The Bet: Part 1 Summary & Analysis

On a dark autumn night, the banker paces in his study and recalls a party he hosted fifteen years before. In a flashback, he and several of his guests, many of whom are journalists and scholars, discuss whether capital punishment is more humane than life imprisonment. Most guests disapprove of capital punishment, claiming it is obsolete and immoral under a Christian state and should be replaced by life imprisonment.

The banker disagrees, suggesting that capital punishment is in its way more moral than life imprisonment because it kills instantaneously instead of by degrees, which is more humane. An unnamed guest remarks that they are both equally immoral, because the State does not have the right to take away that which it cannot give back. A young lawyer then speaks up, agreeing that both punishments are equally immoral but adding that he would prefer life imprisonment because “it’s better to live somehow than not to live at all.”

The banker loses his temper, bangs his fist on the table, and makes a bet with the lawyer for two million rubles that he couldn’t stay in a cell for five years. The lawyer, equally roused, raises the stakes to fifteen years. The bet is solidified in front of numerous witnesses.

The banker further goads the lawyer over dinner, telling him to back out before it is too late. He points out that the lawyer would be losing “three or four of the best years of [his] life,” though no more because he would surely not be able to stay any longer than that. He also reminds the lawyer that voluntary rather than enforced imprisonment is much harder psychologically.

Back in the present, the banker bemoans his decision to make this bet, because nothing has been gained: the lawyer has lost fifteen years of his life, it looks like the banker will lose two million rubles, and no one will have gained any knowledge as to whether capital punishment or life imprisonment is preferable.

Fifteen years previously, the lawyer is put under strict observation in a garden wing of the banker’s house. He is forbidden to leave, to interact with anyone or hear human voices, or to receive letters or newspapers. He is allowed to write letters, read books, play the piano, drink wine, and smoke tobacco. He can also send notes through a little window, asking for things like books or wines. Any attempt to escape means the banker will not have to pay the two million rubles.

At first, the lawyer struggles to adjust to the loneliness and boredom of his captivity. He plays piano all day and night, reads books “of a light character” to pass the time, and rejects wine and tobacco, fearing the former would excite desires he cannot fulfill while the latter would spoil the air in his room.

In the second year, the lawyer stops playing piano and starts reading classic books. By the fifth year, he is playing music again and asking for wine. That year, he often simply lays around. He does not read, and though he writes occasionally he tears it up and often weeps. 

In the sixth year, the lawyer begins to zealously study languages, philosophy, and history, reading more books than can easily be brought to him. He writes a letter to the banker in six languages and expresses joy at being able to understand the geniuses of the world. In the letter, he also asks the banker to fire a gun in the garden if there are no mistakes found in his translations, which the banker does. 

In the tenth year, the lawyer reads only the New Testament. In the next two years, he reads haphazardly and randomly, focusing on anything from the natural sciences to Byron and Shakespeare. He reads almost desperately, as though “he were swimming in the sea among broken pieces of wreckage, and in his desire to save his life was eagerly grasping one piece after another.”