Crime and Punishment (the novel)

            In war, a solider has no room for his own personal feelings and emotions. He has to make logical decisions that will ensure his side victory, and relies on his intelligence, not his morals, to succeed. If he were to make decisions based on his desire not have people get hurt or killed, his goals would most likely not be met. In the same way, Raskolnikov, in Fyodor Dostoevsky's novel Crime and Punishment, tries to do what he knows to be logical and ignores his emotions, throwing away his own morals for the sake of a mere idea. Raskolnikov's struggle to listen to his mind rather than his heart is portrayed through his thoughts and monologues that occur as he faces many hardships. Thoughts about the strangers he meets, the people close to him, and himself, in particular, illustrate his struggle most clearly, and demonstrate Dostoevsky's idea that people sometimes cling to logic to avoid their true feelings.
             From the reactions that Raskolnikov takes upon the people that he meets in Petersburg, one can see how he tries to listen to his own reasoning rather than his emotions. For example, when Raskolnikov leaves money on Marmeladov "s windowsill, he believes that he has done " a stupid thing" since "they have Sonia and I want it myself." By giving money to Marmeladov's family, Raskolnikov shows a moment of emotional impulsiveness, but then the intellectual side of him makes him regret it. Also, later a similar situation occurs when Raskolnikov gives a policeman money to help a sixteen-year-old girl, saying to himself, "He has carried off my twenty copecks And why did I want to interfere?" Once again, he is torn between his true feelings and how he thinks he should be reacting to such situations. The intellectual part of Rasko's mind tells him such people are insignificant and have no relation to him, while the other part of him fells compassion for those same individuals. His conflict of logic and emotion is also shown when Raskolnikov meets a man who calls him a murderer on the street.