"On an exceptionally hot evening early in July, a young man came out of the garret in which he lodged in S-- Place and walked slowly, as though in hesitation, towards Ks-- Bridge."
These are the opening lines to what is still considered one of the best murder stories in the history of literature. It is the paragraph which opens Fyodor Dostoyevsky's "Crime and Punishment."
So, on an exceptionally windy, cloudy and grey afternoon in August, it was decided to retrace those famous steps mentioned in the novel's first chapter and discover the house where Dostoyevsky's hero Raskolnikov committed his pre-meditated murder of an elderly and mean money-lender.
Although the author did not clearly state in his novel the exact location of his path to the house and the bridge, we know from his notes, from recollections of those who knew him and from other sources that all these places and landmarks did and still do exist today.
The novel mentions that Raskolnikov had to cross the large, open square, which in the middle of the last century was called the Haymarket. Today the square is occupied by the twin metro complex of Sadovaya and Sennaya Ploshchad, and a rather unflattering industrial complex right in the middle of an ensemble of art-nouveau buildings on the Sadovaya side and neoclassical architecture on Sennaya Ploshchad or Hay Square.
"The heat in the street was terrible: and the airlessness, the bustle and the plaster, scaffolding and bricks, and dust all about him and that special Petersburg stench, so familiar to all who are unable to get out of town in summer."
Today, of course, the actual hay market has gone since the need for horses has been made redundant by the many cars which now skirt round the square and plug up the narrow streets on either side of the Canal Griboyedova.
But there is still the bustle and that market feeling as queues of people stand in line before silver kiosks too many to mention. With the amount of renovation going on to the faded and crumbling buildings around, it's not hard to imagine what Dostoyevsky was talking about, as "the plaster, scaffolding and bricks" are still everywhere to be seen today.
Haymarket Square originated in the 1730s and from the 1740s was the place where hay was traded. Until the early 19th century it had been one of the least comfortable districts, populated by poor people. In the second half of the 19th century a number of smarter apartment buildings were put up there which you can still see as you come out of the metro.
It was in this building that Raskolnikov had his
appointment with murder.
And you can still spot the impressive wrought iron Ks-- Bridge or Kokushkin Most over the Griboyedova Canal, which in Dostoyevsky's time was called the Katerina Canal. Actually its not all original. The original one Raskolnikov crossed was in such a bad state of repair some of it was replaced in 1949.
Thankfully the "familiar St Petersburg stench" isn't in evidence any more in this part of town.
Depending on which way Raskolnikov chose to approach Canal Griboyedova, there's a choice of two bridges from Sennaya Ploshchad to cross. He could have taken the smaller Sennoy Most as well as Kokushkin Most. Strangely enough signs warn you're not allowed to smoke on this bridge.
Fyodor Dostoyevsky (1821-1881) was born in Moscow but spent more than 30 years of his life in St Petersburg, which he used as the setting for many of his great novels. He lived in the city from 1827-1849 and then from 1860 until his death. During that time he lived in over a dozen different premises and moved no less than 20 times.
He tended to live in lower-middle-class areas which since the 18th century had been traditionally occupied by civil servants, craftsmen and small-time merchants who served or were connected with the Russian court.
Naturally, like so many novelists, he wrote about places that were familiar to him, and in the middle of the 19th century the area around Sennaya Ploshchad and Canal Griboyedova was notoriously down-at-heel and "occupied by a number of establishments of bad character." Suffice to say it was one of the city's slum areas.
The prostitutes have gone but the drunks and down-and-outs clearly haven't, and, just like Raskolnikov, you can still meet any number of drunks swaggering across your path and falling in and out of the not-so-numerous bars which once filled this seedy area and find beggars hanging around the metro at Sennaya Ploshchad.
From his lodging house to the block where the money-lender lived -- 104 Canal Griboyedova/25 Ulitsa Rimsky-Korsokov -- Raskolnikov took 730 steps. The 20 minutes or so it takes to walk to the large, yellowish-green painted block seems more like 2,000.
The further you walk along the canal towards the Mariinsky Theater, the scruffier the buildings become until you finally reach 104 Canal Griboyedova, the house occupied by pawn mistress Alyona Ivanovna and her long-suffering sister and market-trader Elizaveta.
The apartment building has not aged graciously, and is flanked on one side by the Mayor of St Petersburg's Admiralty Youth Center and by a dirty-looking garage and tyre center on the other.
"With a sinking heart and nervous terror, he went up to a huge house which on one side looked onto a canal and on the other onto the street. This house was let in tiny tenements and was inhabited by working people of all kinds: tailors, locksmiths, cooks, Germans of sorts, petty clerks and girls eking out a living as best they could."
The building across the courtyard where the money-lender lived, time has done little to improve its appearance.
Well the shabby-looking building certainly does overlook the canal and is on the corner of two streets. There's actually one courtyard now, rough and uneven, covered in rubble and puddles, while the two archways are still there but the gates have long since gone.
"There was a continued coming and going through the two gates and in the two courtyards of the house. Three or four door-keepers were employed in the building. The young man was very glad to meet none of them and at once slipped unnoticed through the door on the right, and up the black, dark and narrow staircase."
Whatever the scene might have been in the late 1860s, there was hardly a soul about today and the whole place took on a rather abandoned and sorry appearance. Having no trouble at all slipping unnoticed up the staircase I found myself nervously standing outside the brown, fake leather-bound door to flat 70 ---- supposed scene of the action.
Nervous -- not in anticipation of the novel's grizzly outcome -- but because I was so embarrassed that some babushka would accuse me of loitering with intent on her door-step or might think "Oh no, not another literature geek doing the Dostoyevsky run!"
Needless to say I didn't ring the bell and wait for a frail, greasy-haired old woman with grey streaks to chase me away.
In previous years tours were given by Dostoyevsky experts Alexander Raskin, (who speaks English, tel 510-4450) for $5 per person. Minimum 4 and maximum 10 people per tour. Also Sergei Belov on 227-3572. They may be at their dachas until September.