Fyodor Dostoevsky
11 November 1821 – 9 February 1881
Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky was a Russian novelist regarded as one of the greatest writers in world literature, author of Crime and Punishment, The Idiot, Demons, and The Brothers Karamazov. His works explore psychology, faith, and morality in the troubled political and social atmosphere of 19th-century Russia, informed by his own experience of a death sentence commuted to Siberian penal servitude.
Lived at the same time
Well-documented people whose lives overlapped with Fyodor Dostoevsky.
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Life events
Dostoevsky was born on the grounds of the Mariinsky Hospital for the Poor, where his father worked as a doctor (30 October 1821 Old Style).
Source: en.wikipedia.orgSent by his father to train as a military engineer, Dostoevsky graduated in 1843 but soon abandoned engineering for literature.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgThe epistolary novel won praise from the critic Vissarion Belinsky and made the young Dostoevsky a literary celebrity.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgDostoevsky was arrested with other members of a liberal intellectual discussion group and imprisoned in the Peter and Paul Fortress.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgFacing a firing squad in Saint Petersburg, Dostoevsky was reprieved at the last moment and sent to four years of hard labor in a prison camp at Omsk, followed by compulsory army service.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgThe experience of katorga in Siberia, later described in The House of the Dead, profoundly shaped his religious and political views.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgThe novel appeared serially in The Russian Messenger and became one of the most influential works of world literature.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgAnna, who had helped him complete The Gambler under a punishing deadline, became his second wife and managed his finances and publishing (15 February 1867 New Style).
Source: en.wikipedia.orgHis final novel, serialized in 1879-1880, is widely considered his masterpiece.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgDostoevsky died of a pulmonary hemorrhage at the age of 59 (28 January 1881 Old Style); tens of thousands attended his funeral.
Source: en.wikipedia.org