>>>I read The Idiot too. I have to admit though, that I find most translations of Russian authors read too much like first grade primers. My dad was fluent in Russian of course, and he didn't much care for most translations either.
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>>Dostoyevsky is the least readable author among Russian classical writers. One must be extremely dedicated to reading to get it to the end.
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>I did find "Crime and punishment" a bit hard to read (because I tried to read it in Russian :), so I never finished it - I rely on my memory of an excellent theater play they staged in Belgrade, with some of the best actors we had at the time. IMO, the late Ljuba Tadić is on par with, say, Alec Guinness.
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>However, I've read Karamazovs twice, and it's quite a page turner. Also, the "Doppelganger" (don't know the actual translation of the title, it's "Dvojnik" in Serbian) and "Gambler" read very easily. But then, I read them in Serbian, where the translators already have a solid ground on how to bring the atmosphere over, which is nearly impossible to achieve in English. Not just in book translations - in movies as well. I still haven't seen any West made movie based in Russia that has the atmosphere.
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>I was, OTOH, quite surprised with Bulat Okudzhava's "Journey of dilettantes". It read like a soft Dostoyevsky. It's quite similar in atmosphere, time, even events that shape the characters' destiny, yet you see the author's heart is so openly on the side of the main characters - he just loves the couple.

I understand your points and obviously I explained my own opinion. You probably know about two lines in Russian classical literature: one to preach, another to show. Dostoyevsky is the hardest of the first line, and reading 500 pages when every page tries to convince me in something by rather crude examples was unbearable to my taste. By the same reason I have reservations about Tolstoy books, though they have much better (imho) style.