Fyodor Dostoevsky

While he wrote several undisputed classics, "Crime and Punishment," published in 1866, is widely considered his most famous work. The novel follows the tormented mental state of Rodion Raskolnikov, an impoverished ex-student who murders a pawnbroker in St. Petersburg.

Yes, in 1849, Dostoevsky was arrested for reading banned utopian socialist texts and sentenced to death by firing squad. At the very last moment, a messenger arrived with a pardon from the Tsar, commuting his sentence to four years of brutal hard labor in a Siberian prison camp.

Dostoevsky drew heavily on his own deeply held Russian Orthodox faith to contrast the corrupting influence of radical intellect in "The Brothers Karamazov." The psychological tension between the three brothers mirrors the ideological battles of 19th-century Russia.

Yes, Dostoevsky wrote "The Idiot" in 1869. The novel represents his attempt to create a perfectly beautiful, Christ-like character in the form of Prince Myshkin, who is ultimately destroyed by the corrupt, greedy society of St. Petersburg.