“Crime and Punishment” (Pt 5, Chap 4) by Dostoevsky: Raskolnikov begins confession in third person, which in 19th century literature meant multiple personality

In Charles Dickens’s plan for his last novel, The Mystery of Edwin Drood (1870), the multiple personality of the murderer would be revealed by his confession, in which he (his regular personality) would refer to himself (his murderous alternate personality) in the third person.

Dostoevsky—author of The Double (1846), a fantasy version of multiple personality—has Raskolnikov begin his confession to Sonya in the third person, as he explains how he knows who committed the murder:

“I must be a great friend of his…since I know…He wanted to kill the old woman…” (1, p. 410).

Raskolnikov soon reverts to the first person, and today’s readers interpret his initial use of third person as merely a way to gently ease himself into the confession, so as not to upset Sonya any more than he has to. But this is a nineteenth century novel, and the correct interpretation is one that an alert nineteenth century reader might have made.

1. Fyodor Dostoevsky. Crime and Punishment [1866]. Translated by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky. New York, Vintage Classics/Random House, 1993.