Poor Folk

Poor people (Russian: Бедные люди ) is the first novel by the Russian writer Fyodor Dostoyevsky. The epistolary novel was written 1844-1845 and founded Dostoevsky's fame. He reached an unusually wide readership and has been partially taken euphoric also by influential contemporary critics such as Vissarion Grigoryevich Belinsky. It was first time in 1846 published in the journal Peterburgski Sbornik.

Action

The novel portrays the love of the clerk Makar Dewuschkin to the much younger Varvara Dobrosiolowa. He is told exclusively through an exchange of letters between the two. The main characters live not far from each other in a Petersburg slums. Varvara lives to sublet in an elderly woman who exerts, citing former favors a strong influence on them. For details about the past of the two is not known. Finally Decides Varvara to marry a merchant who intended to restore their honor and free them from their fate.

In the correspondence, which drags on for half a year, Dewuschkin occupies the prominent role. He falls in love Varvara and is unhappy, as this decides the merchant really to marry, in order to escape their circumstances. His attempts to dissuade them from this project, but are not successful; she will leave Petersburg. Dewuschkin receives from her finally, contracts for the preparation of the wedding, making him difficult to meet. The novel ends with a suicide note Dewuschkins.