Now that I’m done being in college and all,

I’ve been able to pick up Brothers Karamazov again.

 

So, it’s story time on Megan’s blog.
(This is my take on Part 3, Book 7, Chapter 3, entitled, “An Onion,” p. 343-359. Read on.)

 

 

So there’s this girl named Grushenka. Her full name is Agrafena Alexandrovna Svetlova. She’s 22 years old.

She causes a lot of trouble and is pretty manipulative.

She was abandoned by the guy who was taking care of her when she was little, and now she is so lonely

that she pretty much tries to make people feel what she feels

so she’s not so lonely anymore.

 

In fact, I was just listening to this song by Eisley, and it reminds me of her.
So anyway. There’s this guy named Alyosha. His full name is Alexei Fyodorovich Karamazov.

Everyone in this book has like six different names. I like it.

Well, Alyosha had this monk, Elder Zosima, that he really looked up to. He’s 20 years old, and he’s pretty much the monk’s understudy. A really upright young man with a pure, humble, innocent heart and all.

Right before Zosima dies, Alyosha is given this commission from this compassionate, wise old monk to leave the monastery and go into the world.

But when that Zosima dies, all the people in the town accuse him and attack his reputation.

Alyosha at first is sad, very sad, that his elder has been so defamed, and so runs to go cry under a tree. But then this annoying guy Rakitin finds him and starts bugging him, so Alyosha’s just like “screw it” and gives into him and goes to this girl Grushenka’s house to get drunk and do who-cares-what while Rakitin gets his way and poisons the most pure thing left in town.

When Alyosha gets there, Grushenka isn’t in a good place herself. She’s actually been wanting him to come for a long time, and is delighted to see him. She offers him a drink and sits on his lap.

But something strange happens. Despite Rakitin luring them together in weakness, there is this surprising and pure kinship of suffering human souls.

And in this kinship, Alyosha finds “a true sister… a treasure — a loving soul.”

He puts down his drink, to Rakitin’s frustration,

and thus so does Agrafena Alexandrovna.

Upon hearing this response — rather than the exploitation she has grown to expect —

she responds as such:

“I will start crying, I will start crying! He called me his sister, I’ll never forget it!”

And then she tells this parable to try one last time — and finally to fail — to prove to him that she is unworthy of love.

This is what I wanted to share mostly.

 

“Once upon a time there was a woman,

and she was wicked as wicked could be,

and she died.

And not one good deed was left behind her.

The devils took her

and threw her into the lake of fire.

And her guardian angel stood thinking:

what good deed of hers can I remember to tell God?

Then he remembered and said to God:

once she pulled up an onion and gave it to a beggar woman.

And God answered:

now take that same onion,

hold it out to her in the lake,

let her take hold of it,

and pull,

and if you pull her out of the lake, she can go to paradise,

but if the onion breaks,

she can stay where she is.

The angel ran to the woman and held out the onion to her;

here, woman, he said,

take hold of it and I’ll pull.

And he began pulling carefully,

and had almost pulled her all the way out,

when other sinners in the lake saw her being pulled out

and all began holding onto her so as to be pulled out with her.

But the woman was wicked as wicked could be,

and she began to kick them wither her feet:

‘It’s me who’s getting pulled out,

not you;

it’s my onion,

not yours.’

No sooner did she say it than the onion broke.

And the woman fell back into the lake

and is burning here to this day.

And the angel wept

and went away.

 

That’s the fable,

Alyosha,

I know it by heart,

because I myself

am that wicked woman.

 

Rakitin continues to just make sly remarks toward her to put her to shame,

but for once in her life,

this Alyosha truly treats Grushenka as

 

a treasure.

 

She then defends this newfound brother against Rakitin:

“He’s the first to pity me, and the only one, that’s what!

Why didn’t you come here before, you cherub,”

she suddenly fell to her knees to him, as if beside herself.

“All my life I’ve been waiting for such a one as you,

I knew someone like that would come and forgive me. I believed that someone would love me,

a dirty woman,

not only for my shame…!”

 

His response is what struck me.

 

“What did I do for you?” Alyosha answered with a tender smile, and he bent down to her and gently took her hands.

“I just gave you an onion, one little onion, that’s all, that’s all…!”

 

That’s all.