The Confession/Repentance of Raskolnikov (Crime and Punishment)

Raskolnikov, though he confesses his crime to the police, never repents of his sin in the story. In the final epilogue, Raskolnikov judges himself "severely" for his crime, but "his exasperated conscience [finds] no particularly terrible fault in his past." Shortly thereafter, the narrator explains Raskolnikov's thoughts. "And if only fate would have sent him repentance--," the narrator elucidates, "--burning repentance that would have torn his heart and robbed him of sleep, that repentance, the awful agony of which brings visions of hanging or drowning! Oh, he would have been glad of it! Tears and agonies would at least have been life. But he did not repent of his crime."

It is not until the very last sentence of the novel that Dostoevsky even hints at his repentance. Dostoevsky concludes, "But that is the beginning of a new story--the story of the gradual renewal of a man, the story of his gradual regeneration, of his passing from one world into another, of his initiation into a new unknown life." This alludes to his repentence later on in his life, but as "this" story ends, Raskolnikov does not repent.