Dmitri is becoming desperate and is in dire need of money. After visiting Kuzma Samsonov and then Lyagavy failed to produce the grandiose scenarios Dmitri had imagined, Dmitri goes to Madame Khokhlakov for three thousand roubles. Khokhlakov’s offer of the gold mines is quite a comical scene. It was absurd of Dmitri to even hope that a woman whom he barely knows and whom dislikes him would lend him such a large sum of money.
When Dmitri asks Khokhlakov for three thousand roubles, she immediately agrees. In addition, she promises him infinitely more than he could ever need. She tells him that he needs to go into the mining business and continues caring on about her plans for “saving him.” Her ramblings are very funny due to the fact that this is the ‘woman of little faith.’ She is not really going to trust a scoundrel like Dmitri with 3000 roubles.
The entire scene is even more comical in that when Dmitri demands that money that day, Khokhlakov asks ‘what money?’ She seems not to understand that she had promised Dmitri 3000 roubles. She even claims that she doesn’t have any money. Dmitri is once again thrown into a pit of despair.
Dostoevsky creates a comical effect in this scene by playing off the past tensions between Khokhlakov and Dmitri and by placing Khokhlakov’s extravagant reaction in contrast to Dmitri’s desperation. Dmitri completely believing Khokhlakov adds even more humor to the scene.
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Dmitri is becoming desperate and is in dire need of money. After visiting Kuzma Samsonov and then Lyagavy failed to produce the grandiose scenarios Dmitri had imagined, Dmitri goes to Madame Khokhlakov for three thousand roubles. Khokhlakov’s offer of the gold mines is quite a comical scene. It was absurd of Dmitri to even hope that a woman whom he barely knows and whom dislikes him would lend him such a large sum of money.
When Dmitri asks Khokhlakov for three thousand roubles, she immediately agrees. In addition, she promises him infinitely more than he could ever need. She tells him that he needs to go into the mining business and continues caring on about her plans for “saving him.” Her ramblings are very funny due to the fact that this is the ‘woman of little faith.’ She is not really going to trust a scoundrel like Dmitri with 3000 roubles.
The entire scene is even more comical in that when Dmitri demands that money that day, Khokhlakov asks ‘what money?’ She seems not to understand that she had promised Dmitri 3000 roubles. She even claims that she doesn’t have any money. Dmitri is once again thrown into a pit of despair.
Dostoevsky creates a comical effect in this scene by playing off the past tensions between Khokhlakov and Dmitri and by placing Khokhlakov’s extravagant reaction in contrast to Dmitri’s desperation. Dmitri completely believing Khokhlakov adds even more humor to the scene.
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