The Brothers Karamazov

Fyodor Dostoyevsky · David Fishelson

Aug 2007 · L.A. Theatre Works · Narrated by John de Lancie, Sharon Gless, Arye Gross, Harry Hamlin, Kaitlin Hopkins, Joseph Mascolo, Richard Hoyt Miller, John Randolph, John Rubinstein, Tom Virtue, and Ping Wu

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2 hr 15 min

Unabridged

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About this audiobook

Playwright David Fishelson has adapted Dostoyevsky’s masterpiece The Brothers Karamazov into a spellbinding full-cast drama. The passionate Karamazov brothers spring to life, led by their rogue of a father, who entertains himself by drinking, womanizing, and pitting his three sons against each other. The men have plenty to fight over, including the alluring Grushenka.

An L.A. Theatre Works full cast performance featuring:

John de Lancie as Ivan Karamazov
Sharon Gless as Grushenka
Arye Gross as Alyosha Karamazov
Harry Hamlin as Dmitry Karamazov
Kaitlin Hopkins as Katerina
Joseph Mascolo as Fyodor
Richard Hoyt Miller as Miusov/Waiter/Mussyalovich/Judge Sergeant
John Randolph as Zossima/Visitor
John Rubinstein as Smerdyakov
Tom Virtue as Father Joseph/Pawnbroker/Vrublevsky/Prosecutor/Coachman
Ping Wu as Rakitin/Father Paissy/Innkeeper/Defense Attorney

Directed by David Fishelson. Recorded before a live audience at the Guest Quarters Suite Hotel, Santa Monica in June of 1994.

About the author

One of the most powerful and significant authors in all modern fiction, Fyodor Dostoevsky was the son of a harsh and domineering army surgeon who was murdered by his own serfs (slaves), an event that was extremely important in shaping Dostoevsky's view of social and economic issues. He studied to be an engineer and began work as a draftsman. However, his first novel, Poor Folk (1846), was so well received that he abandoned engineering for writing. In 1849, Dostoevsky was arrested for being a part of a revolutionary group that owned an illegal printing press. He was sentenced to be executed, but the sentence was changed at the last minute, and he was sent to a prison camp in Siberia instead. By the time he was released in 1854, he had become a devout believer in both Christianity and Russia - although not in its ruler, the Czar. During the 1860's, Dostoevsky's personal life was in constant turmoil as the result of financial problems, a gambling addiction, and the deaths of his wife and brother. His second marriage in 1887 provided him with a stable home life and personal contentment, and during the years that followed he produced his great novels: Crime and Punishment (1886), the story of Rodya Raskolnikov, who kills two old women in the belief that he is beyond the bounds of good and evil; The Idiots (1868), the story of an epileptic who tragically affects the lives of those around him; The Possessed (1872), the story of the effect of revolutionary thought on the members of one Russian community; A Raw Youth (1875), which focuses on the disintegration and decay of family relationships and life; and The Brothers Karamazov (1880), which centers on the murder of Fyodor Karamazov and the effect the murder has on each of his four sons. These works have placed Dostoevsky in the front rank of the world's great novelists. Dostoevsky was an innovator, bringing new depth and meaning to the psychological novel and combining realism and philosophical speculation in his complex studies of the human condition.

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