The Gambler
Gambling is a very popular vice not just today but even in past centuries. Several movies, operas and even novels are created with gambling as its main theme. One of the best masterpieces created about gambling is the work of Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoevsky entitled "The Gambler". Fyodor Dostoevsky is a gambling aficionado himself and he forcibly published this novel in order to pay his debts that have accumulated through gambling.
This novel is about a young man named Alexei Ivanovich- a tutor of the children of the former Russian General. Alexei lives in a resort suite in Germany and there he serves a personal tutor of the children. The General is highly addicted to gambling and is greatly indebted to an old Frenchman named De Grieux. The general has mortgaged his properties so that he could pay a few percent of his debt to the Frenchman.
The general has a wealthy aunt he calls "grandmother" and upon knowing that his "grandmother" is already ill and sickly, the General became a vulture who was ready to eat the fortune of the old woman as she dies. With this inheritance he is expecting to receive, he was looking forward to paying De Grieux fully and marrying the French woman Mademoiselle de Cominges.
Alexei's love interest in this story is Polina. Polina is some kind of a brat but with so much love, Alexei vowed to Polina that he would do anything to get her and marry her. One night, while they were walking at countryside, Polina asked Alexei to play in the gambling house. Alexei promptly followed and played roulette. He was a lucky man and soon enough he had a good amount of rubles in his pocket. Polina asked for all of them without even explaining why she needs it. Alexei, as naïve as he was, gave it all to Polina. Alexei suffered so much because of Polina's iniquity but he tolerated it all.
One day, when "grandmother" came, she asked Alexei to guide him and bring him to the gambling house. She lost a pretty good amount but also won in equal proportions. She castigated the General for their vulture-like attitude and vowed that she would never give a single cent to the General.
Polina and Alexei was involved in a whirlwind of events which made Alexei win over two hundred thousand roubles. The next morning, Polina confessed to Alexei that she doesn't love him and she loves Mr. Astley, Alexei's acquaintance and she left. With so much desperation, Alexei went to Paris with Mademoiselle de Cominges and spent all his fortunes there until he had nothing and gambled for his daily living.
When he returned, he learned from Mr. Astley that he (Alexei) was really the one Polina loved and that she is in the Switzerland. With this in mind, the novel ended with Alexei turning his last cent into fortunes as he vows to find Polina and live with her again.