Eight Astonishing Facts about The Brothers Karamazov

Plus Six Unverified Facts and Five Interesting Facts

My men’s book club is reading The Brothers Karamazov this year. My Bantam paperback is 936 pages. I’m on 28. We’re supposed to have the first 200 pages read for our meeting the first week of December.

Fortunately, I read it many years ago, so I can fake the discussions. I even researched a few things and assembled a list of interesting facts that I can contribute, thereby deflecting suspicion that I didn’t get through the first 200 pages:

8. It takes place in Russia.

7. Dostoyevsky didn’t write it in a day.

6. No characters are transgender.

5. It’s rumored that Khloe Kardashian hasn’t read it.

4. Dostoyevsky didn’t release a single section of the book on his blog.

3. The Bantam Book edition had to be translated from Russian because Dostoyevsky didn’t write it in English

2. It reinforces negative stereotypes of Turks, Circassians, Jews (who are occasionally referred to disparagingly as “Yids”), and non-traditional families (e.g., using the term “bastard” to refer to children born outside of the traditional patriarchal home).