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literary and Real-life Prototypes of Dostoevsky's Heroes: The "Tradesman in the Robe" in Crime and Punishment Valentina E. Vetlovskaia "Literaturnye i real'nye prototipy geroev Dostoevskogo ('Meshchanin v khalate' v 'Prestuplenii i nakazanii')," Russkaia literatura, no. 1 (2008): 194-205. The "tradesman in the robe" appears on the scene three times in Crime and Punishment. He is first seen just after Raskolnikov's suspicious visit to the murdered woman's apartment in the guise of a potential tenant. He had climbed the stairs, rung the doorbell, and asked questions about blood: "Several people were loitering near the street entrance to the building, gaping at passers-by: both porters, a peasant woman, a tradesman in a robe and a couple of others" (6: 134). This "tradesman in a robe" is the one who suggests that they turn Raskolnikov in to the police: '''Why don't we just take him down to the police station?' the tradesman interjected and fell silent. Raskolnikov glanced back over his shoulder, took a close look at him, and said just as quietly and lazily: 'Let's go!' 'Let's take him, then!' said the tradesman, encouraged. 'Why was he going on and on about that, is something bothering him?'" And then '''Still, we should take him to the police station'" (6: 135). Take note: although Raskolnikov does "take a close look" at the tradesman , it becomes clear later that he did not get a very good look. When the tradesman comes to his apartment the next day (his second appearance in the novel), Raskolnikov doesn't recognize him: "The porter was standing at the door to his room and pointing him out to a small man who looked like a petty tradesman, was dressed in something like a robe, in a waistcoa t, and who from a distance resembled a woman. His head, in a soiled cap, hung forward and his whole body was sort of hunched over. To judge from his flabby, wrinkled face, he was over fifty years old; his small, sunken eyes had a sullen, stern and disgruntled look" (6: 208-09). During this encounter the tradesman calls Raskolnikov a "murderer," sending a sudden chill through his body and making him go weak in the knees (6: 209). Raskolnikov assumes that this man, whom he doesn't recognize, and who has come looking for him, is a witness to his crime: "Who is he? Who is this man who has appeared from out of nowhere? Where has he been and what did he see? He must have seen everything. Where had he been standing and watching? Why did he wait until now to rise up from underground?" (6: 210). In tllis infernal dream, a conCaro l Apollonio, ed., The New Russian Dostoevsky: Readings for the Twenty-First Century, Bloomington, IN: Siavica Publishers, 2010, 123- 37. 124 VALENTI NA E. VETLOVSKAIA tinuation of nightmarish reality, the "tradesman in a robe" indeed plays the role of witness. After calling Raskolnikov a murderer, he then, as though to confirm the accusation, leads the hero to the old woman's apartment, to the scene of the crime, where he undergoes a mocking and ominous transformation and mutates into the old woman herself. When the tradesman comes later to beg Raskolnikov's forgiveness for his wrongful accusation and his "spite" (his third and last appearance in the novel), Raskolnikov yet again fails to recall their first encounter: The door opened slowly and silently, and suddenly a figure appeared - the man from yesterday who had come up from underground. The man stopped on the threshold, looked silently at Raskolnikov and took a step forward into the room. He looked just the same as the day before, and was dressed the same, but his face and eyes had changed radically: he now looked depressed. After standing a moment , he gave a deep sigh. If he had placed his palm on his cheek and tipped his head to one side, he would have looked exactly like a peasant woman. "What do you want?" asked Raskolnikov, petrified. (6: 274) In this conversation the tradesman reminds the hero about their first encounter : "I was standing [...] right there at the gate then, or have you forgotten ?" Only here does Raskolnikov "clearly recall the whole scene from two days ago" and "a voice that had proposed to take him straight to the police station. He could not recall the face of the person who had said it, and even now he did not...

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