„Глядеть не умеем, понимать не умеем”, или сенситивный код к роману Федора Достоевского Идиот

The novel The Idiot by F.M. Dostoyevsky is considered from the point of view of its composite communication with sensory motifs (visual, acoustical, tactile, olfactory). The understanding of the functioning of these motifs underlies the analysis of figurative and thematic structure, and some artistic details of the writer’s poetics. In the article it is shown that the sensory perception in Dostoevsky connects with the cognitive through the relations of symbiotic continuity. We showed connections between the areas of human activity — perception and understanding — and their interference in the text. Sight and hearing are understood by us as the key elements of a linear creation of a plot, touch and smell, in turn — as factors facilitating studying of some features of the author’s poetics. Organizing this material with a purpose to present various receptive fields (sight, hearing, tactile and olfactory perceptions) taking into account their mutual relations and dynamics, allows to reveal the author’s idea on a deeper and motivated level.