Part II - Chapter II Practice Quiz — Crime and Punishment
by Fyodor Dostoevsky — tap or click to flip
Practice Quiz: Part II - Chapter II
What does Raskolnikov do with the stolen items at the beginning of Part II, Chapter II?
He retrieves them from a hole in his room, fills his pockets with eight articles including jewelry boxes, leather cases, a chain, and a purse, and sets out to dispose of them.
Why does Raskolnikov abandon his plan to throw the stolen goods into the Ekaterininsky Canal?
The canal banks are too crowded with washerwomen, rafts, moored boats, and passersby who might notice him throwing something into the water.
Where does Raskolnikov ultimately hide the stolen goods?
He hides them beneath a large unhewn stone in a deserted courtyard between two blank walls, pressing earth around the edges to conceal any disturbance.
What does Raskolnikov realize about the purse that disturbs him?
He realizes he never examined the purse or the stolen items to determine their value, which undermines his claim that the murder served a rational purpose.
What work does Razumihin offer Raskolnikov?
Razumihin offers him translation work on a German pamphlet titled "Is Woman a Human Being?" for the publisher Heruvimov, along with three roubles in advance.
What happens to Raskolnikov on the Nikolaevsky Bridge?
A coachman lashes him with a whip for walking in the middle of traffic, and an elderly woman mistakes him for a beggar and gives him twenty copecks, which he flings into the Neva.
What does Raskolnikov hallucinate at the end of the chapter?
He hallucinates that Ilya Petrovitch, the police assistant superintendent, is violently beating his landlady on the stairs. Nastasya tells him it never happened.
How does Razumihin serve as a foil to Raskolnikov in this chapter?
Razumihin is generous, practical, and socially engaged despite his own poverty, contrasting with Raskolnikov's misanthropy, self-isolation, and rejection of all human connection.
What does Raskolnikov's behavior toward Razumihin reveal about his psychological state?
His seeking out Razumihin then immediately rejecting help shows the conflict between his need for human connection and his compulsion to isolate himself as an "extraordinary man."
Who is Nastasya and what role does she play at the end of this chapter?
Nastasya is the servant in Raskolnikov's building. She brings him food and water and tells him his hallucination of Ilya Petrovitch beating the landlady never occurred, attributing it to "the blood" in his ears.
How does Raskolnikov's reaction to the Neva view demonstrate his alienation?
A view that once stirred mysterious emotion in him during his university days now leaves him "strangely cold" and "blank and lifeless," showing that the murder has severed his capacity for aesthetic and emotional response.
How does the theme of alienation manifest in this chapter?
Raskolnikov experiences "immeasurable, almost physical, repulsion" for everyone around him, rejects Razumihin's friendship, refuses charity, and flings the coin into the Neva as an act of self-imposed exile from humanity.
How does the chapter illustrate that Raskolnikov's punishment has already begun?
His guilt manifests as paranoia, physical illness, hallucinations, inability to feel beauty, and compulsive self-isolation—all forms of psychological punishment that precede any legal consequences.
What does the chapter reveal about the true motive behind Raskolnikov's crime?
His failure to examine the stolen goods shows the murder was not motivated by financial need or utilitarian philosophy but was an abstract intellectual experiment to prove himself an "extraordinary man."
What does the stone symbolize in this chapter?
The stone represents suppressed conscience—just as Raskolnikov buries evidence under the heavy stone, he attempts to bury his guilt beneath rationalization, but neither can remain permanently concealed.
What is the symbolic significance of Raskolnikov throwing the twenty-copeck coin into the Neva?
It symbolizes his deliberate severance from human compassion and society. By rejecting charity, he enacts his self-imposed exile and his belief that the extraordinary man must stand alone.
What literary device does Dostoevsky use in the hallucination scene?
Dostoevsky employs psychological realism, externalizing Raskolnikov's internal guilt as a vivid sensory hallucination featuring the very authority figure (Ilya Petrovitch) he fears from the police station.
What is the dramatic irony in Raskolnikov's realization about the purse?
Raskolnikov theorized that murder could be justified for a rational purpose, yet he never even looked at what he stole—proving his own theory was intellectually dishonest and the crime was irrational.
What does "spleen" mean in the context "His spleen rose within him"?
In this context, "spleen" refers to a sudden surge of ill temper, irritability, or spite—an archaic usage denoting the organ once believed to be the seat of melancholy and anger.
What does Nastasya mean when she says "It's the blood"?
She uses a folk medical explanation meaning that clotted or trapped blood in the body causes hallucinations and delirium. Symbolically, it connects Raskolnikov's illness to the blood of his murder victims.
What is the significance of the quote: "If it has begun, then it has begun. Hang the new life!"?
This outburst reveals Raskolnikov's disillusionment with the "new life" he expected to begin after the murder. Instead of liberation, he finds only guilt and despair, and his defiance masks growing desperation.
What does Raskolnikov mean when he says he has "cut himself off from everyone and from everything"?
After flinging the coin into the Neva, this thought captures his recognition that the murder has irreversibly separated him from normal human relationships, emotions, and society itself.