Dostoyevsky’s Notes from Underground has been deemed a strange literary piece (Roberts 2). It is written in two parts, contains a neurotic character that is unsettling to some readers, and addresses the Social Radicalist ideology that was popular during that time (Roberts 2; Frank 2). However, it can be argued that this character is portrayed in such a way that he is self-absorbed, petty, and imprudent for good reason. During the time that this work was written, Social Radicalists were spreading the idea that free will does not exist (Frank 7). As a result, Dostoyevsky created the Underground Man to prove how impossible it would be for one to not have free will and successfully integrate into society. This train of thought also strongly believed …show more content…
that human beings are innately good (2). By having the Underground Man ruminate on seemingly pointless events, the author displays Social Radicalist ideas as impossible to abide by. As a result of attempting to abide by all of the Social Radicalist doctrines, the Underground Man becomes a character who hates himself, is awkward, and cannot act in ways he wishes to because he does not have free will. The main character in Dostoevsky’s Notes from Underground comes across as a very neurotic human being.
This character, often called the Underground Man, is portrayed as strange, obsessive, and self-centered (Roberts 2). The Underground Man takes mundane life events and turns them into something much more important. For example, while in a tavern attempting to duel another individual, an officer picks him up and moves him out of his path (Dostoyevsky 734-737). Although this typically can be seen as a minor event in one’s life, the Underground Man sees this as an insult. He then ruminates on this event for a long period of time, attempting to find a way to seek revenge on this officer’s actions. This character becomes fixated on this small meaningless event, much like he does throughout the entire text. The Underground Man is hyperconscious of his intelligence as well (Roberts 2). While at a dinner party that he invites himself to out of spite, he is consistently trying to use his intelligence to insult the other men that he dislikes (Dostoyevsky 748-749). The Underground Man is aware of his poor social skills, describing himself as insecure and overly sensitive, yet he cannot find any way to develop them because of the ideology he is trying to abide by (Roberts 3). These characteristics, therefore, make having relationships with others difficult and this is clear to see as Dostoyevsky continues the
story. At the time that this work was written, Russia was a country trying to accept the ideas of Social Radicalists (Frank 2). Man was innately good and amenable to reason according to this ideology, an idea that Dostoyevsky rejected. The conflict of this idea can be seen when the Underground Man attempts to save Liza (Dostoyevsky 757). He tells her that the life of prostitution will only ruin her and that she should get out of it. But after trying to help her, he ends up being the one who needs saving. When Liza attempts to help him, however, he reacts in an extreme way and feels the need to exert his dominance over her. The Underground Man had to ensure his ego was still sustained, but this made him incapable of loving (Scanlan 555). The Underground Man was displaying his innate “goodness” by attempting to save her, but this quality is quickly overthrown by his desire to retain his ego. The Underground Man in Dostoyevsky’s story can be viewed as a conflicted character. He is constantly trying to accept the major doctrines of the Social Radicalist’s ideas yet this continuously throws him into aversive events (Frank 4). This character that Dostoyevsky has created does not struggle in the social world due to his rejection of reason, but due to the acceptance of all of the aspects of Social Radicalism. He realizes that he is considered strange by others, yet he cannot change his ways without changing his ideological constraints. One of the ideas that Social Radicalists hold is the idea that free will is nonexistent (Frank 7). This would explain how the more the Underground Man ruminated on an event, the more unlikely the event was to occur. When looking at the event that occurred with the officer, the more the Underground Man thought about seeking his revenge, the more he backed out of his actions of bumping into him (Dostoyevsky 737). Furthermore, there are many times within the text where he tends acts in certain ways out of spite, which further reinforces the idea that he does not have free will, he is simply acting through emotional impulses. Through this character, Dostoyevsky displayed all that can go wrong with the acceptance of the Social Radicalist’s ideas (Scanlan 556). By trying to accept the doctrines of the Social Radicalists, the Underground Man struggles to fit into society. He is awkward, rude, and vindictive, characteristics that make it difficult to integrate into society (Roberts 8). He isolates himself from the rest of the world, and when he does interact with others it does not end well (Dostoyevsky 748, 779). His constant rumination brings him to hate himself and his actions. The Underground Man is in a state of consciousness that is miserable and painful (Roberts 11). This character experiences extreme suffering that is brought upon by his own thoughts and actions and teeters on the edge of sanity due to this suffering. He is frustrated with his life, seeing as how he is extremely intelligent yet cannot understand others actions and misinterprets social interactions. This in turn leads him to accuse himself for all of the misfortunes he encounters, further leading to self-hatred. The Underground Man has extremely odd behaviours and thoughts. He is often described as cowardly, inconsiderate, vain, and stubborn (Scanlan 555). This character, in an attempt to adopt the Social Radicalist’s ideology, experiences mundane events in extreme ways (Frank 4). Because he does not have free will, according to this ideology, he fails to act in ways he wishes. This forces him to constantly ruminate on events and think of all of the “what if’s”. By constantly ruminating, he cannot fully function in society and he fails to make meaningful connections with others. Although he is supposed to be innately good, he ends up hurting others in order to maintain his ego. Dostoyevsky’s character is therefore a good metaphor for the idea that one cannot possibly incorporate all the doctrines of an ideology and still be an ideal citizen.
Timshel; meaning “thou mayest”, holds a significant role in East of Eden. It shows that anyone can desire to surmount vile in their hearts and create morality within them self. In the novel, Steinbeck portrays the significance of timshel through the introduction of free will, the internal conflict of Caleb, and the blessing of Adam.
Hansen, Bruce. “Dostoevsky’s Theodicy.” Provo, Utah: Brigham Young University, 1996. At . accessed 18 November 2001.
Dostoyevsky's writing in this book is such that the characters and setting around the main subject, Raskolnikov, are used with powerful consequences. The setting is both symbolic and has a power that affects all whom reside there, most notably Raskolnikov. An effective Structure is also used to show changes to the plot's direction and Raskolnikov's character. To add to this, the author's word choice and imagery are often extremely descriptive, and enhance the impact at every stage of Raskolnikov's changing fortunes and character. All of these features aid in the portrayal of Raskolnikov's downfall and subsequent rise.
Solzhenitsyn believed that it was nearly impossible to have truly free thoughts under the prison camp conditions described in One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, or in any situation where there is an authoritarian ruler. In a pris...
In Crime and Punishment, Dostoevsky gives the reader an inside look to the value system that he holds for himself, as well as the type of characteristics that he abhors in people as well as the characteristics that he admires in people. He uses characters in the novel to express his beliefs of what a person should be like in life to be a “good'; person. Specifically he uses Raskolnokv to show both good and bad characteristics that he likes in people. Also he uses Svidriglaiov and Luzin to demonstrate the characteristics that people should shun and his personal dislikes in people.
One of the most important concepts in Dostoevsky’s novel, The Brothers Karamazov is the concept of free will. It is important to the novel because of the overall theme that everyone is responsible in some way for everything that happens. Also, it makes the novel more interesting because it essentially lets the characters run around doing whatever they like. However, there is one character in the novel who does not exercise his right to free will like the other characters do. Alyosha, who Dostoevsky calls his “hero”, is granted free will like the other characters in the novel, but at the same time, he doesn’t seem to actually use it. For all practical purposes, he doesn’t have free will. Because if free will is the right to make choices based on one’s own rational mindset, then Alyosha cannot be considered to have free will as the other characters in the novel have it. For example, his brothers Ivan and Dmitri are seemingly free to do whatever they please, whether it be not believing in God, or wasting large amounts of money. Their father is no different in that he pursue...
In Notes from Underground, Dostoyevsky relates the viewpoints and doings of a very peculiar man. The man is peculiar because of his lack of self-respect, his sadistic and masochistic tendencies, and his horrible delight in inflicting emotional pain on himself and others. Almost instantly the reader is forced to hate this man. He has no redeeming values, all of his insights into human nature are ghastly, and once he begins the narrative of his life, the reader begins to actively hate and pity him.
In such poor living conditions, those that the slums of Russia has to offer, the characters in Fyodor Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment1 struggle, living day to day. Raskolnikov, the protagonist, experiences multiple layers of suffering (the thought of his murder causes him greater suffering than does his poverty) as does Sonia and Katerina Ivanovna (1). Through these characters as well as Porfiry Petrovitch, Dostoevsky wants the reader to understand that suffering is the cost of happiness and he uses it to ultimately obliterate Raskolnikov’s theory of an ubermensch which allows him to experience infinite love.
Fyodor Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment begins with Rodion Romanovich Raskolnikov living in poverty and isolation in St. Petersburg. The reader soon learns that he was, until somewhat recently, a successful student at the local university. His character at that point was not uncommon. However, the environment of the grim and individualistic city eventually encourages Raskolnikov’s undeveloped detachment and sense of superiority to its current state of desperation. This state is worsening when Raskolnikov visits an old pawnbroker to sell a watch. During the visit, the reader slowly realizes that Raskolnikov plans to murder the woman with his superiority as a justification. After the Raskolnikov commits the murder, the novel deeply explores his psychology, yet it also touches on countless other topics including nihilism, the idea of a “superman,” and the value of human life. In this way, the greatness of Crime and Punishment comes not just from its examination of the main topic of the psychology of isolation and murder, but the variety topics which naturally arise in the discussion.
Dostoyevsky's characters are very similar, as is his stories. He puts a strong stress on the estrangement and isolation his characters feel. His characters are both brilliant and "sick" as mentioned in each novel, poisoned by their intelligence. In Notes from the Underground, the character, who is never given a name, writes his journal from solitude. He is spoiled by his intelligence, giving him a fierce conceit with which he lashes out at the world and justifies the malicious things he does. At the same time, though, he speaks of the doubt he feels at the value of human thought and purpose and later, of human life. He believes that intelligence, to be constantly questioning and "faithless(ly) drifting" between ideas, is a curse. To be damned to see everything, clearly as a window (and that includes things that aren't meant to be seen, such as the corruption in the world) or constantly seeking the meaning of things elusive. Dostoyevsky thought that humans are evil, destructive and irrational.
Dostoevsky, Fyodor. Notes from Underground: A New Translation, Backgrounds and Sources, Responses, Criticism. Norton Critical Edition. New York: Norton, 1989.
In Dostoevsky's Notes from Underground, the Underground Man proposes a radically different conception of free action from that of Kant. While Kant thinks that an agent is not acting freely unless he acts for some reason, the Underground Man seems to take the opposite stance: the only way to be truly autonomous is to reject this notion of freedom, and to affirm one's right to act for no reason. I will argue that the Underground Man's notion of freedom builds on Kant's, in that it requires self-consciousness in decision-making. But he breaks from Kant when he makes the claim that acting for a reason is not enough, and only provides an illusion of freedom. When faced with the two options of deceiving himself about his freedom (like most men) or submitting to ìthe wall,î (a form of determinism), the Underground Man chooses an unlikely third option - a 'retort'. I will conclude this paper by questioning whether this 'retort' succeeds at escaping the system of nature he desperately seeks to avoid.
The tone of “Notes from Underground” is sharp, strange and bitter. The bitterness of the book is traced to the multiple personal misfortunes the author suffered as he wrote his novel. Through these personal tragedies it can be argued that the author presented the position of the “underground man” through his own experiences. Additionally, the research holds the second belief that the novel’s presentation of “underground man” is founded on the social context the novel addresses (Fanger 3). Through this, it was found that Dostoevsky presented the suffering of man under the emerging world view directed by European materialism, liberalism and utopianism. As he began writing his novel, Dostoevsky had been directed by the romantic error that looked at utopian social life and the social vision of satisfying and perfecting regular life for man. The failure for the society to gain these achievements was as a result of the distant liberalism and materialism that reduced the power of reasoning and...
Fyodor Dostoyevsky and Henrik Ibsen were two famous writers of the nineteenth era who became famous by writing about realism with their masterpieces; Dostoyevsky with the “Notes from Underground” and Ibsen with “Hedda Gabler”. Both works are based on the realistic picture of the whole society, between rich and poor, where their protaonist’s actions are result of social determinism. Social determinism is the theory that describes a person whose behavior is influenced by the society. According to this concept, the characters of “Notes from Underground” the underground man, and “Hedda Gabler” Hedda Tesman, are products of social determinism.
One of the most profound and obvious changes in Raskolnikov’s character can be seen in the newfound appreciation for other people and human relationships he discovers at the end of the novel. When the reader is first introduced to Raskolnikov, Dostoevsky quickly makes it apparent that he has little to no regard for others, writing on the very first page that Raskolnikov was “so completely absorbed in himself, and isolated from his fellows that he dreaded meeting, not only his landlady, but anyone at all” (1). Indeed, in Raskolnikov’s mind, “to be forced to listen to [the landlady’s] trivial, irrelevant gossip […] and to rack his brains for excuses, to prevaricate, to lie” is the most loathsome thing imaginable (1). His disdain toward other people is so great that the mere thought of interacting with anyone for any length of time repulses him. On some occasions...