Notes from Underground & The Double

by Fyodor Dostoevsky, Jessie Coulson (Translator, Introduction)

‘It is best to do nothing! The best thing is conscious inertia! So long live the underground!’

Alienated from society and paralyzed by a sense of his own insignificance, the anonymous narrator of Dostoyevsky’s groundbreaking Notes from Underground tells the story of his tortured life. With bitter sarcasm, he describes his refusal to become a worker in the ‘ant-hill’ of society and his gradual withdrawal to an existence ‘underground’. The seemingly ordinary world of St Petersburg takes on a nightmarish quality in The Double when a government clerk encounters a man who exactly resembles him – his double perhaps, or possibly the darker side of his own personality. Like Notes from Underground, this is a masterly study of human consciousness.

Jessie Coulson’s introduction discusses the stories’ critical reception and the themes they share with Dostoyevksy’s great novels.

*Synopsis from Penguin Classics' 2003 edition*

Genres: Classics, Fiction, Russia, Philosophy, Russian Literature, Literature, 19th Century

291 pages, Paperback

First published January 29, 1864

About the author

Фёдор Михайлович Достоевский (Russian)

Works, such as the novels Crime and Punishment (1866), The Idiot (1869), and The Brothers Karamazov (1880), of Russian writer Feodor Mikhailovich Dostoyevsky or Dostoevski combine religious mysticism with profound psychological insight.

Very influential writings of Mikhail Mikhailovich Bakhtin included Problems of Dostoyevsky's Works (1929),

Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky composed short stories, essays, and journals. His literature explores humans in the troubled political, social, and spiritual atmospheres of 19th-century and engages with a variety of philosophies and themes. People most acclaimed his Demons(1872) .

Many literary critics rate him among the greatest authors of world literature and consider multiple books written by him to be highly influential masterpieces. They consider his Notes from Underground of the first existentialist literature. He is also well regarded as a philosopher and theologian.

(Russian: Фёдор Михайлович Достоевский) (see also Fiodor Dostoïevski)

Reviews

[Carolyn Marie · Rating 5 out of 5]

“…which is better, a cheap happiness or a lofty suffering? Tell me then, which is better?”
📖
So many thoughts, and so few words to express them!
I’ll let Dostoyevsky speak for himself!
📖
“I say, let the world perish, if I can always drink my tea.”
(a personal favorite, because I completely agree)

“Impossibility is a stone wall.”

“…to think too much is a disease, a real, actual disease.”

“At home, to begin with, I did a lot of reading. I wanted to stifle all that was smoldering inside me with external impressions and reading was for me the only possible source of external impressions. Reading, of course, helped me a great deal – it excited, delighted and tormented me.”

“But man is a fickle disreputable creature and perhaps, like a chess player, is interested in the process of attaining his goal rather than the goal itself.”

“But try letting yourself be carried along blindly by your feelings, banish your reason if only for the moment; hate, or love, anything rather than do nothing.”

“And when there is love, you can live even without happiness. Life is good even in sorrow; it is good to live in the world, however you live. What is there here, except… a stink?”

[Jonathan O'Neill · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5 ⭐

‘Tragedy and satire are two sisters who go hand in hand, and the name of both of them, taken together, is truth’ - Fyodor Dostoyevsky


Well, I think a few simple words will be sufficient here, absolutely no need to tire the readers. I’ll simply discuss it as it is, I’ll say this and I’ll say that and I think, certainly, it should turn out for the best. On the other hand, why put my head on the chopping block, they’ll surely whisper behind unified smirks, “Look at this Ruffian, this crook! He reads one or two Russian authors and thinks himself up to the task of critiquing the work of comrade Dostoyevsky!”. No, no, no! To hell with it, what do I care?! It’s a trifling matter anyhow! I’ll just type here, in bold, RTC and that’ll be the end of it, I’ll dust my hands of all of it. Write it or not, it’s of no concern to me, water under the bridge I say!

No, Oh for Heaven’s sake, no! That won’t do, why am I talking all this utter nonsense, you idiot! You rogue! I’ll surely be held to account in that case! They’ll drag my name through the mud! They’re scheming, they’re working to spite me! “Oh, look here at this presumptuous simpleton, this scoundrel!”, they’ll say. “It’s as though he imagines that anyone gives a hoot for his buffoonery! As though the whole reading community is on standby, wide eyed and adoring, for his inevitably sub-par review. The height of arrogance, wouldn’t you say?”.

Though I do feel so deeply obliged to pen a few words of a positive nature. Nothing of a particularly serious lilt. I’m well within my rights after all, at least partly so. Of a beginning, ‘It’s like this, dear reader, it’s this and that if you don’t mind my saying so, that’s how it is if we think about it like that, if that’s what things have come to’. Yes, I think my calculations are absolutely correct and the matter seems essentially closed. Well that’s it then, enough is enough, I’ll end it there without a second thought, what do I care anyway! I’ve shared what I’ve shared and all things considered, I think a RTC is highly inappropriate under the circumstances!

But then no time has really been lost here and if I were to sleep on the matter at hand then somehow it might possibly, surely, undoubtedly, certainly, turn out for the best.

….. RTC ?

[Ian "Marvin" Graye · Rating 5 out of 5]

I Am the Lowest and the Worst

I am 40
I am naughty
I am sick
I am angry
I am ugly
I am superstitious
I am undesirable
I am different
I am indifferent
I am petty
I am nothing
I am unstable
I am rude
I am impudent
I am timid
I am frightened
I am vengeful
I am lazy
I am dirty
I am secret
I am wretched
I am self-loathing
I am humiliating
I am humiliated
I am nasty
I am irritable
I am irritating
I am snarling
I am spiteful
I am unseemly
I am disgusting
I am disgusted
I am repulsive
I am ignoble
I am immoral
I am evil
I am guilty
I am shameful
I am shameless
I am clever
I am stupid
I am elusive
I am deluded
I am contradictory
I am self-obsessed
I am sensitive
I am ridiculous
I am infected
I am unaffected
I am ineffective
I am undeserving
I am the lowest
I am the worst
I am miserable
I am unloving
I am unlovable
I am unloved
I am lying
I am unreliable
I am underground
I am under the floorboards
I am in character
I am a windbag
I am an insect
I am no hero
I am a zero
I am revolting
I am rebelling
I am telling
I am compelling.



SOUNDTRACK:

Magazine - "A Song From Under The Floorboards"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kBfh86...

Magazine - "A Song From Under The Floorboards" [Live on Later...in 2009]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUSbcm...

Morrissey - "A Song From Under The Floorboards"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTr6Dp...

Magazine - "Shot By Both Sides"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UvWSPl...

Magazine - "Shot By Both Sides" [Live on Later...in 2009]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MDWOeg...



"I didn't lose myself in the crowd."

[Barry Pierce · Rating 2 out of 5]

Notes from Underground ★★★

This was the more enjoyable work in this collection. I enjoyed the narrator's pithy voice while he went over the events which lead to his "living underground". It also contains Dostoyevsky's infamously morbid black humour which has you smiling at the most desolate of images. I strangely found myself relating with the narrator which probably says a lot about my outlook on life.


The Double ★

Good god this story is 150-pages long and it took me two months to get through. Seriously. I read Crime and Punishment in 24 hours but this novella took me longer to read than Dostoyevsky probably took to write it. It is a juvenile piece of melodramatic garbage, a black smudge on Dostoyevsky's almost perfect oeuvre. Its inclusion in this collection baffles me. The Double was written when Dostoyevsky was only 25 while Notes from Underground and his other major works were written when he was in his 40s and 50s. He was clearly not a wunderkind. Even at the beginning of this Penguin edition it even notes that The Double was not successful when it was first published. I can hardly wonder why. It's so boring that it gives solitary confinement a run for its money. Now we know why the narrator of Notes from Underground was so bored, he has to share the same book with the characters from The Double. Poor guy.

[Vanitha Narayan · Rating 5 out of 5]

What amazing novellas!
Was so lost in them, my head is still reeling with the ramblings of the underground man and Golyadkin!

[Abby · Rating 4 out of 5]

“We are stillborn and we have long ceased to be begotten of living fathers - and this we find increasingly pleasing. We are acquiring a taste for it. Soon we'll devise a way of being somehow born from an idea.”

Notes from the Underground is brought to you by a narrator, with his view on the world shrouded in isolation and a resulting spite. The pages that comprise the story delve into his perception of work- the hierarchy of different titles, love- the inability to deserve it, to live it, people, and most prominently, himself.

Your experience with the narrator takes the form of pity, a resonating with his intense loneliness and embarrassment, sometimes an infuriation, his attacks on humanity and those who portray a life that he never had interweaving through the pages. A complex amalgamation of the world’s hardship’s in one man, and ultimately how they form the basis for his resentful outlook- but the ending leaves it open to the reader, do you agree with his perspective? Isn’t he right to some extent, no matter how daunting his words have been?

The read is only a short one, but in true Dostoyevsky style, every word is useful, meaningful, and ultimately, comprise a worthwhile experience.

[poncho · Rating 5 out of 5]

If spite makes you unworthy of a single pound,
Try to write about your life in the underground.
If this makes life as cold as ice,
To read Dostoevsky is my advice.


Notes from underground.

The above quasi-verse was written by me, not the author of the book; so don’t be spiteful, gentlemen.

Apropos of the spite, what can I say about Notes from underground? It’s simply stunning. I would say that I can’t understand why some people wouldn’t like this book, but I do understand. Allow me to tell you my personal story behind this book.

I was hesitating about reading this novella because of what I had previously read about it and so I tried to do it twice this year. The first time I felt quite cheerful — something that seldom happens — so I didn’t feel like doing it after all; and besides, I didn’t want to spoil my mood. So I tried to save it for a more spiteful time. That time came (I knew it would), but surprisingly I just wanted to stay in bed and hide in my room (yes, like such an underground man), and I didn’t want to read anything. Then one day I felt neither cheerful nor spiteful: that was the time!

So, like I said, I do understand why people do not like it. It could be a depressing, miserable reading — for me, it was deliciously depressing. The first part is more dense and the second one is a little bit more ‘friendly’ and more like the usual style of Dostoevsky’s writings. While reading the first part I felt quite… scolded, mocked, reproached! It was like listening to a sociopath, but I never thought I’d enjoy such a talk. In this same part, Dostoevsky plants his most fundamental ideas, which would completely bloom till The brothers karamazov. For instance, he describes a dystopian idea of how morals and fate — or rather life — would be if they were ruled my numbers and math: no more than a ‘logarithmic table’, to use his own expression. He does not state this in this book, but he does in his later works, that it’s faith, hope and love what should rule morals and that they should be the base of our decisions, not science. If the latter were supposed to rule us, where would our free will begin? That reminds me of the famous chapter in The brothers Karamazov: The grand inquisitor, in which the inquisitor is talking to Christ (who actually never speaks throughout the conversation), and here Dostoevsky points out a very interesting interpretation of the Gospel according to St. Matthew (yes, the chapter itself is a story within a story within a story), where Christ is tempted to turn stones into bread so he can have the whole world at his feet, for every human needs food to survive; but He rejects the temptation because He doesn’t want just a bunch of followers: He wants people to believe on their own. And the same goes for science and numbers (kind of): if everything is premeditated by reason, what’s the thrill of living? On the other hand, in the second part the underground man tells a story, more what we are used to read from Dostoevsky, with its gloomy scenarios and sorrowful people, the monologue-like conversations, the psychological analysis, etc etc.

The book is magnificent and although it’s a very short story, it’s so vast. There are many points about solitude (with which I identified myself so much that now I’m afraid that I may become an underground man), about will, about resignation, about spite. And even though the story is told by an anti-hero, there’s something in Dostoevsky’s skill that makes me feel empathy and makes me feel attached to his anti-heros, like the underground man, like Rogozhin, like Dmitri Karamazov; because I think that even though Dostoevsky made them all brag about being wicked, they still believed there was hope left for them, and that there’s still goodness in them. If you want something really base and vile, there’s Smerdyakov from TBK.

So, generally speaking, it is not Dostoevsky’s friendliest book, but it is outstanding and it’s totally worth the reading as much as his longer works. However, I wouldn’t recommend it to get started with the author. For that purpose, I’d suggest C&P, or, if you feel more adventurous, try TBK once and for all.


The double.

What would you do if one day you were walking by a solitary street and you ran into your so-far-unknown identical twin? Would you recognize this person immediately as your twin? I remember when I was a child I used to think a lot about that, and I thought (and still think) that I wouldn’t realize about that at first. Just when some of my friends say someone looks a lot like me I don’t believe it and maybe this is all due to the fact that our perception of ourselves is altered by so many things but especially by the fact that most of the time we spent with ourselves is from an inner point of view. It’s something quite strange. However, strangeness is Dostoevsky’s speciality! The double is such a tale about a man, Mr. Golyadkin, who one day finds out there is a new man in town who is identical to him and has the same name as him. This man, known as Golyadkin Jr., is introduced as a meek and humble man who tries to look for Golyadkin’s protection, but all of a sudden, after a night of drinking, things have a little twist, a twist that grows progressively throughout the story. It turns out that Golyadkin Junior is now taking over the original Golyadkin, the original hero and little by little the latter is driven to madness. The whole story is about madness though and utterly paranoid — you know, just Dostoevsky being himself with his crafty psychology. The author uses the absurd to shape his story but the core of it, I think, resides in the fact that we ourselves make multiple selves out of the original one: personalities that we have to switch all day long. For instance, we might behave differently according to the people we are with, to the place we are at, to the occasion we are living and so on and so on, and then we might even doubt of our own existence, just like Mr. Golyadkin does at some point of the story.

There’s one part, I think it’s chapter two, when the hero goes to see a doctor who prescribes him a more sociable and cheerful life, even though the patient tries to emphasize that he is more of a lonesome being. Then the mean twin turns out to be everything the doctor prescribed Golyadkin to be: there had to be another self who could survive among society. Unfortunately, there was room for only one self — who do you think survived? the one who knew how to fake flattery and socialize or the one who was more honest and meek but asocial? You are going to have to read it in order to find out — though I think it’s quite obvious.

The tale itself is really well crafted and it’s very interesting from a psychological (and maybe philosophical) point of view, but… well, for me the literary style was hard sometimes. Some of the paragraphs were well written and very meaningful, but others were more tedious and kind of repetitive. And besides, there’s this thing Dostoevsky does about the names: he overuses them so so much when he could have used pronouns. Nonetheless, I think he did it on purpose, especially since I realized that the one who did it the most was Golyadkin himself: the one who’s having personality issues. But all in all, the story is full of symbolisms and a very good one and quite helpful to understand more and more Dostoevsky’s work.

I have a plan: to become a madman. Let people get furious and put me under treatment, let them make me reasonable.
— F. Dostoevsky, in a letter to his brother Mikhail at the age of 17. 1838.

Well, D., I don’t know if you achieved your plan, but your characters sure did.

[Renée Paule · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've not much to say about this book that hasn't been said before. Both stories are nice and deep.

'Notes from Underground' - a mind bender!

'The Double' - a mind bender in a very different way!

Though hard going at times - I think that was largely due to translations - I loved this book. I'd love to read it in Russian, but I don't speak Russian :)

[Blair · Rating 4 out of 5]

5 stars for Notes from Underground, 3 for The Double, so 4 overall.

Notes from Underground (1864) is sublimely misanthropic, dripping with scorn, blisteringly horrible. Its narrator is the anonymous 'underground man', whose voice and attitude make him seem a practice run for Crime and Punishment's Raskolnikov. In the first part of the book, he lays out his personal philosophy, a bitter attack on – well, just about everything, including himself. In the second, 'The Story of the Falling Sleet', he relates a sequence of events that acts as an illustration of his paranoia, rage and self-loathing, starting with his obsessive quest to humiliate an officer he hates, and ending with his cruel rejection of a prostitute, Liza, whom he both loves and despises. Despite a lapse into sentimentality when the narrator first encounters Liza, the tone remains acrid throughout, resigned to shame and misery. It's quite exhilarating.

The Double is a much earlier novella (1846). The plot sees a fawning government clerk, Golyadkin, tormented by a man who appears to be his exact double. There is undeniably a dark comedy to its events, but it's much lighter in tone and much more conventional in style; it feels very 19th-century, where Notes from Underground (and Crime and Punishment) have that disconcertingly modern/timeless flavour that makes them so effective. The Double drags, and while he's entertaining in small doses, Golyadkin is neither hero nor antihero, just a supremely irritating character.

I wish the order of the novellas had been swapped, or I'd thought to read The Double first. Reading it after Notes from Underground felt like eating a meal in the wrong order – a perfectly adequate main course after a spectacular dessert. According to the blurb, they're grouped together because both are 'masterly studies of the human consciousness', but they're so very different that seems like a reach. My advice is to skip The Double and read Notes from Underground on its own.

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Some favourite quotes from Notes from Underground...

At last comes the act itself, the revenge. The wretched mouse has by this time accumulated, in addition to the original nastiness, so many other nastinesses in the shape of questions and doubts... Nothing remains for it to do but shrug the whole thing off and creep shamefacedly into its hole with a smile of contempt in which it doesn't even believe itself. There in its nasty stinking cellar our offended, browbeaten and derided mouse sinks at once into cold, venomous, and above all undying resentment. It will sit there for forty years together remembering the insult in the minutest and most shameful detail and constantly adding even more shameful details of its own invention, tormenting and fretting itself with its own imagination. It will be ashamed of its fantasies, but all the same it will always be remembering them and turning them over in its mind, inventing things that never happened because they might have done so, and forgiving nothing. – p21-22

Needless to say, I hated all the members of my department from first to last, and despised them, and yet somehow feared them as well. At times I would even rate them above myself. This quite often happened to me at that time; at one moment I despised them, at the next I felt they were superior to me. – p48

Sometimes, on holidays, I would go to the Nevsky Prospect in the afternoon and enjoy a walk along the sunny side. That is, I didn't actually enjoy my walk at all: I experienced an endless series of torments, crushing humiliations and attacks of spleen... It was an agonising torment, a never-ending unbearable humiliation, caused by the suspicion, constantly growing into clear-cut certainty, that compared to them I was a fly, a nasty obscene fly – cleverer, better educated, nobler than any of them, that goes without saying – but a fly, always getting out of everybody's way, humiliated and slighted by everybody. – p55

I passionately wanted to show all these 'nobodies' that, on the contrary, I was not nearly so much of a poltroon as I imagined. Moreover in the very worst paroxysms of my fever of cowardice I still dreamed of coming out on top, winning them over, making them like me, if only for my 'elevated ideas and undeniable wit'. – p70

In the next room, two of the hotel guests, gloomy, angry-looking, silent, were dining at separate tables. There was a great deal of noise in one of the other rooms, further away; some shouting, even, the noisy laughter of a whole mob of people, and some nasty French-sounding screams; 'ladies' were being entertained. In short, everything was sickening. – p71

'I'd like to sling a bottle at the lot of them this minute,' I thought, taking up a bottle and – pouring myself a full glass. – p77

[Wealhtheow · Rating 2 out of 5]

Hey wait, are you a misanthrope? Do you feel betrayed and disappointed with life? Are you a bitter, bitter man? Why narrator, I never would have guessed! Why don't you spend the next hundred pages telling me about it? That sounds like loads of fun.

[Xander · Rating 3 out of 5]

This Penguin Classics edition offers two lesser known works of Dostoevsky: The Double (1846) and Notes from the Underground (1864). In both (rather short) stories we follow poor and downtrodden characters in their daily adventures, their every move being symbolic of the abject state of contemporary Russian society. Dostoevsky uses these characters to offer his own sharp analysis of society yet at the same time hinting at solutions.

In general, his criticism boils down to the following: human beings have a biological need to express themselves - to be someone in this world. Contemporary society suppresses this biological need, distorting and disfiguring these human beings in its wake. The mechanism operates through (dis)satisfaction. If we can express ourselves, be ourselves, we are satisfied; if we are hindered from expressing ourselves we are dissatisfied. Dissatisfaction leads to fundamental problems: psychological breakdown, absence of a sense of human dignity, necessary egoism. These problems find their way in all forms of escapism and brutality. Thus, contemporary Russian society's ills are the product of its own suppression of human needs.

More specifically, Dostoevsky points to Romantic idealism (especially the German forms) and scientific and moral positivism as the culprits. Romantic idealism was fashionable among the Russian elites of the 1830's and 1840's - contrasting starkly with the ingrained autocracy and serfdom under which the masses suffered at the time. This schism leads to all sorts of hypocritical suppression, leading to things like mental illnesses, alcoholism and criminality.

Dostoevsky levers a different criticism at positivism: the reduction of man to a bag of cells leaves absolutely no room for transcendental phenomena as morality, religion and values in general. This worldview - as expounded by socialists and liberals alike - results in hyper-individualism. This sets people up for meaningless and senseless existence, worsening the social ills already at play.

In Notes from the Underground the latter problem of hyper-individualism is shown through the mind and actions of the protagonist. This is a man who is deeply spiteful about himself, and as he progresses through life, he continuously projects his own self-hatred on all around him: his colleagues, his servant, etc. He feels personally hurt by literally everything anyone does or says, he always interprets every situation in the bleakest way possible, and he makes the world revolve around him while at the same time despising himself.

When he visits a prostitute - by chance, since he went to the brothel to punch a colleague in his face - he suddenly feels compassion for the young lady. He ends up in bed with her and starts a long tirade of how she is throwing herself away, especially her love, and will end up dead in some years. The woman cries and he leaves saying she should visit him. When she finally visits the protagonist after three days, he is enraged and out of his mind, confessing that all he wanted was to dominate and humiliate her. He then breaks down and starts crying, after which the lady caresses him. His heart blackened as it is, the story ends with the reflection that, after all, in his hatred he meant well: "which is better - cheap happiness or exalted suffering?" (p. 116)

Supposedly the lady is better off, "purified" by this insult, because if he wouldn't have insulted her "tomorrow I would have defiled her soul and wearied her heart by my presence." (p. 116)

This is a man who wants to suffer, and because of this, he wants others to suffer. Even though he doesn't really seem to do a good job at the latter - most of his self-proclaimed "enemies" don't care one bit about him, his presence or his words - he does suffer himself. He ends up living (voluntarily, it has to be said) in an underground cellar being obsessed with the existential questions life poses us. He does recognize (after twenty years) that he missed out on life "through moral decay", "lack of human contact", "losing the habit of living" and "my narcissistic, underground spite" - he even calls himself an "anti-hero".

I think Dostoevsky puts in his main message when he writes "We have even become so unaccustomed to living that we sometimes feel a kind of loathing for 'real life' and that's why we cannot bear to be reminded of it."(p. 117)

The moral of the story is that only love, community, religion (in a very particular, Dostoyevskian sense) can offer us meaning in life, can make our lives worth living. Contemporary society seems to wage war against human relationships, love, the feeling of community and belonging. On the one hand we are turned into individuals while on the other hand we - or rather, our existential needs and desires - are suppressed by social structures. What that can lead to, the protagonist of Notes from the Underground shows us.

Turning now to the other work, The Double, we see a similar theme yet in a totally different setting. We follow a certain Mr Golyadkin, a civil servant who seems to be psychologically disturbed. Throughout his daily life we witness him psychologically disintegrating. Golyadkin is hysterical, restless, paranoid and in the end even psychotic - he sees all sorts of things that clearly aren't there and he spirals totally out of control. Somewhere half in the story Golyadkin starts experiencing a double, another Golyadkin who is exactly like him and is taking over his life, setting his colleagues and friends up against him and basically humiliating him at every turn. The real Golyadkin feels a deep love for his double but also shows flashes of blind hate against his imagined self. In the end, the man crashes a party of one of his superiors at office and makes a total mess of things. The story ends with Golyadkin in his doctor's coach on the way to his final destination: a lunatic asylum.

Here we see, again, a poor and lowly clerk totally losing himself in life and being weighed down by the stratified society with its ranks and privileges, abject poverty, and - paraphrasing the sociologist Emile Durkheim - anomy. For all its social orders, society for the masses is lawless and ruthless. People are on their own and Golyadkin is a prime example of a human being in dire need of compassion, community and stability. Lacking all these things, he loses himself and becomes insane.

In The Double, Dostoyevsky basically levels the same charge against contemporary society as he would do almost twenty years later in his Notes from the Underground. Both stories share the same theme, yet offer us different perspectives on this theme. Or rather: both stories show two different expressions of the same theme - people can lose themselves in hate or in insanity due to the same social causes. Personally I liked The Double more than Notes from the Underground, because the character is more likeable and the story offers a little bit more in terms of storytelling and events.

[Taruna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Review for Notes from Underground:

This short novel is written in 2 parts. Although the whole of it is very philosophical in nature, the first part really got me. When I heard people say Dostoevsky is difficult to read, I always assumed it might be because of complex language and storyline, or long Russian names that are hard to keep up with. This might be the case in his longer works like Crime and Punishment and The Brothers Karamazov. I did not realise the difficulty would arise from the very encounter with the characters (or character, in this case)

In a way, I don't know how to review or rate this book. Part 1 had some of the most troubling stream-of-consciousness, philosophical prose, which made me question my own self. I guess I would qualify as Turgenev's 'Superfluous man', as opposed to the underground man. This realisation, given how much I respect people who are considered eccentric or misfits in the society only because they're actually more in touch with the reality of the human condition, made me extremely uncomfortable. The word Volition is stuck in my head. I am sure the impression the first 40 pages made on me is going to stay for a long, long time.

Part 2 too made me extremely restless. One man's descent into the abyss of thought, with a feeling of being constantly wronged, of being more civilised than the rest of the world while being the subject of people's scorn, hating oneself helplessly while being so adamant that they're right: everything boiling down to that one word - volition.

I felt so much empathy for the underground man. I wish I could say I couldn't relate to him. But in reality, reading this book made me want to write with an immense urgency - somehow validating this divide I feel in complying with the world and being true to myself. The underground seems to be a place I deliberately keep suppressed, but that which inadvertently and as Dostoevsky says "in bouts" surfaces every now and then.

The line 'Half-dead with spiritual pain' is stuck in my head. Hoping to read much more of Dostoevsky.


Review for the double:

5/5 stars. And beyond.

I feel so grateful to have come across this masterpiece so early in exploring Dostoevsky.

Deeply distressing, dreadful, nightmarish, this short novel must be on every dissatisfied soul's list. The basis of the underground is continued here.

I am amazed at his hyper self awareness, and the ability to so acutely see outside of prevalent systems of the world. Experientially, the book ceases all of one’s senses and transports them entirely to Mr. Golyadkin’s head, a distressed place, where all of us have been.

I finished with an immediate urge to re-read the book. I don’t have the right words to describe my feelings.

Without another thought, pick this up.

[Kevin · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Double, April 20, 2021

doppelgänger: German (literally "double-walker") - a biologically unrelated look-alike, or a double, of a living person. In fiction, a doppelgänger is usually seen as a harbinger of bad luck.

Here we have an introvert who, dissatisfied with his station in life, tries desperately to elevate his social standing while combating a debilitating inferiority complex. Along the way, his persecutory delusion and paranoia blossom into full blown schizophrenia which itself mushrooms into a dissociative identity disorder. Or does it..?

Dostoyevsky himself labeled this literary experiment unsuccessful but I rather enjoyed it (especially after I stopped trying so hard to understand it).

_________________________________

Notes from Underground, March 10, 2022

Let’s be honest, I just don’t play well with fiction. I try to pick up on symbolism and allegory and metaphors, but it all seems so convoluted and unnecessary. Seriously, if you’re unhappy with socialism or capitalism then just say so. Why do you feel compelled to express your displeasure through talking crickets giving sage counsel to marionettes, or through retired civil servants bitterly contemplating the duality of wet snow? Take Chomsky for example, if he was disenchanted with the system at hand he wrote, “I am disenchanted with the system at hand” and then he proceeded to give you ten or twenty or a hundred reasons why. But not Dostoyevsky. Dostoyevsky gave us wet snow.

Moving on…

My first impression is that Dostoyevsky’s protagonist is tilting at the windmill of determinism. He repeatedly asserts that he is not a spiteful person yet his defining characteristic seems to be his ability to hurt, annoy and offend those around him. He’s not really a dick at heart, but being a dick gives him so much pleasure that he can’t really help himself.

My second impression is that Dostoyevsky’s protagonist is chafing under the constraints of Russian nihilism. His love interest, a prostitute, is convinced that she can better her situation and rise in the hierarchy of the brothel by aligning with and embracing the political establishment. Our anti-hero, predictably, thinks otherwise.

Am I off base? I don’t know enough about Russian history to know what, if anything, Dostoyevsky is railing against. I hate that I agonize and overthink and second guess myself to the point of insomnia. Why do you always do this to me Fyodor? Why????

[Mackie]

10/04/2025 - Embarrassingly Dnf'd @ page 12. The issue is with me, not the book. I might be a dumbass. C&P and TBK were easier to read in comparison. Need to circle back and try this again some day soon. The underground man remains underground for now.

If anybody has any info/experiences on this book that may improve my understanding before diving back in, it's most certainly welcome!

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

My experience of Dostoyevsky before reading Notes From Underground was pretty limited. I had read half of The Brothers Karamazov and Crime And Punishment, without paying any real attention to the main themes (cultural, religious, philosophical). I now feel like I missed so much in those books and I can’t wait to read them, and the rest of Dostoyevsky’s work with a new perspective.

Notes From Underground is the musings of an unknown narrator as he explores themes of nihilism, determinism, utilitarianism, rational egoism and utopianism - many of which were new concepts to me, that I enjoyed researching further!

In terms of the book/plot itself, I really really liked it. The narrator is unreliable, self deprecating and extremely self aware. I laughed out load at some parts and found other parts extremely confronting. I think everyone, to some extent, can relate to this narrator. There are positively hundreds of eloquent and thoughtful reviews of this book so I’ll leave my thoughts there.

[Eustacia Tan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Since I had an overall positive experience with The Gambler, I thought it was best to move on to more Dostoyevsky works before I lose steam. This book contains two novellas – Notes from Underground and The Double, and they were both interesting reading experiences.

Notes from Underground has a protagonist that gives me strong “I am better than everyone vibes”, but his issue is that he knows that he’s not, in fact, the best at everything. So he spends the first half of his book talking about his philosophy, and the second half talking about things that he experiences – such as spending two years psyching himself up to bump into an officer that insulted him and inviting himself to a party with people he doesn’t like and then refusing to make a toast and other things. Basically, he sounds like an exhausting person to know.

The Double has another unlikeable character and a narrator that likes to make fun of the unlikeable protagonist. After going to see his doctor, who tells him he needs to be more social, Mr Golyadkin embarrasses himself at a party, runs into the night, and meets his doppelgänger. Or maybe he just started hallucinating. Either way, the stress of having a double that’s more socially adept than him drives Mr Golyadkin off the edge.

I think one problem I have with reading Dostoyevsky is that his works are quite dark and hence I don’t really want to linger over them. Where Tolstoy’s writing is light(er) and easier to follow, Dostoyevsky’s words feel denser and harder to follow. I was confused through a lot of The Double, which makes some sense since Mr Golyadkin is confused through most of the book too.*

This edition comes with an introduction by Robert Louis Jackson, which should be read after you finish both novellas and helped me understand that both stories held a lot more meaning than I initially understood.

Among the three works (The Gambler, Notes from Underground, and The Double), I don’t really have a clear favourite. I’m kinda glad that I read them, and I might even read them again when I feel like challenging myself, but I don’t really see myself reading Dostoyevsky for fun in the future (unlike Tolstoy, who is clearly the only other Russian author I know).

*On second thought, that may be a me problem. After reading this, I went for a talk on how the internet changes our reading and the speaker pointed out that if you spend most of your time reading on screens (as I do), your brain gets distracted trying to figure out if it should click on a hyperlink and the ability to deep read is diminished. So maybe if I cut down my screen time a bit more, this would have been easier to read?

This review was first posted at Eustea Reads

[Tracy Reilly · Rating 4 out of 5]

I cannot write. This is a quite disturbing book to me, second only to NAUSEA.

The narrator, the "anti-hero" who claims to be-- all we are just too self-deluded to be --spends his life destroying his life with contradictory outbursts. They are contradictory because first he assumes one pose, one that is, generally, judgmental, a point of view against his fellow men. Then he spends the next 6 hours regretting what he's done, plotting to undo it,berating himself, but ultimately only sowing confusion and disdain for himself in those unfortunate enough to have entered his field of attention.

Of course his victims---of his so called honest encounters-- maybe really do dredge up some truth that will allow them to see themselves in a better light, if for no other reason than in contrast to himself.

I can't help thinking that this book seems more in line with what is traditionally seen as the epileptic's view of the world--a stark black and white morality, is what I've read, a hypersensitivity to criticism, both to the self and everyone else around the epileptic. I have marveled that it didn't seem a part of his later famous novels, which are full of fine compassion for so many of his characters. But the "Underground Man" truly has a world view that is verging on paranoid, and exceptionally violent. One imagines him capable of almost anything. You want to warn the others away from him, as he will turn, even though he really means to turn on himself, the source of his real loathing. Generally, the narrator starts with a person who most likely is deserving of some contempt--a spoiled dandy of an aristocrat, a sarcastic prostitute--but, the abuse he heaps--much of it potentially true---becomes so outrageous and violent it completely flips the readers sympathy towards his target.

One spends the story wishing for some moment, some ONE, to redeem him.

His view of "love" is particularly odious--that love/ friendship, even, to him is merely experienced by subjugating the other--he spends his time of acquaintance trying to manipulate the situation to this position (and oftentimes, ironically, by calling attention to his own weaknesses). Once he has the other's "love" or sympathy or empathy or care---he then merely wants to feel triumph. And be alone. This is not my definition of love, however the Underground Man would like to frame me as deluded. Sad story.

I'll be doing the DOUBLE later, when I've recovered .

[Sunil · Rating 5 out of 5]

A genius of a book written by a mind that can effortlessly delve into the nuts, bolts and avagadros of the psyche.


Regard this extract:

Every man has reminiscences which he would not tell to everyone, but only to his friends. He has other matters in his mind which he would not reveal even to his friends, but only to himself, and that in secret. But there are other things which a man is afraid to tell even to himself, and every decent man has a number of such things stored away in his mind. The more decent he is, the greater the number of such things in his mind.

After the Upanishads, it took around 2500 human years for man to explore the innards of himself; By a drunkard and a pathological gambler to be this original, before the world wars, before the pentium processors, before blogging, before any one single man had any guts to sit in a corner and think for himself about himself and his insignificance in the scheme of things, is what makes this book a precious gem.



PS- My copy of the book is bound in an apt cover featuring the handsome self portrait of Kramskoy; Cant find it here.

[Vanessa · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars.

These novellas were my first ever Dostoyevsky reads, and it was an interesting and somewhat challenging experience. For this review, I will be reviewing each story individually.

Notes from Underground - 4 stars.

This novella was the one I wanted to read the most by Dostoyevsky. I always thought it sounded very interesting, although some people had told me it was challenging. It is narrated by an unnamed protagonist, a retired civil servant living in St. Petersburg. The novella is split into two parts; the first a sort of rambling memoir, the second a depiction of the events that led up to his current situation. The narrator deals with numerous topics such as human suffering and theories of reason and logic, amongst other things.

I enjoyed reading from the narrator's viewpoint, as although he was unreliable, he had an incredibly strong personality that really bounded off the page. He was so angry and stuck in his own ways and almost nihilistic in a way that sometimes I found his ramblings very funny. It goes without saying that I enjoyed the second part of this novella more, as there was an actual narrative of sorts, but I would definitely recommend this if you like philosophical fiction.

The Double - 3 stars.

I had already seen the Richard Ayoade film adaptation of this novella earlier this year, and part of me wonders if I would have enjoyed it more if I had read this first. The protagonist, Yakov Petrovich Golyadkin, is a titular councillor who encounters a man who is his exact double. Although they initially begin being friends, Golyadkin soon sees his double infiltrate his way into his life, taking over everything and turning his colleagues against him.

I really enjoyed the premise of this novella, but I found it a little difficult to read at times. Sometimes there would not be a paragraph break for two pages, and I found the way the protagonist used other characters full names repeatedly in the same sentence quite irritating. Although I did enjoy the fact that the events in the novella were different from the film adaptation, I felt that I enjoyed the adaptation better as there was a great deal more drama, and more of a development in the characters' relationships. Saying that, this was an enjoyable read, and one I would recommend.

[inkedblues · Rating 5 out of 5]

My own reading experience would lean towards giving both of these pieces 4 stars each, but what can you do with the first-ever* existentialist and modernist novel? Especially when NfU incoherences are due to censorship of the first edition rather than lack of clarity within my boy Fyodor's mind. The introductory essay is lovely, too, and analyses these works thoroughly in the context of contemporaneous Russian intellectual thought, which I was ready to find lacking, given the lectures on NfU I've attended in a course on existentialism. I should not have fretted! I certainly recommend this edition, especially since a thorough contextualisation might be desired to fully comprehend what the hell the underground man is ranting about.

First time reading NfU gave me the feeling I haven't encountered since I had read novels in my teens, e.g. the types of Steppenwolf, for I'd find myself exclaiming: "Yes! That's how it is!," or "Ha! I do so too," reveling in the miserable, spiteful and pitiful state that the underground man, and myself, have put ourselves in. My boy Fyodor's ideas are still as topical as they were then, if not more - after all, hasn't alienation only intensified, both in terms of labour and in existentialist alienation from oneself (often leading from the former)?

The Double is simultaneously hilarious and tragic. When we're all cogs in a bureaucratic machine, how can we tell each other apart? Well, we can't really, and if you feel indignant about the idea, just wait to see how Mr. Golyadkin feels...

*I humbly request to be enlightened, have I erred in my judgement.

[David Sarkies · Rating 4 out of 5]

Two of Dostoyevski's shorter works
12 May 2010

I'm glad that I'm not the only person that found this book hard to follow at times, but since it is a collection of thoughts from a man who is trapped in his own feelings of self-worthlessness it is understandable. Dostoyevsky is a writer that one needs to be able to focus on to be able to read and understand clearly, if it is possible to clearly understand much of his writings. It is not to say that he is not fpr he seems to be able to catch the essence of the human condition, particularly being a Russian living in the 19th century who spent time in the Russian Gulags. The critics say that there is a distinct difference between Dostoyevsky's writings from before his time in the Gulag and afterwards. These two stories do capture that.

However, The Double, which is the second story in this collection is about a man who is haunted by a younger double. I guess it is something that we all face as we grow up and begin to see the younger go getters beginning to take the kudos that we have been so used to receiving for so long. However, one needs to be able to balance the energy and drive of the youth with their lack of experience. While knowledge may be one thing, experience is something that adds to one's self-worth.

[Junta · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some (bad) Dostoyevsky jokes (for children?)

#1
Knock, knock.
Who's there?
Rodion Raskolnikov.

#2
Why did Ivan Karamazov drive through a red light?
Because everything is permitted.

#3
Yakov Golyadkin Sr. went to McDonald's and ordered a Big Mac, but he was served something else. What was it?
A Double Cheeseburger.

#4
How did Yakov Golyadkin Sr. feel when he saw the new guy at work?
He was beside himself.

#5
In Dostoyevsky's stories we can see many beautiful examples of requited love. Which one is the best representation?
a) White Nights
b) The Meek One
c) The Gambler
d) Notes from Underground
e) The Christmas Tree and a Wedding



Additions are more than welcome!

April 20, 2016

P.S. I read this combined edition but reviewed the works separately; my review for The Double is here.

[Meagan · Rating 4 out of 5]

My rating is only for Notes from Underground. I don’t plan on reading the double anytime soon.

[Petra · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fyodor Dostoevsky is excellent at creating gloomy and unstable male narrators that make following the story feel like you are solving a puzzle. I enjoyed the book thoroughly and it is hard to say which one of the novels, Notes from Underground or The Double, I liked more. Both of the stories were very dark stories with unreliable narrators; you could see how both of the narrators were sliding into madness slowly through the story, and you couldn't never tell if the details in the story were just from the mad imagination from narrator or the truth. That made the two novels a bit challenging to go through, but all in all, I really enjoyed these two novels and really recommend getting into this or other works of Dostoevsky because he is, indeed, excellent writer.

[Gina · Rating 3 out of 5]

I've only read Notes from Underground for class, so my review is restricted to that:

I immediately enjoyed this book more than Crime and Punishment. Maybe I should go back and read that again sometime to see if the distance of years and not being forced to choke through it would help, but that's beside the point.

Dostoyevsky really impressed me with this one. The character is so well fleshed out and he's such a cranky, arrogant jerk it's hard not to laugh as he spews all his opinions like a grump and verbally slays the rest of mankind for their stupidity. All the world is beneath him, it seems, and it's actually rather amusing.

Add to that that I could actually relate to him at times (oddly enough) when he's discussing his awkwardness in social situations, panicking about what he has said or didn't say to someone, and his overall back and forth between wanting to be around people and hating them, wishing for "peace."

Maybe that makes me just as crazy as him, because he certainly is quite an oddball.

It is a little rough getting through the first part because it's mostly just him spewing his opinions about things, but I still found it rather enjoyable. It was a good way to get to know the character, I think.

Overall, I liked it despite it. If that makes any sense.

[Mr. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dostoyevsky's 'Notes from Underground,' is often called the first truly existential work of literature in the history of the west. Yet I think it is read today for the very seem reasons we always read Dostoevsky: for his command over intensity, his genuine and masterly sense of atmosphere, and his ability to psychologize those who are suffering. 'Notes from Underground,' is a true masterpiece in that it recreates the truth of genuine alienation and hatred. It laid the basis for all great works of existential art to follow, from the Stranger to Taxi Driver. Truly a dark gem of European literature.

I found the Double, by contrast, to be rather tired and uninteresting. Perhaps it is because Kakfa and Freud has handled the theme of the doppelganger far more interestingly. I found it difficult to get into this one. It seems to me that the translation rang a little flat in comparison to Notes. Nevertheless, its an entertaining read, though one could never put it in the same class as great Dostoyevsky.

[Arijit Gayen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dostoyevsky's works always poses a strange premonition of societal alienation. The protagonists in both of these works deal with their inherent crumbling of Ethics and morality as the gap between their version of Reality and societal expectations of Reality ever widens. In Notes from Underground, the protagonist unapologetically proclaims how he derives twisted pleasure from causing others harm while Mr. Golyadkin of The Double loses touch with sanity as he fails to cope with the ever increasing competitive nature of society. These works can essentially be viewed as the first seminal works in Existentialism.

[Rachel Louise Atkin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Notes from Underground is April's read for the Existential Book Club, and is hailed by some as the first work of existential fiction. It's a piece I really enjoyed, and especially the wit from the narrator's voice which I think strengthened the work. The use of unreliability was done very cleverly, and the narrator constantly second-guessed himself providing a really intricate perspective I would love to pick apart further.
The first half of the story consists of the narrator introducing his position in 'the underground' and talking about the difference between he and other 'natural' men. The second was the actual story, set twenty years earlier, and told of various episodes in his life where he was forced to confront his own existence. I think I preferred the first part of this text, just because I found it that more interesting in terms of philosophy, yet it still had the witty narration in it. I guess it takes a few rereads to fully understand what he's trying to say which was my only real problem with it, as well as trying to understand what he means by 'natural'. But overall, a good read and I'm really impressed with my first Dostoyevsky.

The Double completely messed me up. I was so close to giving this five stars, because it was a terrifying yet addictive read at the same time. It is the story of a man who sees his double - a doppelganger who is able to be confident and excel in areas of life that he fails. I'm so interested in the idea of doubling, doppelgangers and twins, and so this story was such a great thing for me to read. I thought the use of the word 'hero' was interesting and drew attention to the fact that the narrator was more of an 'anti hero'. The way the narrator loses control was done cleverly through the narrative, and led to a terrifying end. Basically, I loved this. It was amazing, creepy and I'm obsessed with it.

[Frankie]

Maybe I shouldn't have read this at the end of my Christmas holidays, right when I'm about to go back to work at my miserable office job.

I enjoyed The Double more than Notes from the Underground. For me, No Longer Human by Dazai Osamu still reigns supreme as the ultimate depressing existentialist classic. However, I'm glad I finally read it and I think I understand why people like it so much. The protagonist in Notes is an awful, despicable man -- incredibly cringey -- but he rallies against the world: the hypocrisy of society, having to constantly bow down and scrape to your superiors, being a worker drone under capitalism (had Marx even been published yet?), the shallowness of preferring looks over intelligence, and, well, just generally being miserable that other people have a better life than you, when you think they don't deserve it.

Really, the most depressing part is the realization that human life has always been the same and we will never change. Happy New Year, folks.

[Shawin · Rating 3 out of 5]

I only read Notes and not the Double because I did not sign up for the double. However I did enjoy Jessie Coulson’s translation.