The Karamazov Brothers (Oxford World's Classics)

Reverend starets, forgive that last bit about Diderot’s baptism, I made it up myself just now, even as I was telling it to you, it had never entered my head before. I made it up just to please you. I carry on like that, Pyotr Aleksandrovich, so that people’ll like me all the more. But then sometimes I don’t know myself why I do it.

You’ve got your head screwed on all right. The fire is burning in you now, but it’ll die down; you’ll get it out of your system and you’ll come back here. And I’ll be waiting for you, because I feel you’re the only person on earth who hasn’t condemned me, my dear boy, I really feel this, how can I fail to feel it!…’ And he began to snivel. He was m

The moment anybody comes close to me, his personality begins to overpower my self-esteem and intrude upon my freedom. Within one day I can end up hating the very best of men, some because they take too long over their dinner, others because they’ve caught a cold and keep blowing their noses. I become a misanthrope, he said, the minute I come into c

With people it’s all a question of what they’re used to, even in the matter of the state and politics. Habit is the prime mover.

The main thing is to abhor dishonesty, any kind of dishonesty, but above all, dishonesty with regard to your own self. Be aware of your dishonesty and ponder it every hour, every minute of the day. Never be squeamish, both with regard to yourself and others; what appears to you disgusting in yourself is cleansed by the very fact that you have ackno

We have reached a stage at which we have surrounded ourselves with more things, but have less joy.

the more absurd the approach, the closer one gets to the crux of the matter. Clarity in absurdity. Absurdity is direct and guileless, whereas the intellect is evasive and illusive. The intellect is a blackguard, but absurdity is undeviating and honourable.

‘I think that if the devil didn’t exist and if man has created him, then he has created him in his own image and likeness.’

Oh, in my poor, earthly, Euclidean mind I know only that suffering exists, that no one is to blame, that one thing leads to another just like that, that life goes on and things find their own equilibrium in the end—but then, that is just Euclidean nonsense, I know that, and when it comes down to it I can’t agree to live by it!