The Brothers Karamazov is often considered one of the world's most complex novels. Dostoevsky examines many different facets of life, investigates many problems of lasting importance, and is able to do so successfully in this novel because the mere size and bulk of the book allows him to proceed with deliberate slowness in introducing and developing his ideas. Attempting in these Commentaries, however, to isolate some of the main ideas and to analyze them destroys the essential unity of the novel. Part of its greatness is the manner in which Dostoevsky is able to integrate all the divergent elements into one unified whole. Each idea borders upon another and is somewhat vitiated when isolated from the remainder of the novel.
In the complex spirit of the novel and in the leisurely nineteenth-century fashion of giving the intricate background of the main characters, Dostoevsky begins his book, then immediately establishes its tone. He first announces the element of mystery in the novel — the "gloomy and tragic death" of Karamazov — and then begins defining the elements of tragedy — especially the Karamazov tragedy.
The older Karamazov is depicted as base, vulgar, ill-natured, and completely degraded, and his "tragic" death will be revealed to be tragic only because his sons are implicated in the death — not because Karamazov himself arouses tragic emotion. In fact, in the trial scene later in the book, it is pointed out that the murder is not a parricide in the truest sense because Fyodor Karamazov never functioned as a proper father. To support this idea, Dostoevsky begins at the very outset of the novel to show the blackness and vulgarity of the man who is to be murdered.
