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  • Published: 13 January 2026
  • ISBN: 9780241739822
  • Imprint: Penguin Classics
  • Format: Hardback
  • Pages: 784
  • RRP: $55.00

The Idiot




Dostoyevsky's great novel of suffering and sickness, now in Penguin Clothbound Classics

Inspired by an image of Christ's suffering, Dostoyevsky set out to create a protagonist with 'a truly beautiful soul' and to trace the fate of such an individual as he comes into contact with the brutal reality of contemporary society. The novel begins when the innocent epileptic Prince Myshkin - the 'idiot' - arrives in St Petersburg and finds himself drawn into a web of violent and passionate relationships that leads to blackmail, betrayal and eventually murder.

This is a stunning new Clothbound Classics edition of Dostoyevsky's great novel, designed by the award-winning Coralie Bickford-Smith and translated by David McDuff. These delectable and collectible Penguin editions are bound in colourful, tactile cloth with foil stamped into the design.

  • Published: 13 January 2026
  • ISBN: 9780241739822
  • Imprint: Penguin Classics
  • Format: Hardback
  • Pages: 784
  • RRP: $55.00

Other books in the series

A Dog's Heart
The Black Tulip
The Lady of the Camellias
Selected Poetry
On Sparta
Man and Superman
Saint Joan
Botchan
Kusamakura
Love
Annals
Selected Poems
Military Dispatches

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