The Idiot, by the Russian writer Fyodor Dostoevsky, tells the tragic story of Prince Lev Nikolayevich Myshkin. The Prince is a kind, modest man and an unfortunate sufferer of epilepsy. After spending years in an insane asylum in Switzerland, he travels back to his native Russia to find his ancestors. Experiencing society for the first time, he finds himself an outsider and open to manipulation.