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Comment by UncleOxidant | Hacker News Reader

Currently reading The Brothers Karamazov for the first time and while I knew it was supposed to contain a lot of theological/philosophical ideas, it's also very political. Socialism was already in the air in 1870s Russia such that it's often discussed by characters in the novel.

There's one scene where one of the Russian nobleman who has often lived in Paris suggests to some Russian Orthodox priests that he had heard it said in Paris that the worst socialists were not the atheistic ones, but the Christian Socialists. The Priest takes umbrage with this asking if the nobleman was lumping these priests into that category. This on the heels of a multi-page discussion on the separation of church and state and whether the state will eventually subsume the church or whether the church will eventually subsume the state.

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Socialism was discussed in many countries in the 19th century. There was still no widespread idea that socialism could be a negative for the world (this is a direct product of the cold war). Intellectuals in countries such as England and Germany were open to developing the idea of a socialist society, and France even had a brief communist revolution.

In the early 19th century the memory of the Münster rebellion was still fresh. IIRC Marx and Engels discussed it. The Münster rebellion didn't go well. But "it's alright, we can always try again!".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M%C3%BCnster_rebellion

> Socialism was already in the air in 1870s Russia such that it's often discussed by characters in the novel.

That's not necessarily a valid conclusion. It is a work of fiction. You can't use it as evidence of what was going on in Russia. At best it can be used as evidence of what were the topics the author were thinking about, and as such an indirect proof of what was discussed in the zeitgeist.

Similarly I could write a book set in 2025's America where everyone constantly talks about how the collapse of the bubblegum markets wiped them out, and discusses the benefits and ills of bubblegum trading. Doesn't make it true.

Sure, but the author is writing with his audience in mind. As I understand it, it started out as serialized stories in a periodical and was popular. If he wrote about something that was completely foreign to his audience it's not likely to have become popular. It really seems like he's having his characters take various positions on topics that were being discussed in the culture.

> was completely foreign to his audience

I suppose "The Lord of the Rings" is a true history of England?

Perhaps you can appreciate the difference between The Lord of the Rings, which was self-consciously written to be a mythology for England, and The Brother's Karamazov which is set in the middle of the 19th century. We get it Walter, you hate socialism.

More accurately, I'm an advocate of freedom, yours as well as mine.

I appreciate that, and I'm sure we feel very similarly about the importance of individual freedoms. My snark has to do with the fact that I find your comments on political threads to be ideological and uninteresting, which is disappointing as someone who thinks highly of your work (and talks) on programming.

> ideological

It's evidence based, not faith based. Try me!

In contrast, I am not religious any longer because I could not find any evidence of its reality.

> and uninteresting

I can't help with that.

P.S. I'm giving a talk on code generators on Jan 16 at nwcpp.org. Come join in!

This is a truly bizarre and random attack. I don't think OP claimed the book as "proof" of radical socialist fervor in the first place - it's the widely known history, and are we attempting to contradict that?

> This is a truly bizarre and random attack.

It is a discussion, not war. Nobody got attacked. That comment is not an attack, this comment is not an attack.

> it's the widely known history, and are we attempting to contradict that?

No. One can reach true statements with faulty reasoning. Just because the statements are true doesn't mean that the logic behind them is right.

> I don't think OP claimed the book as "proof" of radical socialist fervor in the first place

I can't read the sentence I quoted from their comment in any other way.

The sentence you quoted is

> Socialism was already in the air in 1870s Russia such that it's often discussed by characters in the novel.

Socialism was in the air therefore it was discussed in the novel.

You interpreted it as “Socialism is discussed in the novel therefore it was in the air,” but that’s not what was said.

> You interpreted it as “Socialism is discussed in the novel therefore it was in the air,”

Yes. I still read it that way.

> but that’s not what was said.

If you say so. I re-read the comment and I interpret it the same way still. If we are not using the book as evidence of what was going in Russia, but evidence of what topic was interesting to its audience then I'm happy with that.

Reading comprehension issue I guess.

Always possible. I’m not a native speaker.

The OP just said socialism was in the air in 1870, which it clearly was since the book this article about came out in the 1860s.

You can say the same thing about any book ever written, "it's only about what the author was thinking about" - yeah, that's how writing generally works lol.

Between 1991 and 1998 there was an undercover war waged in Great Britain between two warring factions of a secret cabal. At various points one faction or the other controlled the so called "Ministry of Magic" main function of which is to enforce the secrecy of the whole conspiracy.

I know it is true because I read it in a book. Except it is not, it is completely made up and none of it is true. One can accidentally stumble upon true statements in the book. For example there is indeed a Kings Cross station both in the real world London and the fictional one.

> You can say the same thing about any book ever written,

Not really. There are this class of books called "nonfiction" where the stated goal of the author is to write true things. For example if you say "Socialism was already in the air in 1870s Russia, I read it in Peter Kenez's A History of the Soviet Union from the Beginning to the End" that would be not mistaken.

This is an excessive level of pedantry, even for HN.

Ralph Waldo Emerson – ‘Fiction Reveals Truth That Reality Obscures.‘

Tangent: I would be very interested in an AI produced version of Brothers K, In graphic novel form, Illustrated in the style of Gerhard (of Cerebus fame).

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