I'm alive. I am. Physically at least. But after 564 pages of Dostoyevsky, my head and heart are heavy. That being said, I'm relieved and quite honestly proud for getting through this novel (the fact that I'm about a month behind is not worth dwelling on.) So, now that I've read The Idiot in its entirety, I can tackle the eternal question: Is it AP worthy? That is, is this story worth reading, discussing, or even merely mentioning in an AP curriculum? The short answer is yes, but allow me to elaborate.
The Idiot is an almost agonizingly dense and dry piece of literature, I'm sure most who read it will admit to that. The story itself is a rather beautiful one. The telling of a young man's quest for love and companionship in Russia despite the obstacle of being regarded as a simpleton by his peers. The story is full of heart-breaking betrayal, humorous anecdotes, and deep philosophical and religious discussions. That being said, it still dragged along at a snail's pace, and no matter how into the story I felt, it still took regularly over 2 hours to read fifty pages. However, that doesn't mean that The Idiot didn't contain everything necessary for an AP piece of writing.
The Idiot is full of literally dozens of complicated characters, each with their own story, motives, and personalities. This ensures that the reader never gets bored of anyone in particular. While it does cause you to ask yourself "who are we talking about again?" several times per reading session, the abundance of characters keeps things interesting and continually adds different insights and perceptions of plot points and other characters themselves. Any book with so many characters, and so many contributing factors to each one, is of an AP level in my opinion.
Dostoyevsky uses not an abundance of literary devices, but the ones he chooses to employ are used in a very strong and sometimes unique way. There are foreshadowings and flashbacks throughout the book, but the way that Dostoyevsky uses them is unique and frankly, while off-putting at first, grew to be almost comforting. I am referring to Dostoyevsky breaking away from the plot and beginning to talk in 1st person, which he did maybe only 10 or 12 times throughout the entire book, but when he did it was to either foreshadow an event coming up or touch on something that happened previously. As I said, while this was quite odd and detracted from the story at first, I grew to enjoy it, and it gave me a feeling of security, knowing Dostoyevsky was with me on this mammoth journey. Not to mention when the author himself is the one explaining things, you can count on fully understanding his intentions. In addition to these devices, Dostoyevsky alludes to historical characters and works of art of literature, in addition to making use of a stream of consciousness technique. Constant breaks of dashes and parentheses followed the characters' and even the narrator's changing (and even cluttered at times) thought processes. The literary devices in this book are not necessarily copious, but they are effective, which constitutes AP work.
The theme of The Idiot is a simple one, as it's even basically stated on the back of the book ("A sanatorium is the only place for a saint.") That being said, even though the theme is known from the start, it's not one that's completely clear or easy to understand initially. How can such a good person fall to such misfortune? And how can no one seem surprised? Throughout the story, the theme becomes clearer and clearer, but it is still open to different interpretations. Were the events that happened to Prince Myshkin his fault or the fault of the other characters, society, etc.? Would this story be the same today? The same in America? While the theme of the book is simple, it is by no means presented in a simple way, and a complicated theme always screams AP!
While the issue of length and density may make The Idiot a difficult book to fit into a tight AP schedule, that doesn't mean it doesn't deserve it. Complex characters, numerous literary devices and allusions, and a simple yet layered theme make The Idiot a book worthy of being at least discussed in any AP curriculum.
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