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Part 1, Chapter 2, Section 2
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Demons, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Politics and Self-Interest
Ideology and Extremism
Morality and Nihilism
Herd Mentality
Atheism vs. Belief in God
Summary
Analysis
When the governor returns to town, he asks Nikolay to come and see him. The governor and Nikolay are distant relatives. The governor asks Nikolay what has gotten into him. Nikolay leans in close to the governor and whispers that he’ll tell him what the matter is. Nikolay then bites the governor’s ear and doesn’t let go for close to a minute. The governor is appalled and has Nikolay arrested. Varvara goes to see the governor, but the governor refuses to see her. Varvara is outraged.
Nikolay continues his pattern of flouting norms of morality and propriety. In this case, Nikolay bites the ear of the governor as the governor tries to get to the bottom of Nikolay’s behavior. Nikolay’s response of biting the governor’s ear shows that Nikolay is willing to challenge authority in any form it comes in and suggests again that he doesn’t consider himself subject to the same rules that govern others.
Themes
While imprisoned, Nikolay goes into an acute attack of “brain fever.” That brain fever seems to clear everything up, as people in town now believe that Nikolay had acted inappropriately due to delirium related to alcohol consumption. Nikolay is released from prison and spends two months in bed. After those two months, he visits the man whose nose he pulled and offers a formal apology. The man is satisfied with Nikolay’s apology. Nikolay then goes to visit Liputin. Liputin explains that he told his servant to wish “intelligence” for Nikolay because he (Liputin) sensed that Nikolay wasn’t in his right mind. Anton isn’t sure exactly why, but Liputin has a profound impact on Nikolay.
The novel explains Nikolay’s impropriety and inappropriate acts by calling it “brain fever,” an illness at the time thought to originate from excessive drinking or from withdrawal symptoms when someone with alcoholism abruptly stops drinking. For his part, Liputin explains that he believed that Nikolay wasn’t in his right mind. The question remains, though, of whether Nikolay’s actions stemmed from a deeper dissatisfaction with society’s norms or whether all of his behavior can be truly explained by the diagnosis of “brain fever.”
Themes
