The Eternal Husband Audiobook (Unabridged)

Although this is a very short book compared to Crime and Punishment, The Brothers Karamozov, and other works by Dostoevksy,The Eternal Husband is considered by many to be one of Dostoevsky's most perfect works. It displays the full range of Dostoevsky's genius. The novel is a profound exploration of imitative rivalry and the duality of human consciousness.

Told from the point of view of a rich and idle man who is confronted by a rival, the husband of his former, and now deceased, mistress, the story concerns the interchanging hatred and love of the two men. The book has both emotional power and an uncompromising insight into the human condition.

Download and start listening now!

"Dostoevsky took some sort of cue from Gogol--they both gravitate toward the pained, obstinate side of the Russian character, as opposed to Tolstoy's robust extroversion--but this nonetheless strikes me as a ferociously original work. Who else in the 19th century was writing like this? Dostoevsky can nail all the social aspects: the contrast between Pavlovich's squalid life and the well-adjusted families that look on helplessly is portrayed perfectly, and the cruelty of the children towards him during a game of hide and seek (a game very prone to cruelty, after all) is one of the greatest scenes I've ever read, completely pitiful. But this mastery didn't satisfy Dostoevsky--what he's really interested in are the undercurrents. And so it is the feverish dreams during those interminable white nights that he keeps coming back to. His people lie awake, wrestle each other behind thick curtains that shut out the light: what a physical book this is, so many grabbed lapels, so much falling down exhausted. (Why, when we read Dostoevsky, do we find so many people sleeping on the couch in their clothes?) Unlike Crime and Punishment this book makes the outcast the secondary figure and focuses on someone who shuttles between both worlds, charming the parlor crowd but afraid he might have more in common with the wretch he's bunking with. If you were to adapt this nearly-150-year-old story to modern times, there's barely anything you would need to change."

— Jason (5 out of 5 stars)