Jess’s Reviews > Notes from Underground > Status Update

In my underground dreams as well, I never pictured love to myself otherwise than as a struggle; for me it always started from hatred and ended with moral subjugation, and afterwards I couldn't even picture to myself what to do with the subjugated object.

I hated them terribly, though I was perhaps worse than they were.

A developed and decent man cannot be vain without a boundless exactingness towards himself and without despising himself at moments to the point of hatred.

To be sure, gentlemen, my jokes are in bad tone—uneven, confused, self-mistrustful. But that is simply because I don’t respect myself. How can a man of consciousness have the slightest respect for himself?