A Comparison of How Man’s needs and Social Status Effect His Behavior in Anna Karenina and Crime and Punishment

Crime and Punishment and Anna Karenina are two Russian Novels that both take place in the eighteen-sixties. The novels reflect two different ends of the sociology spectrum. Anna Karenina’s conflicts revolve around the realm of high-class society, however Crime and Punishment’s conflicts reflect the life of lower, mid-class society. The two main characters of both novels are Anna Karenina and Raskolnikov. The social statuses of these two characters are determined by the level they find themselves on “Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs”.

“Maslow set up a hierarchical theory of needs in which all the basic needs are at the bottom, and the needs concerned with man's highest potential are at the top. The hierarchic theory is often represented as a pyramid, with the larger, lower levels representing the lower needs, and the upper point representing the need for self-actualization. Each level of the pyramid is dependent on the previous level.” (Maslow)

Th...