Fyodor Dostoevsky inspiration for his writing. They continued their trip through Germany, visiting Frankfurt, Darmstadt, Heidelberg and Karlsruhe. They spent five weeks in Baden-Baden, where Dostoevsky had a quarrel with Turgenev and again lost much money at the roulette table. The couple travelled on to Geneva. In September 1867, Dostoevsky began work on "The Idiot", and after a prolonged planning process that bore little resemblance to the published novel, he eventually managed to write the first 100 pages in only 23 days; the serialisation began in "The Russian Messenger "in January 1868. Their first child, Sonya, had been conceived in Baden-Baden, and
Prince Myshkin plot, but he is of vital importance because he represents an antithetical orientation to Myshkin in relation to the problems of life and death, God and morality, that form the thematic basis of the novel. Like Myshkin, Ippolit lives in the shadow of illness and death, but his tormented nihilistic worldview excludes the vision of harmony, joy and compassion that is so essential to Myshkin. Consequently he is impelled to increasing extremes of rebellion—against society, against nature and against God, as he strives to affirm his will in the face of his impotence. Despite their apparently opposite orientations, Ippolit and