fort'.And here I find myself realizing that I have missed what is perhaps the most importantreason for why we invest so much of ourselves in Ivan: it is because, all the time that heis tormenting himself and (as I have said above) thus evoking our sympathy, we see theremote possibility of his salvation and, because we already sympathize with him, wedesire very strongly for him to have it. Yet, even by the end of the novel, Ivan's internalconflict is not resolved. When we see him last it is with 'acute fever and unconscious'(871). We cannot help but have pity for someone whose depths of conscience drove him toinsanity and perhaps even to his death-bed. Indeed, it is these very ideas that lead me toassert that the critics whom I mentioned at the beginning of this essay were wrong: oursympathy for the character of Ivan Fyodorovich Karamazov does not makeDostoyevsky's great work a 'diabolodicy', but rather supports its intended role as atheodicy. In identifying with Ivan so strongly we are led through the 'crucible of doubt'along with him and, while he apparently succumbs to his intellectual pride, we see this andare pushed in the direction of accepting God, or, at the very least, His necessity. Ofcourse, it could be argued that this 'acceptance' only stands in the context of the novel-that is, the events in the novel are structured so as to make all non-believers come to badends and thus make it seem as though any path other than that of Zosima and Alyosha isthe wrong path; however, I must stress that the existence of such a profound conscience in Ivan and our deep sympathy for him leads us, almost inevitably, to reject the idea that'all things are lawful' because our sympathy proves that we ourselves have consciencesas well. Thus, whether we believe in God or not, we are forced to admit that we must atleast act as though there is. To do otherwise is to risk the fate of Ivan FyodorovichKaramazov. ...
