of both murderers that not only leads them to kill, but also compels them to reveal their crimes. Indeed, we are reminded of the general proposition of Poe's Eureka: "In the Original Unity of the First Thing lies the Secondary Cause of All Things, with the Germ of their Inevitable Annihilation." Poe, E. A., Eureka: A Prose Poem. New York, NY: George Putnam, 1848.

In any case, both Poe's murderer in "The Tell-Tale Heart" and Raskolnikov lurk in hiding and await the proper moment to commit their crimes in a similar fashion in scenes with "some similarity of detail and atmosphere." Grossman, J. D. Edgar Allan Poe in Russia: A Study in Legend and Literary Influence. Wurzburg: Jal Verlag, 1973, 49. Moreover, both characters seem to experience a heightened sense of hearing just prior to committing their respective murders, as J.D. Grossman demonstrates by juxtaposing the descriptions of the above-mentioned scenes in which they stalk their victims. Furthermore, J.D. Grossman does not mention the fact that both characters are enamored with their own cunning. From "The Tell-Tale Heart" we read:

"And every night, about midnight, I turned the latch of his door and opened it--oh so gently! And then, when I had made an opening sufficient for my head, I put in a dark lantern, all closed, closed, that no light shone out, and then I thrust in my head. Oh, you would have laughed to see how cunningly I thrust it in! I moved it slowly--very, very slowly, so that I might not disturb the old man's sleep." Poe, 303.

Meanwhile the narrator says of Raskolnikov: "Recalling it afterwards, that moment stood out in his mind vividly, distinctly, for ever; he could not make out how he had had such cunning" (Crime and Punishment, quoted from J.D. Grossman 50, our emphasis). Blood is another moment of possible correspondence. In addition to J.D. Grossman's observation that Raskolnikov is careful not to get blood on himself, while Poe's murder smothers his victim with a pillow, thus leaving no traces of blood at the murder scene, we can also add that while dismembering and disposing the body of the old man, he is similarly cautious:

"If still you think me mad, you will think so no longer when I describe the wise precautions I took for the concealment of the body. The night waned, and I worked hastily, but in silence. First of all I dismembered the corpse. I cut off the head and the arms and the legs. I then took up three planks from the flooring of the chamber, and deposited all between the scantlings. I then replaced the boards so cleverly, so cunningly, that no human eye--not even his--could have detected anything wrong. There was nothing to wash out--no stain of any kind--no blood-spot whatever. I had been too wary for that. A tub had caught all--ha! Ha!" Ibid., 796.

Of course, avoiding leaving behind traces of blood either on one's person or at the scene of the crime is likely to be a consideration that any murderer would be faced with and we do not wish to cast about overzealously for evidence to support the argument that "The Tell-Tale Heart" was a model for certain aspects of Crime and Punishment. Nonetheless, it is the abundance of similarities that are ultimately convincing.

J.D. Grossman goes on to discuss the resemblance between the detective story aspects of the two stories in question. She notes that both are not true detective stories, according to the definitions of Rйgis Messac and Poe himself, since the identities of the murderers are known from the start. "However, in both the converse side of the detection process is shown, as the reader wonders when and how the criminal will be broken down." Grossman, J. D., 51.

Moreover, "Surely the bravado of Poe's criminal as he shows the detectives the murder chamber and plants his chair over the concealing floorboards anticipates Raskol'nikov's behaviour in the restaurant with the clerk Zametov, when he impudently advances to the very brink of confession." Ibid. Perhaps even more important than the two murderers' self-sabotaging bravado is the fact that Raskolnikov's interviews with the detective Porfiry Petrovich irresistibly, and initially without overt interrogation, lead the former to make his confession after polite conversation, just as occurs in "The Tell-Tale Heart" when the narrator sits down for a chat with the police. Furthermore, J. D. Grossman implies that the police were waiting for a confession from Poe's killer, despite their convivial demeanors, which is essentially the same technique Porfiry Petrovich employed to elicit Raskolnikov's confession. Dostoevsky's detective, as Astrov noted, "has much more of Poe's Monsieur Dupin than of the methods practiced by the real magistrates in those days." Astrov, Vladimir. “Dostoievsky on Edgar Allan Poe.” American Literature, 14 (1942), 72. Indeed Dupin was the literary prototype of the detective whose method is based on logical deduction and had appeared 25 years before the publication of Crime and Punishment.

J.D. Grossman also indicates that "The Black Cat" shares many features with "The Tell-Tale Heart" --unmotivated murder, concealment of the victim's corpse in the within the house, all followed by murderer's psychological collapse. In relation to Crime and Punishment, we should note that the murder weapon is the same--an axe--and is used in both cases to commit a double-murder. Grossman mentions that Poe's narrator loves animals so much that he considered killing his cat a murder.

Indeed, Mabbott, in his introduction to "The Black Cat," wrote, "Poe was from his earliest youth very fond of cats. Mabbott, T. O., ed. Collected Works of Edgar Allen Poe:Tales and Sketches, 1843-1849. Cambridge, MA and London, England: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1978, p. 848. In 1840 he seems to conclude that they think. The killing of a cat was for him the slaughter of a reasonable creature. The protagonist of "The Black Cat" was already morally a murderer when his ultimate act of cruelty made him one legally." Poe even uses cats, and his own pet black cat specifically, to examine the reason and instinct in his article "Instinct vs Reason."

Furthermore, while Poe's murderer kills his wife "accidentally" when she tried to save the cat from his axe stroke, Raskolnikov kills Lizaveta without premeditation because she happened to stumble onto the scene of the crime. J.D. Grossman then enters into a theme that is not only central to this study, but has been the object of interest for the majority of critics cited in this literature review. She writes, "Another, more profound element enters Poe's work in this particular story, one which is so central in Dostoevskij's creation that, whatever its origin for him, he could hardly have overlooked it in Poe. This is the element of the perverseIt is the spirit which brought the destruction of the catPoe thought that philosophy had taken no account of thisWhatever the objections to his supposed originality, the concept has certainly not been neglected since his time. In Dostoevskij it is found repeatedly, with special stress on the element of masochism." (J.D. Grossman 52).

In J.D. Grossman's opinion, Notes From Underground is the primary text in which the element of the perverse is to be found in Dostoevsky. She highlights how he employs perversity as a weapon against utopian socialists who held that man is governed, and thus can be guided by, reason. However, the Underground Man understands that, as J.D. Grossman puts it, "Reason is only a fraction of the whole, not the determining factor." Ibid., 53. She also attributes what is essentially a masochistic conception of human freedom to the Underground Man, and by extension, to Dostoevsky, quoting the former: "For it is very possible for a man to feel like acting against his interests and, in some instances, I say that he positively wants to act that way." Notes from Underground, quoted from J.D. Grossman 53. From this J.D. Grossman concludes that, according to Dostoevsky, since a person's free choice can be demonstrated by acting against his or her own best interests, and freedom is the highest good, according to Dostoevsky, then "Man's chronic perversity is at once his chief defect and the symbol and instrument of his freedom." J.D. Grossman 53.

Moreover, J.D. Grossman, like Purdy before her and Harap after her, argues for Dostoevsky's superior perspicacity in exploring the psychology and social ramifications of human perversity: "Poe had not gone this final step, he did not see man's perversity as an advantage. Having stumbled on the edge of the abyss, he only stands horrified and fascinated, looking over the brink." Ibid.

We will have find some cause to question this statement later in this study. Indeed Poe writes in his short story "The Imp of the Perverse," the first two-thirds of which contain his most detailed elaboration of his concept of human perversity: "Examine these similar actions as we will, we shall find them resulting solely from the spirit of the Perverse. We perpetrate them because we feel that we should not. Beyond or behind this there is no intelligible principle; and we might, indeed, deem this perverseness a direct instigation of the Arch-Fiend, were it not occasionally known to operate in furtherance of good" (our emphasis). Poe, Edgar Allan. The Complete Tales and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe, 283. Taking into consideration Poe's words and reflecting on the fact that unless we believe that murderers should be able to commit their crimes with impunity and escape from both the retribution of their bad consciences and that of the judicial system, then it is hard to agree fully with J.D. Grossman's claim. Indeed reading "William Wilson" in which a dissipated swindler destroys his own soul by slaying his guardian-angel double should give us cause to reconsider Poe's moral depth.

In the meantime we will also comment in passing that J.D. Grossman employs interesting imagery to drive home her point about Dostoevsky's greater profundity in depicting perversion. Indeed, in an interesting moment of correspondence, which seems not to have been noted by prior commentators, is that both Poe and Dostoevsky utilize the imagery of being subconsciously drawn to throw oneself off a height--Poe in "The Imp of the Perverse" and The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym and Dostoevsky in "A Gentle Creature"--to illustrate human perversity. We will explore this in detail further on.

J. D. Grossman ends the section of her book on Dostoevsky and Poe with the observations that the evidence suggests that Dostoevsky "imbibed certain things from Poe" and that although, as she claims, the period of the Russian's concentration in the American author's work was probably short-lived, "the impression was definitely made." Grossman, J. D. Edgar Allan Poe in Russia: A Study in Legend and Literary Influence. 53.

G. Bograd, in his article, "Оказал ли влияние Эдгар По на творчесвто Достоевского?" Боград Г. Оказал ли влияние Эдгар По на творчество Достоевский: Материалы и исследования. СПБ., 2010, T. 19. C. 87-98. (Bograd). retraces Jakobson's argument that Dostoevsky may have been inspired by Poe's "The Raven" and "The Philosophy of Composition," which explicates theoretically Poe's most famous poem, while writing his chapter in The Brothers Karamazov that features the conversation between Ivan and the Devil. Bograd tackles the important question of whether or not Dostoevsky had read "The Raven" and "The Philosophy of Composition," noting that Poe's most famous poem was translated twice in 1878, the same year in which the Russian author began work on his The Brothers Karamazov. Furthermore, the first of these translations, that of C. A. Andreevkiy, was published in The Messenger of Europe, a journal that Dostoevsky habitually read. Morever, in the same volume of this journal was published Poe's "The Philosophy of Composition," also translated by Andreevskiy. As further evidence that Dostoevsky was likely familiar with these two works of Poe, Bograd cites the fact that Dostoevsky was personally acquainted with the second translator of "The Raven"-- S. Palmini.

Bograd offers further evidence that Dostoevsky read Palmina's translation of "The Raven." He suggests that the fact that Dostoevsky writes that Alyosha tapped on Ivan's window "frame" (рама), following Palmina's translation of Poe's poem, who was the only translator to choose this wording, rather than "lattice," as in the original poem. In The Brothers Karamazov, Dostoevsky writes: "Стук в оконную раму хотя и продолжался настойчиво, но совсем не так громко, как сейчас только мерещилось ему во сне." Ibid., 90. We might add that the continuity between dream and wakefulness, in which the sound of the knocking exists in and passes through both states, is another striking similarity between "The Raven" and this scene of The Brothers Karamazov. "Подчеркивание в романе наличия окна в комнате Ивана и стука извне в его оконную раму во время пурги напоминает внешнюю ситуацию поэмы "Ворон" в переводе Пальмина." Ibid., 90.

We add further that, once again, this deliberate treatment of the fantastic, that is, of confusing the dream and waking states of the protagonist in order to maintain a sense of the plausibility that such an event could really occur, is explicitly detailed in "The Philosophy of Composition," providing more support to the notion that Dostoevsky had read this work and adopted at least some of its prescriptions about the use of the fantastic. In any case, Bograd declares that he is not arguing for the definitive proof that Dostoevsky was acquainted with Palminim. However, the Russian critic maintains that Dostoevsky's reference to the knocking on Ivan's window frame, suggests Dostoevsky had read Palminim's translation of "The Raven." Furthermore, Bograd notes that Poe's work was of great interest to Dostoevsky, and that the latter would almost certainly taken every opportunity to read every translation of the American author's works.

Bograd then goes on to recall that E. I. Kijko claimed that Poe's tale "The Angel of the Odd" also contains many similarities with the scene of Ivan's conversation. Кийко Е. И. К творческой истории «Братьев Карамазовых» // Достоевский. Материалы и исследования. Л., 1985. T. 6. С. 256-262. These include their plots and general styles as well as the nature of the respective protagonists' conversations with fantastic visitors. Bograd notes the common opinion that Dostoevsky's scene with Ivan's devil is a parody of Goethe's Faust. Herein Bograd finds parallels with Poe's "The Bargain Lost" (or "Bon-Bon" is it was later known) in which a heavily parodied philosopher cook tries unsuccessfully to sell his soul to the devil in exchange for genius and renown. Bograd notes that in this example of an unexpected appearance of a devil and his subsequent comedy with the protagonist of the tale, once again inclement weather is featured. In this case the devil's visit to Bon-Bon's home takes place during a terrible storm.

Furthermore, similarly to Ivan's devil, Bon-Bon's devil also appears apparently out of nowhere and also wears old-fashioned, worn-out, ill-fitting, and comical attire. Ivan's devil is also described as a "джентельмен," ("какой-то господин, или, лучше сказать, известного сорта русский джентльмен") which is of course, as Bograd points out, an English word used by Poe to describe Bon-Bon bearing an English understanding of a certain class of person (Bograd 91). Another rather striking similarity that Bograd notes is that in both "Bon-Bon" and The Brothers Karamazov, the devils are poorly dressed and conduct themselves in an ironic, and even absurd manner. The Russian critic writes, "Здесь Бон-Бон бросает в черта бутылку, как Иван Карамазов во сне бросает в черта стакан. И то, и другое ассоциируется с "Лютеровой чернильнецей". Далее в тексте "Братьев Карамазовых" об этом говорится, у Э. По подразумевается. Но оба литературных героя, бросая предметы в дьявола, стараются таким образом расправиться со своими двойниками." Bograd, 91.

Bograd notes that the theme of doubles is a common one in Dostoevsky's work and that Maria Vidnese argued that Dostoevsky was already under the influence of Poe in the 1840s, when the former was writing The Double (1846). Vidnese claims that Poe's "The Imp of the Perverse" (1845) and "A Tale of the Ragged Mountains" (1850). But, as Bograd correctly notes, these two tales were not yet translated into either French or Russian and in so far as Dostoevsky did not know English, it is inconceivable that he had read these tales before he wrote The Double.

When Bograd inevitably directs his attention to Dostoevsky's introduction to Poe's three tales published in Vremia, he makes an interesting observation: "Стоит подчеркнуть, что в журнале "Время" предисловие к рассказам Э. По официально считалось редакционным. Редакция, таким образом, желая привлечь подписчиков, заявляла о своих художественных вкусах и принципах." Ibid., 92. This is a useful warning to bear in mind-- a researcher should consider the context in which Dostoevsky's remarks on Poe's creativity are made. The fate of his new journal was his main concern at the time, as Bograd reveals by citing Dostoevsky's comment that he published his novel The Insulted and Injured in his "начинающемуся журналу, успех которого был мне дороже всего" in the very same issue in which Poe's three tales were also published. Мочольский, K. B. Достоевский: Жизнь и творчество. Москва. Книга по требованию. 1947, 163.

From Dostoevsky's introduction, Bograd--who, like most other researchers in this study, characterizes as giving "an extraordinarily deep analysis of Poe's work--notes the fact that Dostoevsky highlighted most strongly Poe's immense talent and that Poe's fantastic tales always contain a sense of reality, unlike Hoffman's stories, which are more idyllic and unearthly. This is not a surprising comment to come from Bograd as he directs so much of his attention in this article to the ways in which Poe and Dostoevsky both[G2] combine realism and the fantastic in order to create an uncanny ambivalence that demonstrates the protagonists' slipping grasp on reality and often leads to the phenomenon of doubling.

The question of Poe's possible influence on Dostoevsky is one that will inform the rest of this study, both explicitly and implicitly. Nevertheless, we will offer some conclusions here. It is our opinion that Poe's work exerted a significant influence on Dostoevsky's works subsequent to his publishing and writing about Poe in Vremya in 1861. Nevertheless, this influence was limited to certain themes and stylistic considerations. One such theme was the psychology of perversity that Poe returned to repeatedly in his fantastic stories, and which Dostoevsky developed further in order to support his polemic against social utopianism that declared that humanity could live in utopian conditions if people could be convinced to pursue their rational self-interests. Another important

In summary, we believe that there is compelling evidence that Dostoevsky likely found some key kernels of insight into human psychology--which he adapted for his own political polemics--as a unique treatment of the fantastic in Poe's work that combined detail and psychological tension to create a sense of higher realism. Furthermore, Dostoevsky's publication of Poe corresponded to a critical time in his artistic development, as Astrov and J.D. Grossman point out and Joseph Frank also notes in his article "Dostoevsky's Discovery of `Fantastic Realism.'" Purdy and Borgrad have also suggested that elements of Poe's parodic style, most evident in his grotesques, may have also been borrowed by Dostoevsky. We believe that this is a particularly interesting direction to explore further.

Of course, J.D. Grossman's warning about the vast difference in scale between the two writers is entirely accurate. There is no doubt that Dostoevsky was the greater writer, and his works achieve a depth and breadth that Poe could never rival, but that is precisely what, in our mind, is so fascinating about the problematic of influence in this context. What finite aspects of Poe's creative art did Dostoevsky select and develop further? We will continue to attempt to answer this question throughout this study.

2. Specifics of the Fantastic in Dostoevsky and Poe

We propose in this chapter to analyze Poe and Dostoevsky's respective conceptions of the fantastic. In so doing, we will juxtapose the authors' own statements about their artistic visions and craft, appearing primarily in Poe's "The Philosophy of Composition" --which we have already had cause to refer to repeatedly--and Dostoevsky's semi-autobiographical "St. Petersburg Dreams in Verse and Prose." We will then refer to secondary sources--Todorov's Genres in Discourse and Frank's "Dostoevsky and the Discovery of `Fantastic Realism'" --in order to flesh out the similarities and differences of our two authors' visions of the fantastic. Finally, we will reconsider Dostoevsky's comments on Poe's fantastic, highlighting which elements Dostoevsky then employed in his own work. Three important statements by Dostoevsky about Poe's art will inform much of the following analysis: that Poe was a materialist, a capricious writer, and that he placed his characters in the most extreme of realities, and then describes with great skill the state of their souls. Furthermore, we will address Dostoevsky's comparison of Poe with E.T.A. Hoffmann, examining in particular what is at stake for both Poe and Dostoevsky's conceptions of the fantastic.

But first, we repeat here the definition of the fantastic that will inform much of the following analysis. We will primarily use the definition provided by Tzvetan Todorov in two of his books--The Fantastic: A Structural Approach to a Literary Genre and Genres in Discourse--as a framework with which to analyze the genre in Poe and Dostoevsky. The most succinct definition of the fantastic genre that Todorov offers is as follows: "The fantastic is nothing but a prolonged hesitation between a natural explanation of events and a supernatural one. It amounts to playing with the boundary between the natural and supernatural." Todorov, Tzvetan. Genres in Discourse, translated by Catherine Porter. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990, 95.. Both Poe and Dostoevsky's artistic styles commonly fit within the parameters of this definition, as we have already seen. Furthermore, this definition helps to explain the reason that Frank and Astrov stated that Dostoevsky is closer to Poe than Hoffmann, despite his preference for the German romanticist, stated in his "Introduction to Three Stories by Poe." After all, Hoffmann's work often falls into the category of supernatural. We will thus conduct a modest comparison of Poe and Hoffmann in this chapter as well.

We commence then, with Poe's "The Philosophy of Composition." It is already necessary to mention a caveat, however. Many critics, including Baudelaire, harbored doubts about Poe's sincerity in writing this essay. Poe discusses his compositional method in "The Philosophy of Composition" on the example of the supposed strategy he employed while composing his most famous poem "The Raven." As we will discover, Poe details that the considerations that he underwent in order to create an effect of the fantastic.

Todorov also writes that one of the central principles of how the fantastic genre operates is that it invokes a reaction from the reader: "The fantastic requires the fulfillment of three conditions. First, the text must oblige the reader to consider the world of the characters as a world of living persons and to hesitate between a natural and a supernatural explanation for the events described." Todorov, Tzvetan. The Fantastic: A Structural Approach to a Literary Genre, translated by Richard Howard. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1975, 33.

Sure enough, the consideration of overall poetic effect is Poe's single-most important consideration as expressed in "The Philosophy of Composition" as well as in his exposition of his theory of the short story, appearing in a review of Hawthorne's tales. There Poe reveals that considerations of causation are central to his craft. Poe writes," "I prefer commencing with the consideration of an effect. Keeping originality always in view for he is false to himself who ventures to dispense with so obvious and so easily attainable a source of interest- I say to myself, in the first place, "Of the innumerable effects, or impressions, of which the heart, the intellect, or (more generally) the soul is susceptible, what one shall I, on the present occasion, select?" Having chosen a novel, first, and secondly a vivid effect, I consider whether it can be best wrought by incident or tone whether by ordinary incidents and peculiar tone, or the converse, or by peculiarity both of incident and tone--afterward looking about me (or rather within) for such combinations of event, or tone, as shall best aid me in the construction of the effect." Poe, E. A. “Philosophy of Composition.” xroads.virginia.edu/~HYPER/poe/composition.html

In terms of Poe's own conception of the fantastic, it is informative to note that the creative technique that he outlines in his "The Philosophy of Composition" is remarkably similar to the definition of the fantastic that H.P. Lovecraft gives in his book Supernatural Horror in Literature. Both masters of the fantastic underline the importance of the reader's experience as fundamental to the genre. Lovecraft writes, "Atmosphere is most important, for the ultimate criterion of authenticity [of the fantastic] is not plot structure but the creation of a specific impression--Hence we must judge the fantastic tale not so much by the author's intentions and the mechanisms of the plot, but by the emotional intensity it provokesA tale is fantastic if the reader experiences an emotion of profound fear and terror, the presence of unsuspected worlds and powers." Lovecraft, H.P. Supernatural Horror in Literature. San Bernardino, CA: Gold Edition, printed 2017, 7.

Interestingly enough, Lovecraft's dismissal of authorial intentions and plot structure are at variance with Todorov's analysis of Poe's formalist constructive methods, as well as Poe's own description of them. Nonetheless, Poe's primary focus is indeed on the creation of atmosphere and effect on the reader. Lovecraft's emphasis then, unlike Todorov's, is on the what and not the how. In Poe's treatise on compositional technique, he details his compositional method and then proceeds to demonstrate its workings on the force of the example of his apparent methodology in writing "The Raven," whose fantastic nature Poe explicitly detailed, and whose intentionality of effect becomes evident. It is important to note that both Baudelaire expressed reservations about Poe's sincerity in this peace--once again demonstrates Poe's incessant playing with the limits of the serious and the comedic. In any case, Poe, like Lovecraft, emphasizes the paramount importance of the creation of effect in the reader.

Returning to Todorov's idea that the fantastic must hesitate between natural and supernatural causes, we find that Poe discusses at length his efforts to create the ambiguity in the poem of the possibility of a supernatural explanation--that the raven is some sort of demon--and the natural--that the raven merely escaped from its master and by chance flew into the narrator's room. The narrator being in a state of despondency over the death of his beloved--which Poe determined was the most suitable situation for the creation of the poetic effect of beauty, as best represented by sorrow--he interprets the raven's presence as a visitation from some force from the beyond.

"I saw that I could make the first query propounded by the lover- the first query to which the Raven should reply "Nevermore"- that I could make this first query a commonplace one, the second less so, the third still less, and so on, until at length the lover, startled from his original nonchalance by the melancholy character of the word itself, by its frequent repetition, and by a consideration of the ominous reputation of the fowl that uttered it, is at length excited to superstition, and wildly propounds queries of a far different character- queries whose solution he has passionately at heart- propounds them half in superstition and half in that species of despair which delights in self-torture- propounds them not altogether because he believes in the prophetic or demoniac character of the bird (which reason assures him is merely repeating a lesson learned by rote), but because he experiences a frenzied pleasure in so modelling his questions as to receive from the expected "Nevermore" the most delicious because the most intolerable of sorrows." Poe, E. A. “Philosophy of Composition.” xroads.virginia.edu/~HYPER/poe/composition.html

We note both the deliberate creation of the effect of hesitation on the part of the narrator between believing in the mundane response of a trained raven, whose one-word cry "Nevermore" just coincidentally happens to speak to him in his moment of despair, on the one hand, and his tendency to find a superstitious cause, on the other. Interestingly enough, one of the psychological mechanisms that pushes the narrator toward seeking a supernatural cause for the birds appearance and strange behavior is nothing less than a form of the Imp of the Perverse: that is, a fascination with, and pleasure in, vexing himself, or wallowing in sorrow. Thus we find ourselves in very close proximity indeed to the territory as the Underground Man, and his similar masochistic tendencies. This parallel begs the question of how many of Dostoevsky's characters who are closer to the fantastic genre, because they see visions, have strange dreams, or exert a sort of demonic influence on events--characters like Svidrigailov, Stavrogin, Smerdyakov, etc. --might not similarly "vex themselves" into such states of heightened, pathological consciousness.

As a bridge to an analysis of some particulars of Dostoevsky's conception of the fantastic, we will examine Rosman Jakobson's words on Poe's "The Philosophy of Composition" and and Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov. Dostoevsky's Although Jakobson only dedicates one page of his Questions de Poйtique to the topic of the connection between Dostoevsky and Poe, he offers a highly insightful reading.

He begins his analysis with the following: "L'habilitй de Poe а suggйrer le caractиre empiriquement plausible d'un йvйnement surnaturel a йtй l'objet de l'admiration et des йloges de Dostoпevski, qui s'en est souvenu dans le cauchemar d'Ivan Karamazov" (The ability of Poe to impart an empirically plausible character a supernatural event was the object of admiration and praise by Dostoevsky, who remembered it in the nightmare of Ivan Karamazov" --translation G.C.). Jakobson, R. Questions de poetique. Paris: Le Seuil, 1973, 209. Jakobson claims that Ivan believes that what he sees is his own "hallucinated monologue" and an unexpected visitor alternatively. Ivan believes the visitor to be a devil, just as in Poe's "The Raven" the narrator exclaims: "thing of evil!--prophet still, if bird or devil!" Moreover, as Jakobson notes, both Ivan and the narrator of "The Raven," having been awoken by their fantastic visitors, ask themselves if they are really awake or rather still asleep and simply dreaming. Citing the exchange between Ivan and the devil in which Ivan states that the devil is merely his own feverish projection, Jakobson comments: "L'alternance, cependant, de la premiиre et de la deuxiиme personne chez les deux "interlocuteurs" rйvиle l'ambiguпtй du thиme." ("The alternation, however, of the first and second person by the teux "interlocutors" reveals the ambiguity of the theme" --translation, G.C.)

Jakobson goes on to remark that although according to Poe's literary theories the superficial and profound are intertwined. Jakobson claims that the internal discourse in "The Raven" is a dialogue, while reproduced discourse is re-appropriated and refashioned by the character who cites it. This in turn leads to a borrowing by someone else or by a time passed, that is, a time before.

Jakobson finds another moment of tension in the text: that between the poet's "me" and the fictive narrator's "I": "c'est la tension entre ces deux aspects du comportement verbal qui confиre au Corbeau--et j'ajoute : а ce qui constitue le sommet des Frиres Karamazov--leur richess poйtique." (It is the tension between the two aspects of the verbal comportment that give to "The Raven" --and I add: what constitutes the summit of The Brothers Karamazov--their poetic richness." --translation, G.C.).

Meanwhile in some of Dostoevsky's most explicit statements about his own artistic vision, we find remarkable parallels in the mixing of fantasy and reality in order to arrive at higher sense of reality that seems to imply something akin to Poe's "pure elevation of soul." Frank, in his article "Dostoevsky's Discovery of Romantic Realism," argues that Dostoevsky's "St. Petersburg Vision in Verse and Prose," which, as Frank notes, has inspired much biographical speculation, and The Insulted and Injured are pivotal texts in Dostoevsky's artistic development that demonstrate his transition to his fully articulated style of fantastic realism.

Frank discusses the famous "vision of the Neva" passage in "St. Petersburg Dreams," which Dostoevsky had first written in the short story "A Faint Heart" (1848). In this scene the narrator of "St. Petersburg Dreams" observes the frozen and magical St. Petersburg at sunset:

"Помню, раз, в зимний январский вечер, я спешил с Выборгской стороны к себе домой. Был я тогда еще очень молод. Подойдя к Неве, я остановился на минутку и бросил пронзительный взгляд вдоль реки в дымную, морозно-мутную даль, вдруг заалевшую последним пурпуром зари, догоравшей в мглистом небосклоне. Ночь ложилась над городом, и вся необъятная, вспухшая от замерзшего снега поляна Невы, с последним отблеском солнца, осыпалась бесконечными мириадами искр иглистого инея. Становился мороз в двадцать градусов Мерзлый пар валил с усталых лошадей, с бегущих людей. Сжатый воздух дрожал от малейшего звука, и, словно великаны, со всех кровель обеих набережных подымались и неслись вверх по холодному небу столпы дыма, сплетаясь и расплетаясь в дороге, так что, казалось, новые здания вставали над старыми, новый город складывался в воздухе Казалось, наконец, что весь этот мир, со всеми жильцами его, сильными и слабыми, со всеми жилищами их, приютами нищих или раззолоченными палатами, в этот сумеречный час походит на фантастическую, волшебную грезу, на сон, который в свою очередь тотчас исчезнет и искурится паром к темно-синему небу. Какая-то странная мысль вдруг зашевелилась во мне. Я вздрогнул, и сердце мое как будто облилось в это мгновение горячим ключом крови, вдруг вскипевшей от прилива могущественного, но доселе незнакомого мне ощущения. Я как будто что-то понял в эту минуту, до сих пор только шевелившееся во мне, но еще не осмысленное; как будто прозрел во что-то новое, совершенно в новый мир, мне незнакомый и известный только по каким-то темным слухам, по каким-то таинственным знакам. Я полагаю, что с той именно минуты началось мое существование Скажите, господа: не фантазер я, не мистик я с самого детства? Какое тут происшествие? что случилось? Ничего, ровно ничего, одно ощущение, а прочее всё благополучно." Ф.М. Достоевский Собр. соч. в 15 тт. Т. 3 с. 484-485.