The Idiot three prisoners were tied to stakes facing the firing squad: Dostoevsky was among the next in line. Just as the first shots were about to be fired, a message arrived from the Tsar commuting the sentences to hard labor in Siberia. The experience had a profound effect on Dostoevsky, and in Part 1 of "The Idiot" (written twenty years after the event) the character of Prince Myshkin repeatedly speaks in depth on the subject of capital punishment. On one occasion, conversing with the Epanchin women, he recounts an anecdote that exactly mirrors Dostoevsky's own experience. A man of 27, who
Vladimir Myshkin a domestic championship until his very last year. Myshkin came to prominence in the late 1970s when he earned a spot of the Soviet national team as a backup to the legendary Vladislav Tretiak. On February 11, 1979, he was the surprise choice of coach Viktor Tikhonov to start in the deciding game in the Challenge Cup tournament against the National Hockey League all stars. Myshkin responded with a sterling effort, shutting out the NHL stars 6-0 to win the Challenge Cup for the Soviets. A couple of months later, he won his first of six World and European championships,