Humiliated and Insulted is a novel by Fyodor Dostoyevsky, first published in 1861 in the monthly magazine Vremya. Narrated by a young author, Vanya, who has just released his first novel which bears an obvious resemblance to Dostoyevsky's own first novel, Poor Folk, it consists of two gradually converging subplots. One deals with Vanya's close friend and former love object, Natasha, who has left her family to live with her new lover, Alyosha. Alyosha is the saintly but dimwitted son of Prince Valkovsky, who hopes to gain financially by marrying Alyosha off to an heiress, Katya. Valkovsky's... cruel machinations to break up Alyosha and Natasha make him one of the most memorable "predatory types" that Dostoyevsky created. The other branch of the plot deals with the approximately 13-year old orphan Nellie, whom Vanya saves from an abusive household by taking her into his apartment, and whose deceased mother's story in some ways parallels that of Natasha.
more