Psychoanalytic Interpretation of Crime and Punishment

Abstract

As a masterpiece of Dostoevsky’s psychological novels, Crime and Punishment tells the story of Raskolnikov, a college student, who committed a crime because of the opposition between reality and ideal, and then was punished, understood, and atoned for his sins. Attempting to analyze the process of Raskolnikov’s “crime” and “punishment” through the psychoanalytic theory put forward by Freud in Ego & Id, this thesis aims to provide a better interpretation of the theme of “crime and punishment”.