Notes from Underground

"What sort of Crystal Palace would it be if any sort of doubt were allowed?" —the Underground Man

Notes from Underground written by Fyodor Dostoyevsky.

Study Guide

Brief summaries, commentaries, and notes on Notes.

Notes from Underground, Part 1

1. Chapter 1
2. Chapter 2
3. Chapter 3
4. Chapter 4
5. Chapter 5
6. Chapter 6
7. Chapter 7
8. Chapter 8
9. Chapter 9
10. Chapter 10
11. Chapter 11

Notes from Underground, Part 2: Apropos of Wet Snow

1. Chapter 1
2. Chapter 2
3. Chapter 3
4. Chapter 4
5. Chapter 5
6. Chapter 6
7. Chapter 7
8. Chapter 8
9. Chapter 9
10. Chapter 10

Characters

The Underground Man

The Underground Man is the narrator and protagonist of Notes of Underground. The Underground Man can be viewed as: "a sheer irrationalist whose rejection of Rational Egoism is a tortured emotional outburst with no logical credentials" (Scanlan). He beleives that consciousness is a disease: " I swear to you, gentlemen, that being overly conscious is a disease, a genuine, full-fledged disease" (1257). Such consciousness shows: "within Underground Man's self-descriptions, while relational in the ways not reducible to behavior" (Hagberg).

Themes

The Artificiality of Russian Culture

For decades, the Russian social and intellectual elite had been imitating western Eropean culture, in the middle of the nineteenth century. In Russia, a man was considered "developed" and "educated" only if he was familiar with the literary and philosophical traditions of Germany, France, and England. Dostoevsky may have shared this view when he was a young man, but by the time he wrote Notes from Underground he had decided that that certain mindset was destructive. In being captavated by the west, Russian intellectuals had lost touch with the true way of the Russian life. The life that many of the peasants and lower-class workers still practiced.

Major Symbols

Underground

It is the home of the underground man. It is also refered to as his corner. " Yet the underground is more than a physical placeof isolation; it's a psychological hang-up as well. Possessing the overly sensitive and sheltered consciousness of the underground, the underground man finds himself unable and unwilling to meaningfully interact with others, despite his desire to do just that" (Novelguide). The underground man claims to prefer the underground to the real world. There he is able to express his indviduality.

The Ant Hill

This shows that there is no individuality. All of the ants are working for one main goal.

Critical Perspectives

Notes from the underground is an important work in Western European history. " It has attracted attention for many reasons. For one , it contains an all-out assault on Enlightenment rationalism and the idea of progress which foreshadows many such assaults in the mid-to-late twentieth century" (WSU). Another example of this novels' importance is the fact that it has one of the first anti-heroes in fiction. " It portrays a protagonist utterly lacking every trait of the Romantic hero and living out a futile life on the margins of society. Such figures were to dominate much serious fiction in the mid-twentieth century" (WSU).

External Links and Resources

http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/underground/themes.html

Works Cited

• Hagberg, Garry L. "Wittgenstein Underground." Philosophy and literature 28.2 (2004): 379-392.
• Madden, Caolan. SparkNote on Notes from Underground. 12 Mar. 2006 <http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/underground/>.
• Scanlan, James P. "The Case against Rational Egoism in Dostoevsky's Notes from Underground." Journal of the History of Ideas 60.3 (1999): 549-567.
• Novelguide.com. "Notes from the Underground". March 2006 [<http://www.novelgude.com/notesfromtheunderground/metaphoranaylysis.html>.]