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Aspects Of The Soul In Fyodor's The Brothers Karamazov

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When reading through the Brothers Karamazov, I have found that each of Fyodor's three legitimate sons reminds me in different ways of many of the voices from the great conversation. Dmitri: Plato's Republic (the three aspects of the soul); Aristotle's Ethics (virtue and vice); Sophocles’ Oedipus the King (patricide); Euripides’ The Bacchae (the table and the bed). Ivan: Plato's Republic (the three aspects of the soul); Aristotle's Ethics (virtue and vice); Aristophanes’ Birds (longing for a better city); Augustine, The City of God (the cleaving of the soul). Alyosha: Republic (the three aspects of the soul); Aristotle's Ethics and Politics (virtue and vice, the education of children); Augustine, The City of God (the cleaving of the soul); Luther's On Christian Liberty (free man but slave to all). The one major theme that jumps out at me when thinking about the three brothers has to do with the three aspects of the Platonic soul. Each brother in a general way epitomizes one of the three parts (i.e. Noetic, Thymotic, and Epithymotic). …show more content…
According to Plato his soul is Epithymotic. This is a man caught in a love triangle between two women and every chance he gets he eats and drinks away his money. Ivan is clearly the Noetic part of the soul, the logical soul. Because of this he finds himself in a strange situation, he is a reluctant atheist of sorts. His logical side cannot find a harmony between a loving God and a sin sick world. Alyosha has a spirited soul or what Plato might call, Thymotic. There is a boldness and courage in him as well as a spiritual side. He is the one who shows kindness and compassion while also being a spirited

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