Rhetorical Question

Question asked without expecting an answer, because the answer is already implied, or because what matters is the doubt it exposes.

In Crime and Punishment

Do you understand, sir, do you understand what it means when there is no longer anywhere to go?

The question “Do you understand, sir … what it means when there is no longer anywhere to go?” does not ask for an answer. Marmeladov asks it to force on the listener the conclusion that poverty explains everything he has done.

Part One: The Crime, Marmeladov

There is life! Haven't I just lived? My life hasn't died along with the old crone!

Part Two: The Inquiry, Raskolnikov

And what would I be without God?

Part Four: The Siege, Sonia

Was it the old woman I killed? It was myself I killed, and not the old woman! Right there, all at once, I destroyed myself, forever!..

Part Five: The Confession, Raskolnikov

that I killed a loathsome, noxious louse, an old moneylending hag who serves no one, for whose death forty sins are forgiven, who sucked the lifeblood of the poor, and that is supposed to be a crime? I don't think about it, and I don't think about washing it off.

Part Six: The Surrender, Raskolnikov