Guilt of Crime and Punishment In Crime and Punishment, Fyodor Dostoevsky tells the story of a young man who was forced to drop out of university due to poverty. Under these circumstances, he develops his theory of an extraordinary man (Frank 62). This conjecture is composed of the idea that all great men must overcome obstacles in their way to reach their maximum potential and benefit mankind. In Raskolnikov's life, the big obstacle is lack of money, and the way to overcome this obstacle is to kill a pawnbroker he knows. The victim is a rich, stingy, heartless old hag, and by killing her, taking this evil out of the world, Roskolnikov does many great deeds for humanity (Jackson 99), (Kjetsaa 182). "The little old hag is nonsense! ' "Thought [Raskolnikov] with ardor and impetus. "The old woman may have been a mistake, but she's not the point! The old woman was simply an illness... I was in a hurry to step over... it wasn't a human being I killed, it was a principle!" (C&P, Pevear 274). Raskolnikov consciously refuses to accept guilt for committing the crime because he believes there is nothing to regret. Subconsciously he knows he has taken a human life and must suffer the consequences. The resulting guilt and suffering can be seen in his delirium. Soon after Raskolnikov kills the pawnbroker, he falls ill. When he sleeps he has nightmares; when he walks, he sees ghosts. These visions are his subconscious telling him that he is wrong for not taking the blame and confessing his sin. In his delirium Raskolnikov believes he sees ghosts. “And just now I imagined that maybe I am really crazy and I only see a ghost” (C&P, Pevear 295). He thinks he saw a......middle of paper......and Sonia (C&P, Pevear 547-549). It is here that he begins to appreciate his goodness and purity and learn to enjoy life and abandon his selfish theory. The chosen people are the ones who are like Sonia, kind, calm and faithful, not the rationalistic and superior ones (Mortimer 116). So in this dream, Raskolnikov sees that for his unrepentant thoughts, he would die in the plague. Through Raskolnikov's fears, the reader is able to see that he feels guilty. When he is awake and sober in mind, he is selfish and believes himself to be extraordinary. It is through his visions of ghosts and ghosts that one can feel the guilt that haunts him. Through his dreams, he sees for himself that his beliefs are wrong. Works Cited: Dostoevsky, Fyodor M. Crime and Punishment. Trans. Jessie Coulson. Ed. Giorgio Gibian. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1989.