The Idiot

Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky (30.10.1821 - 28.01.1881)

A great Russian writer, author of works “Poor People,” “The Humiliated and Insulted,” “Crime and Punishment,” “The Gambler,” “The Brothers Karamazov,” “The Adolescent,” “Notes from the Dead House,” “The Mistress,” “Unetochka Nezvanova,” “A Nasty Anecdote,” “The Eternal Husband,” “Uncle’s Dream,” and others. The famous literary critic Petr Annenkov wrote: “Read Dostoevsky, love Dostoevsky—if you can; if you can’t, then curse Dostoevsky, but read him… as far as possible only him.”

On the novel “The Idiot,” whose staging is presented here, the writer worked in 1867–1868. “The idea for the novel,” Dostoevsky wrote, “is my very old and beloved idea, but so difficult that for a long time I did not dare to take it on. The main thought of the novel is to depict positively a truly beautiful person. Harder than that there is nothing in the world—especially now…”

“In dramatic art, I don’t know whether anything could be higher. And not because this has happened once before. But where and when—and above all, with whom—could such a rare dramaturgy, endowed with human gifts, be born, as it is presented by Fyodor Dostoevsky in his ‘The Idiot,’ that is, Prince Myshkin. To speak frankly, none of my work, neither ‘before’ nor ‘after,’ has come close to this level. Unfortunately, that is true.” (Innokenty Mikhailovich Smoktunovsky)