Crime and punishment

HarperCollins is proud to present its new range of best-loved, essential classics. 'Talking nonsense is the sole privilege mankind possesses over the other organisms.

It's by talking nonsense that one gets to the truth!

I talk nonsense, therefore I'm human.' Desperate student Raskolnikov murders an old female pawnbroker in the slums of St Petersburg, rationalising with himself that it was a principled killing in order to rid the world of her and that he can do good with the money in order to counteract his crime.

Based around this grim action, Dostoevsky journeys into the psychological and moral mind of Raskolnikov, illuminating the enduring conflicts that lie at the very centre of human existence.