Another Flag or Signpost: Dostoevsky

Call him Dostoevsky or Dusty-and-Dusky but Kafka seemed to enjoy planting the flag every now and then (doesn't say which woman painter, why that letter, but I'll see what I can dig up):
Dostoyevsky's letter to a woman painter.

*

Can't retrieve the painter or letter by googling. IMHO the text is unclear in this respect, but at least one site seems to suggest that what follows the "flag" is a quote from (or is it merely a "grappling with the content of") the letter.

The next paragraph begins:
The life of society moves in a circle. Only those burdened with a common affliction understand each other.  

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