Dostoevskii's Forgotten Children: Lost Babies and Baby Loss in <em>The Adolescent</em>

Abstract

Framed as a study of infant loss in Dostoevskii's 1875 novel, The Adolescent, this article examines the disappearance of babies as a narrative and metanarrative phenomenon in the Russian writer's major works. It identifies three different kinds of narrative ‘miscarriage’ of babies in Dostoevskii's fiction: firstly, conceptual miscarriages, where the plan to include an infant character is confined to early drafts and never realized in the published novel; secondly, structural miscarriages, where Dostoevskii or his implied author apparently forget to relate the fate of a baby or young child; and thirdly, symbolic deaths, in which an infant character is directly killed off. These scenarios challenge the new-born child's traditional symbolism of hope and renewal, while contradicting Dostoevskii's well-known love for children and faith in ultimate redemption. As a novel abundant in both infant characters and incomplete plotlines (and, moreover, one written as a reappraisal of the nature of family in the mid-nineteenth century), The Adolescent is an exemplary text for investigating this apparently paradoxical phenomenon. By re-reading narratives of infant mortality in the context of Dostoevskii's religious beliefs, the article proposes that the many incidents of baby loss and lost babies in The Adolescent and elsewhere are not symbols of general doom or damnation. Instead, drawing on Dostoevskii's familiarity with the teachings of Nikolai Federov, they remind readers that spiritual self-renewal should take precedence over seeking personal salvation through marriage and childbirth. The deaths and disappearances of infant characters can be read, not as Dostoevskii's rejection of the possibility of redemption, but as his warning of the moral inadequacy of his own generation.