On a hot July day in Saint Petersburg, a 23-year-old student named Rodion Romanovitch Raskolnikov slips out of his small apartment to avoid his landlord, to whom he is “hopelessly in debt” (38). Raskolnikov walks aimlessly through the streets on his way to meet an elderly pawnbroker named Aliona Ivanovna. He is an alienated, lonely young man, who avoids contact with other people. His poverty and squalid living conditions depress him so much that he has fallen behind in his studies. Half starved, having eaten almost nothing for two days, he dreads some unspeakable, unspecified act which he is about to perform. Though Raskolnikov is a handsome young man, he now dresses in dirty rags to avoid people’s attention.

Raskolnikov arrives at Aliona Ivanovna’s house. As he approaches, he becomes more and more disgusted with his secret plan, seeing his actions as degrading and loathsome. When Aliona Ivanovna opens the door, she considers Raskolnikov with her sharp, spiteful eyes. Raskolnikov wishes to pawn yet another one of his possessions. They haggle, but he is forced to accept her low offer because they both know that Raskolnikov has nowhere else to go. Raskolnikov pays close attention to where she had hidden her money and then announces that he has something even more valuable to pawn.