«WHAT SORT OF WORK? THINKING»
F. DOSTOYEVSKY, Crime and Punishment
1.
He had resolutely withdrawn from all human contacts, like a tortoise retreating into its shell. His landlady had stopped supplying him with food two weeks earlier and it had not yet occurred to him to go down and have things out with her, although he had been left without dinner. He was crushingly poor, but he no longer felt the oppression of his poverty.
Nastasya: Get up!—why are you still asleep? It’s past nine o’clock. I’ve brought you some tea; wouldn’t you like some? You’ll be wasting away!
Raskolnikov: Did the landlady send up the tea?

2.
Nastasya: Likely, isn’t it?
Raskolnikov: Here, Nastasya, take this, please, and go and buy me a loaf. And go to the provision-shop and get me a bit of sausage, the cheapest kind.

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3.
Nastasya: That Praskovya Pavlovna’s going to go to the police about you.

4.
Raskolnikov: To the police? What does she want?
Nastasya: You won’t pay her her money, and you won’t get out. It’s plain enough what she wants.

5.
Raskolnikov: The devil! It only needed that! No! Just now that’s… not convenient for me… She’s a fool. I’ll go and talk to her tomorrow.
Nastasya: Of course she’s a fool, and so am I, and you’re very clever—but in that case, why do you lie here like an old sack, with nothing to show for your cleverness? You say you used to go and teach children; why do you do nothing now?

6.
Raskolnikov: I am doing…
Nastasya: What?

7.
Raskolnikov: Work…
Nastasya: What sort of work?

8.
Raskolnikov: Thinking.

9.
Nastasya: Well, and have you thought up how to get a lot of money?
Raskolnikov: I can’t teach children when I have no boots. Besides, I despise the whole business.

10.
Nastasya: It’s no good quarrelling with your bread and butter.
Raskolnikov: Teaching children is very badly paid. What can you do with a few copecks?

11.
Nastasya: I suppose you want a fortune straight off?
Raskolnikov: Yes, I do.