"Krotkaya" from 1876 was published in Fyodor Dostoyevsky's one-man journal "A Writer's Diary," where each issue was eagerly awaited in contemporary Russia. The short novel recounts a despairing man's monologue the night after his young wife's suicide, with the tragedy slowly played out through his incoherent speech at her bier. The narrator is a dismissed officer, who now works as a pawnbroker. Feeling unappreciated by those around him, he marries a young, poor, but proud woman and tries through his dominance in the relationship to achieve recognition and love. However, his strict demands have the opposite effect.
