Nihilism and "Notes from Underground" [PDF]

Nihilism and "Notes from Underground" Author(s): Joseph Frank Source: The Sewanee Review, Vol. 69, No. 1 (Winter, 1961), pp. 1-33 Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/27540632 Accessed: 18/11/2009 19:14 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use. Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=jhup. Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed page of such transmission. JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

The Johns Hopkins University Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to The Sewanee Review.

http://www.jstor.org

NIHILISM AND NOTES FROM UNDERGROUND By JOSEPH FRANK among other vagaries were also to have the notion that // philosophy it could occur to a man to act in accordance with its teaching, one might make out of that a queer comedy. Fear

Kierkegaard, works

FEW more

in modern cited

often

are more

literature

than Dostoevsky's

and Trembling.

Notes man"

The

read

widely

or

from Under has entered

ground. designation "underground and of the modern the vocabulary educated consciousness, Don has now begun?like Don Quixote, this character Hamlet, on one stature the symbolic take of the of Juan and Faust?to on or the book No creations. essay great literary archetypal some al without culture would situation of modern be complete into

lusion ment

to Dostoevsky's of

the

figure.

Every

important

past

half-century?Nietzscheanism, Crisis Theology, Surrealism,

cultural

Freudianism, Existentialism?has

Expressionism, man as its own 5 and when the underground claimed as a prophetic he has been been adopted anticipation, exhibition

as a luridly

Indeed, been discussed but

he held

has up

not to

warning.

seem to have from Underground by now would one conceivable from every point of view?with is the point of For this exception exception. important

Notes

single

repulsive

develop

FROM

NOTES

2 view drop erudite the

of Dostoevsky of a hat?amid

are ready

to expatiate at the smokescreen of suffocating

Critics

himself. an

increasingly and melodramatic

irrelevancies

vast

UNDERGROUND

pseudo-profundities?on of Notes from Underground. significance" little work the real point of Dostoevsky's fascinating lost in the shuffle. completely

"cultural

Meanwhile, has gotten

was Dostoevsky

What that Notes

from

himself trying to do? Everyone was

Underground

originally

knows

as a polemic

begun

inspired by Dostoevsky's opposition to the Socialist radicals of his time (popularly called Nihilists as a result of the label affixed to in Turgenev's

them man

for

and Sons). The outstanding spokes was Nicolai G. at this moment radicals

Fathers

the Russian

Chernyshevsky, whose Utopian

Is To Be Done?

novel What

in the spring of 1863 and had caused appeared as an answer was intended from Underground the

Done}

y and

runs

as follows.

accepted

account

of

the

a sensation. to What

relation

had

Notes Is To Be

between

them

that man was innately and the radicals believed Chernyshevsky as to his once to reason, and that, enlightened good and amenable reason and science would true interests, enable him to ultimately construct lieved structive

on Dostoevsky, society. perfect that man was irrational, evil, innately a

; not

reason

but

only

faith

in Christ

hand, be and de capricious could ever succeed

the

other

in helping him to master the chaos of his impulses. This view of Notes

from

Underground

was

first

advanced

by

the Russian

re

ligious philosopher V. V. Rozanov in his brilliant study, The Legend of the Grand Inquisitor (1890). And regardless of the explanations this Weltanschauung, differing has

continued

to reign

(though

for

interpretation unchallenged

of Dostoevsky's genesis of Notes from Underground ever since.1

the

come across I have but not very much. some qualification, is A. Skaftymov This in toto. version the Rozanov reiected amidst Dostoevsky's "Notes Journalism," from Underground in a Czech but published in Russian This article, written contains in the Soviet Union) is still alive and active Skaftymov

needs aThis assertion only one critic who has in his interesting article Slavia, VIII (1929-1930). periodical

offered

FRANK

JOSEPH the

Despite

it has

hegemony

enjoyed,

theory is at best only a beguiling was

Rozanov

not

art

toevsky's

but with

the

enlisting

Rozanov's

however,

and misleading

concerned

primarily

3

half-truth. Dos

with

interpreting name awe-inspiring

novelist on the side of his religious philosophy;

of

the

and he unduly

one pole of the actual dialectic of the work, bringing emphasizes a as the entire meaning of the whole with it to the foreground for context. Worst of all, he sees the under total disregard was of what Dostoevsky ground man only as the simple negative irrational

attacking?the against

social

purposive this

If

interpretation was that Dostoevsky

evil

reason,

against

and moral

chaos

activity. were just

true, then we about the worst

could

conclude

only

in all

polemicist

of

literary history. Could Dostoevsky really have imagined that any reader in his right mind would prefer the world of the under ground

man

as an alternative

Utopia? Hardly! or as maladroit

to Chernyshevsky's was by no means

Dostoevsky as admirers like Rozanov?though

Socialist

idyllic

as simple-minded certainly with

out fully realizing it themselves?would make him out to be. In reality his attack on Chernyshevsky and the Nihilists is a good deal more been

given

subtle insidious, credit for.

and effective

V. L. Komarovich with Beginning in detail Russian critics have explored

from Underground

and What

that whole attempt Nevsky

ever

has

a

number

of

in

1924, the relation

between

Notes

It is now clear

Is To Be Done?

sections of Dostoevsky's man the underground or the famous Prospect, of

than Dostoevsky

novella?for

example, into an officer on

to bump encounter

with

the

the the

prostitute

stays too close to Skaftymov's analysis general remarks; and is quite disappointing. individual psychology to note, It is amusing that Rozanov's stand incidentally, point of view has become name ard in the Soviet Union. with is never mentioned Rozanov's by Soviet writers out an appropriate is the mildest), but his uncomplimentary ("obscurantist" epithet has become The only difference definitive. is that from Underground reading of Notes Rozanov the theologian of "evil of Dostoevsky's view approves heartily supposed and irrational human the Soviet Russians while it as a product of nature"; reject and line up with Chernyshevsky's decadence" "bourgeois "optimism."

acute many the level of

but

of

the

text

NOTES

4

FROM

conceived

Lisa?were

in Chernyshevsky's

but

as parodies

entirely

book.

The

vided the first real glimpse artistry}

UNDERGROUND

the Russian

of of

uncovering

episodes specific these parodies pro

into the inner logic of Dostoevsky's critics

have

themselves

never

their own insights home with sufficient rigor. What to realize

failed

is that Notes

from

and episodes?was only certain details as one satirical magnificent parody. does not parody, however, and setting up a competing

This Nihilism

in its place.

since parody

Rather,

they have

as a whole?

Underground

not

pressed

conceived

executed

and

consist

in rejecting merely nature" version of "human

is ridicule

by imitation,

Dostoev

sky assimilates the major doctrines of Russian Nihilism into the life of his underground man 5 and by revealing the hopeless di he

in which

lemmas

these

undermine

doctrines

man

underground cause of his rejection all the implications carnation?and

as a result, from within.

lands

does

intends Dostoevsky The of tragedy

as

not

is popularly arise, supposed, It derives from his acceptance of reason. of "reason" in its then-current Russian

particularly

those

cates of reason like Chernyshevsky

which

implications

the

to the be of in

advo

blithely preferred to overlook

or deny.

Dostoevsky

himself clearly pointed to his use of parody in the

to the footnote appended and the Notes of the Notes fictitious.

Nevertheless, not only may,

memoirs into

consideration

of our

society. more

the

title

of his novella.

themselves," such persons

It was my

intention than

to bring

been

"are, of course, author of such

claimed?about

the

before

our

reading one is usually of the done, of is one of the representatives here is obviously Dostoevsky

conspicuously of our recent past. He a generation that is still with us." of Russian about the formation talking often

the author

if we take but must, exist in our society, led to the formation circumstances which

public, characters

has

"Both

he writes, as the

not?as society, ("our") society of nineteenth-century

Western

Europe

as Dostoevsky

culture."

could

man

underground

the

emplifies

all

expect

the

since

of

life

of Peter

been

that had The

the Great.

the

reflects

society, had

influence

latest

this

of

phases

of subject-matter of two tableaux

consists

each

man?but

and method selected

from

also, and episode and very crucial

to a different

corresponds

ex

in this way can

from Underground

the underground

importantly,

to know,

readers

time

choice

Dostoevsky's The work

of organization.

Russian

And

whose is a parodistic life persona process. impasse of this historical

-, he

serio-comic

understand

5

of Western

and

if we approach Notes

Only

his

accretions

embodies

in himself

evolution

the

or of "modern

into Russia

streamed

more

FRANK

by the successive

formed

we

JOSEPH

moment

in the spiritual history of the Russian intelligentsia. The first section shows the underground man in the ideological grip of the Nihilism of the Sixties , the second, as a perfect product of thus

educated

been

the peculiar

and disrupted and ideals.

disorganized

to alien

according

doctrines

construction

of

section

of

the work of

the

of

the

by the attempt

to

the personality the dominant ideology

in which on

Russian?depending

moment?had live

manner

the differing

reveals

Each

of the Forties.

the social Romanticism

the work,

This reverses

which

also

cal sequence and proceeds backward in time. The Nihilism Sixties

was

in

uppermost

the

of

consciousness

explains

chronologi

of the

Dostoevsky's

for the story. the immediate and had provided inspiration readers, a man was not primarily individual Since the underground private a social

sacrifices type, Dostoevsky and development of inner growth as possible from the very cal timeliness

but

order

Notes

from

personality, pathological evils of "human nature," sky's

then,

Underground,

involuntary

natural

first

is not

biographical as much polemi

page.

the self-revelation

of a

over the a theological cry of despair a Dostoev work least of all expressing of "im of Nietzsche's philosophy

not

adoption

the

to obtain

NOTES

6 moralism"

the will

and ironic

liantly

Swiftian

satirical

mastery, this contention

FROM

to power.2 On the contrary, it is a bril for its self-conscious remarkable parody

control we

UNDERGROUND

and Machiavellian

must

set

the work

it came, and endeavor on which Dostoevsky ordinates

The

famous

picture unforgettable "funk-hole" his Petersburg his character?or rather, his

could be more

Nothing

the

to prove context from But

framework his

co

of

effects.

of Determinism

of Notes

tirade

us an

in the

to obtain

depended

The Dialectic

opening

back

to supply

which

II.

finesse.

from Underground gives man in the underground stewing over the peculiarities of and mulling of

total

inability

to become

a character.

abject, petty and ridiculous than the

to be treated for a liver refuses of his life. He image he gives an out of "spite"; made in his ailment he remembers attempt an was to he in browbeat officer when still the civil service, youth, for no reason of his

other

than

the assertion

then,

when

and

honesty,

such boasting is, he deliberately even more

in the eyes

The

underground a chaos of conflicting defined

as that

himself.

"I

says, man, feels

lets it stand to degrade himself

of the reader. seems indeed, emotional impulses;

man,

of a search

did

he boasts of petty vanity; how "contemptible" realizes

he

not

own

for his

even

know

how

or good, either "either spiteful At either a hero or an insect." most

us, he was

conscious also "guilty

of "the of

sublime

the most

to be nothing more than and his conflict may be character?his

for

quest

he to become anything," or an honest a blackguard he when the very moment

the beautiful," actions contemptible and

as

he

tells

which?

in Notes reflected "Nietzscheanism" from so-called (especially dostoevsky's book by Leo Shestov, has been the subject of an influential Dostoevsky Underground) a and thinker Shestov is The Philosophy and Nietzsche, powerful of Tragedy (1903]. or rejects whatever critic who but an extremely neglects literary irresponsible writer, tosses he simply As a consequence does not iibe with his opinions. aspect of a writer as "hypocritical." out Dostoevsky's Christianity and of Shestov's book have had a wide and German translations circulation, French a eood deal of confusion of Dostoevsky's the real meaning work. about have caused on the ideas does not depend value of Shestov's I might add that the philosophical about Nietzsche. for that matter about Dostoevsky?or of his views accuracy

FRANK

JOSEPH

7

in fact, everybody is guilty of, but which, as though

well, which,

on purpose, to commit when con I only happened I was most scious that they ought not to be committed." he asks plain Why,

tively, should this be so? The

answer

to this question or

"abnormal"

has

"psychopathic"

been sought invariably trait of the underground

in some man,

which is then usually traced to the hidden recesses of Dostoevsky's own

But

psychology. a vides perfectly he happened," normal a sort ...

and

simply

plausible assures us, which

inertia

therefore couldn't

any

to his

attributes

words, determinism.

could

you make

man's pro underground monologue answer to his question. "Whatever

with the in accordance "happened and by laws of intensified consciousness is a direct those of consequence laws,

fundamental

and of

the

not

not

only

change

to."

attempt

man

underground

Dostoevsky, a belief

who

The

man, underground not to be enough superstitious,"

"well-educated

but you in other

yourself,

remarks

in scientific that he is

is quite

well

up

on the most enlightened opinion of his time; he knows all about science

and

the

of

laws

the fact that whatever

intensified

and

consciousness;

he

accepts

he does is inevitable and unalterable be

cause

it is totally determined by the laws of nature. man of the underground thus springs di The moral impotence one cornerstones from his the of Cherny of of acceptance rectly This determinism. aspect of Cherny shevsky's thought?absolute

shevsky's philosophy To

Be Done}

Chernyshevsky

; and himself

is mentioned the behavior

only incidentally inWhat of

is embarrassedly

some

of forced

the

Is

characters?as

to concede?can

in his re hardly be reconciled with this doctrine. Nonetheless, sounding article on The Anthropological Principle in Philosophy (1860), which was equally if not more famous than his novel, Chernyshevsky had flatly denied the existence of anything re free will?or, for that matter, any kind of will. motely resembling to Chernyshevsky, is "only the subjective An act of will, according our minds the in rise of thoughts which accompanies impression

FROM

NOTES

8 or

from

actions

UNDERGROUND

man

underground

use Chernyshevsky's

of

The

situation.

dented

to

he wishes

that

and

as an excuse

character

his

underground someone

forgive

displays the be this

before for

man,

all

consequentially!,

skillful dialectical ingenuity, Dostoevsky demoralization

the

by having

philosophy

determinism, if taken seriously action has become impossible.

wildered

facts."

the magic wand of Chernyshev

for his moral flaccidity. Under

With

external

thus begins his parody of Nihilism

Dostoevsky

sky's moral

or

actions

thoughts,

preceding

unprece

instance,

imagines for

magnanimously

having

slapped him in the face; but the more he thinks about it, the more such an action

impossible not have

to do with

what

known

the man

since forgive, most probably

have

"For

becomes.

who

done

would

most

I should

certainly

to my magnanimity?neither face would have slapped my to the laws of nature;

it in obedience

nor

to forget, since though even if it is the law of nature, it hurts all same."

the Or

to

but

magnanimously

give

to act the other

he wishes

suppose

take

way

revenge.

to for

round?not can

How

one

take

revenge when nobody is to blame for anything? "One look and the object

no guilty man,

inevitable

all

action

there

evaporate, no

one

man says, as the underground result of consciousness the legitimate

"the

of

toothache

for which

is why,

That

the

reasons

is

the injury is no longer an injury but just fate,

in the nature

something blamed."

matter

into thin air, your

disappears

and

impossible."

of revenge?then

can be

direct, is to make

on the is taken?say if any action Or, be out of spite." "it would merely Spite

is not a valid cause for any kind of action, but it is the only one the "laws

left when

of nature"

make

any

other

response

illegiti

mate.

In

vacuum created the moral passages, determinism of scientific man's acceptance

such

ground with unrivalled member

of

psychological the

intelligentsia,

acumen. reason

by

the

under

is expressed as a well-trained

But while, forces him

to

accept

de

FRANK

JOSEPH

9

terminism, it is impossible for him humanly to live with a result

As

clusions.

"you

as

any

sardonically, it were though

the

of

writes

of

are quite consolation

is a blackguard."

actually

laws

intensified

he consciousness, a in right being blackguard, to the blackguard that he

as regards

Or,

its con

the

in the

slap

face,

it

is impossible to forget because "though even if it is the law of it hurts

nature, human

the same."

all

moral

reaction?a

at the

of anger

upsurge

insult

of a human

possibility man ground

comments

a total

pose

a

an blackguard, a scien slapped?against

at being

of being

all human responsibility and thus "Reason"

response.

the under

tells

or even are of guilt of indignation feelings but conscience and a sense of and unjustified; for mankind?and they "reasonable"?happily

that

totally

irrational

dignity

are

manage

to assert

It

these

revulsion

tific rationale that dissolves all

Both

not

is this

all

themselves

assertion

of

same.

the

the moral-emotive

level

of

the person

ality, striving to keep alive its significance in the face of the laws that

of nature, "masochism."

is expressed He

by

confesses,

man's

the underground in a much-commented

so-called

passage:

I felt a sort of secret, abnormal, contemptible on coming home on one of the foulest nights

delight when, in Petersburg,

I used to realize intensely that again I had been guilty of

some used

myself,

inwardly,

worrying

myself,

secretly, accusing

shameful,

damnable

Yes,

there

sweetness,

into delight!

just because

I was

and finally,

. . . The so

intensely

into real positive

feeling of delight aware

of my

own

degradation. a passage of this kind may reveal about Dostoevsky's to the trained clinical of Notes eye, in the context psyche from not it to does refer to the under but Underground Dostoevsky

Whatever

ground

man;

I

till at last the bitterness I felt turned into a sort of

delight! was

. . . and

action that day dastardly to go on nagging myself,

and

it has

a

specific

dramatic

function.

The

am

NOTES

10

biguous emotive

"delight"

FROM

UNDERGROUND

man arises from the moral of the underground to the blank nullity of his human nature of the

response It signifies to abdicate his refusal his conscience of nature. even and submit to reason as his silently determinism, though sures him that there is he can really do to change for the nothing man better. The "masochism" of the underground thus has a laws

reverse

from

significance

that

to

attributed

usually

Instead

it.

of being a sign of pathological abnormality, it is in reality an indi cation

of the underground of his moral preservation

man's

is only from tion of the normal man's

The Man

ground he argues

all

of Action its deceptive that we can grasp

with

this perspective, moral horizon,

relation

to the

interlocutor

through a follower is obviously interlocutor et de de la nature of action, I}homme

simply

as we man, a mechanical man

underground this theory makes less. heart,"

all moral

envy such a man says the underground But perhaps that. man,

for his

action,

man.

"He

normal

from Underground. a man of Chernyshevsky, la v?rit? ^ and the under

action

of

not?that

does

is stupid?I man should

am not dis be

stupid." of action, inspired by a to his goal, like a mad bull, that what he thinks of realize

the man

straight does not i.e.,

whom

or at least meaning impossible, all the forces of my embittered

with

the

the under

that all human life is theory But the the laws of nature.

the man

action

for example,

of revenge, "goes feeling He horns." with lowered as the basis

of

product knows what

"I

puting normal The

his

see, accents

transvalua

with

imaginary the first part of Notes

This

ground

health?his

spiritual

sense.

///. It

paradoxical

is justice, eliminated

a

ludicrously by the laws

old-fash

of nature. and unscientific prejudice that allows him to maintain his compla is only his stupidity man's with un cency, and to look on the underground squirmings men action in of Or the contempt. conversely, "capitulate feigned ioned

It

all sincerity"

before

the "stone

wall"

of scientific

determinism

and

FRANK

JOSEPH the laws

exert

which

of nature,

11

"a sort of calming

them, a sort of final and morally

a mystic one." The of plain men that scientific determinism understand does about

"morally a smug with behaving

exactly different

Very

and

anything; of being

awareness

as in the past. is the response

upon

decisive influence and perhaps

even

decisive"

influence

action not

do not simply them to be allow

accept its conclusions while they go on

they

up-to-date, of the

ignominious underground knows who what the "stone wall" man, only really as a can a means nurse resent consequence, and, only despicable ment that he cannot But the justly discharge against anybody. cannot his with well-known man, underground "masochism," help as some sort were of human free still response pos if behaving too well

sible left, can."

it not much

"Is

against to understand

"to be aware

man,

underground

better

is only one solution as hard as you the wall cries the everything,"

there

and meaningful?"consequently your head namely, knocking

to be conscious

of everything,

of

all the impossibilities and stone walls? Not to be reconciled to any of those impossibilities or stone walls if you hate being reconciled to them? nations

To

irrefutable by way of the most on the eternal hideous conclusions

reach

the most

own

is somehow

your clear it is abundantly to abandon yourself

fault that

is a stone wall, not it is your fault at all, if there

to doing

sensuously

nothing,

combi

logical theme

that

it

though again and therefore and

silently

and impotently gnashing your teeth?" man the paradoxes of the underground to reach a paroxysm of psychopathic but appear self-accusation; once we understand the logic of Dostoevsky's it is quite creation, Here,

at first

sight,

clear that nobody in the world man.

the underground all other moral with

He

can be guilty of anything except

knows has

that been

notions, in having moral nature; yet he persists else for him And since there is nowhere

bility, by the most for

everything.

the

idea of guilt, along the laws of by

abolished

responses just to assign moral

the

same.

responsi

irrefutable logic he and he alone is to blame

NOTES

12

FROM

UNDERGROUND

The portrait of the underground man we have been tracing is developed up through Chapter VI of the first part of Notes from Underground.

.And, as we have tried to show, dramatization of a double movement:

it is based

on an

the acceptance rea man's

imaginative determinism of Chernyshevsky's by the underground It is only his moral-emotive but its instincts. son, rejection by the complex that we can grasp from this point of view, indeed, of the under of Dostoevsky's creation. The self-mockery raillery ground

he uses the disgusted pejoratives but as we have taken literally;

man, been

usually

In

meaning. underground

a literal

such

"masochism,"

entirely reading same way, the continual

the

man

to convey

is intended

about seen

have himself, case of in the

misses

Dostoevsky's of the self-derision

a consummate

tragi-comic

irony.

The underground man becomes what he is because his life is the

ad

reductio and

action;

portray whole Only where

of

repulsive

of the man the metaphysics this he portrays and hideous

as being, the more he underlines

(and himself) obtuseness

absurdum

the more

his

of

man

the underground of Notes purpose

the incredible

Far from wishing judge. as the embodiment of evil,

self-confident

of life

to the

is quite the opposite. from Underground a difference, can make choice human where only is is no absolute any morality determinism, possible

in a world there

at all;

and Dostoevsky as the "capriciousness" whatsoever.

adroitly necessary

man's the underground for any morality precondition

defends

The Crystal Palace with Chapter VII of Notes from Underground, IV.

Beginning Dostoevsky been aiming formulation; on the one Palace.

shifts

his

target

of attack.

at Chernyshevsky's but now he turns

Up

metaphysics to his ethics

to this point he has in its most general of "rational egoism"

to the ideal of the Crystal hand, and, on the other, use of the same are these doctrines Both by the exploded

FRANK

JOSEPH that Dostoevsky strategy as it were, of projection

has into

13

already employed?his the absolute. Dostoevsky,

technique, that is,

places himself imaginatively at the position where the doctrine he to attack

wishes

its goal;

achieved

and

the moral-psychological incompatibility some aspect of the nature of man?in

strates ment

has already

of

Dostoevsky of his work?a

when he spoke of the "fantastic realism" rather than and the extreme of the possible use of this the actual; and his first large-scale

realism

of the median

and

occurs

realism"

the first

In

in Notes

this

of

part over the "theory of merry race by means of the system

is man's

is

This

responsible.

meant

what

"fantastic

achieve

this

this case, man's

with

need to feel spiritually free and morally

then he demon

Underground. man waxes the section, underground human the regeneration of the whole of

from

its own

But

advantages."

what

true advantage? Can it only be found by "taking the on scientific and economic figures and relying "That's the trouble, says the under gentlemen," there "that which exists something commiseratingly,

of statistical

average

formulas"?

ground man to almost is dearer

every

man

upset the logic of my argument) able good too, that (the one, the one we are talking namely, than

desirable if need

be,

all

other

is ready

goods,

or (not to his greatest good, one most valu that there exists

than

is being overlooked, constantly which is and more greater about)

to challenge

all

peace,

honor,

for the

and

short, prosperity?in can he obtain that provided

things, good The

which

most

valuable

is dearer

tone

to him

and

all

sake of which

a man,

law, that is to say, reason, and useful those excellent

desirable and most primary than anything in the world." of its pretense of this passage, with

language a parody is clearly of some of the more precision, philosophical Even more in The Anthropological laborious passages Principle. "one to is understand however, why Dostoevsky's important,

"reason,

honor,

Chernyshevsky's

good" peace, ethics

is placed

in such

prosperity," of "rational

opposition immitigable ultimate etc. The goal

egoism"

was

the

creation

to of of

NOTES

14 a sanctified

humanity

FROM

UNDERGROUND

out

which,

of sheer

rational

"rational

egoist,"

to Chernyshevsky,

according

of

calculations

A true

self-interest, had lost the very possibility of doing evil. "may

say to him

I will be wicked, I will do people harm; but he will not be

self:

to do

able

that any more

than a clever

he wanted to be one." Not Dostoevsky posed choose

the alternative: between

advantages. man's need the

cisely

freedom, or "reason"

"one

himself

most

of

free

valuable

the

i.e., with

all

had

he

to

its material

underground autonomous and morally for which

if

freedom

man

the

good"

even

but Chernyshevsky

either moral

and evil, good And the answer

to feel

can be a fool

man

is that is pre to

is ready

sacrifice all the others. To obtain this "good" he will "deliberately and

desire

consciously

stupid,

outrageously

something just because

desire for himself even what an obligation by however stupid serves

only what unreasonable

this

"good"

our personality

may

to us,

important

precious and our individuality."

at all events, be, "it pre

For

is sensible."

and most

is most

what

is very stupid and not to be bound

to desire and

even stupid, to the right

is injurious, to have he wants that

of "rational man's rejection underground ideal its ultimate the way for his reaction against The

namely,

paves egoism" in the future?

In this future Utopia, de the world of the Crystal Palace. all the laws of nature govern scribed inWhat Is To Be Donef ing

society

will

have

longer dramatizing purely

deterministic

been

Here

discovered.

the moral-psychological world;

the

laws

of nature

is no

Dostoevsky

impossibility of a are now

seen

in

the light of their future triumphs, which will guide man's way was Palace The material to overwhelming Crystal prosperity. as all Chernyshevsky's readers knew, on the Fourierist modelled,

phalanstery; details only

and Fourier had calculated and combined all the

in the phalanstery but maniacal. mathematical of

life

with The

a precision phalanstery,

that was

not

as Emile

in available Palace is now conveniently of the Crystal description 'Chemyshevsky's with and selections edited in a new of Notes edition from Underground, English E. Matlaw of relevant material translations i960). Paperbacks, (Dutton by Ralph

FRANK

JOSEPH Faguet

once

pithily

"c'est

remarked,

15 d'un

l'Arcadie

chef

de

bu

reau."

The triumph of the Crystal Palace presupposes that science will taught man

have

to being a regret in addition free-will, to his wel hindrance error, was also a positive speculative nor For that man science proves neither will "possesses

table fare.

that his

and never has done, and ... he himself is nothing more caprices, or organ-stop." than a sort of piano-key it might be (Fourier, as the laws and mentioned, spoke of the phalanstery embodying

principles of "harmony." His a

in

famous

Socialist

What

Is To

Be Done}*

whose

notes

could

sky's musical

treatise

human

compared

into such harmony:

The

trouble

inclined,"

that the best definition legs

and

hence Dostoev that man

is, however,

even

I'm

ungrateful.

ground man, "to believe on two ture who walks

in anagrammatically a to "clavier" passions

mentioned

be blended

imagery.)

"phenomenally

chief disciple, Victor Consid?rant,

the under

says of man For

is ungrateful."

is

crea

is?a even

if you

"shower all the earthly blessings upon him, drown him in hap piness, the

over

head

ears,

or bestow

surface,

so that such

bubbles

only

economic

should

on

be visible him

upon

prosperity

as

would leave him with nothing to do but sleep, eat cakes, and only about keeping world worry history man will, out of sheer ingratitude

going . . . play

. . . even a

then he will, trick on you."

dirty

This "dirty trick" is precisely that he will throw everything over set his heart on the most uneconomic and positively board, will to himself "for the sole purpose of proving harmful nonsense, are men were so necessary) that that still men and (as though not keys on a piano." this point, the underground chaos which universal duplicates,

man

chaos

life

At

of the underground

?La Destin?e him expounded

Sociale a

lively

man's

(1834-1838). style, was more

rises

on the

This

to a climactic

socio-historical

in the earlier

work, read widely

vision level,

chapters.

which systematized than Fourier himself.

Fourier

of the

And and

NOTES

16 in both

reason

further

is the same?the

of a world

the vision

against have no

free-will

UNDERGROUND

the cause of this chaos

cases,

personality

FROM

in which For

for being.

revolt

of

the

and personality even if such a

world could really be created, even

even but a piano-key, really were nothing to him by natural science and mathe proved even then he would to come to his senses. refuse

if he

[man]

if this were matically, . . .And

if he has no other

and

he will

devise

all

chaos, that this, too, can be and darkness, table?chaos, say

he will plan destruction remedy, ... sorts of sufferings. If you calculated by the mathematical and curses?so that the mere

possibility of calculating it all before hand would reason would

and

in the end?well,

triumph

stop it all

if that were

to

happen man would go purposely mad in order to rid himself of

reason

and

carry

his

point.

inNotes at first sight, seems more Nothing from Underground, than this invocation to the gods of darkness? daring and shocking to not surprisingly, all destruction, chaos, and madness. And, of have same taken it with the interpreters Dostoevsky invariably literalness with which man's "maso they took the underground chism"

and "immorality."

None

have

paid

the slightest

attention

to the hypothetical

and conditional form in which Dostoevsky

cast

nor

these

assertions,

have

they

seen

them

in the

projection of the future ideal of the Crystal Palace. however,

the

senseless

and

envisaged by Dostoevsky only stances where man has no other of his personality. clear abundantly as he

as a last-ditch

of

of his

In fact, freedom

is

in circum

defense, of preserving the autonomy man himself the underground makes way

Indeed, that his frenetic exists

does not refer to man harangue in ordinary to "irrational" it applies life; to become if Chernyshevsky's Four forced

actually as he might be ever were ierist Utopia

man

in the name

revolt

self-destructive

light

of curses,

For

realized.

darkness

and

after

chaos,

declaiming lividly man the underground

FRANK

JOSEPH

17

"And how is one after

returns to reality for a moment and adds: that

to resist

the

to rejoice

temptation

not

this has

all

that

hap

pened yet and that so far desire depends on the devil alone knows what."

Once having envisaged the completion of the Crystal Palace, man

the underground

however, that

such

ideal was

man

what

to ques

IX,

and the Socialist radicals

tion the confidence of Chernyshevsky an

in Chapter

continues,

really

"Man

wanted.

to

likes

the underground is undeniable," paths?that man to accomplish and socially useful pro agrees -yman wishes man denies that man wishes labor. But the underground ductive create

clear

and

to achieve

the

secular

static

of

Apocalypse

the Crystal

to

Palace,

reach the literal end of history when all further striving, moral inner

and

struggle,

will

conflict

have

ceased.

man

Perhaps

"is

instinctively afraid of reaching the goal and completing the build . . .Perhaps he only loves building it and not ing he is erecting? aux animaux domestiques living in it, preferring to leave it later such as ants,

sheep,

etc.,

. . . They

etc.,

have

[ants]

one marvel

lous building of this kind, a building that is forever indestructible ?the

The

ant-hill."

maux need

ideal

because

they free?because

exactly domestiques to feel creative and

no

have all

aux

is suitable

of the "ant-hill"

they

inkling desire

ani

of man's is to com

reason and the laws plete their appointed tasks in conformity with of nature

through

all

eternity.

was a comparison of the Socialist ideal to an "ant-hill" use commonplace in the Russian journalism of the period, but the of such an image here as a symbol for the secular end of history "If humanity very probably derives from Alexander Herzen. This

went

to some

straight

Shore (1855), would

stop the animals

goal,"

Herzen

wrote

in From

the Other

"there would be no history, only logic; humanity status quo form, in a spontaneous if the libretto existed, history would

in some finished . . . Besides,

all interest, it would become futile, boring, ridiculous." Herzen's

works,

Dostoevsky

publicly

expressed

special

like lose

Of all

admiration 2

NOTES

18

FROM

UNDERGROUND

the Other Shore;* and the similarity is too great to be

for From accidental.

Now

more

Herzen,

than any other

single

individual,

was responsible for the propagation of Socialist ideas in Russia; but he never accepted the Nihilist scientism and determinism of the Sixties.

Like

Dostoevsky

was

Herzen

himself,

a member

of

the generation of the Forties which had been nurtured on Schell and no member

ing and Hegel; ever politics,

succumbed

materialism.

of

completely here

Dostoevsky

this generation, to the lure

is thus using

of

regardless of mechanical

the Forties

to argue

against the Sixties, as he was to do later again in The Devils And this interplay between the generations, as we (1871-1872). shall see, is of first importance for understanding the meaning of Notes

as a whole.

from Underground ultimate

The

of

argument

man

the underground

against

the

Crystal Palace is that it outlaws suffering. "In the Crystal Palace it is unthinkable; suffering is doubt, it is negation, and what sort of Crystal Palace would it be if one were to have any doubts about it? And

I am

yet

convinced

that man

will

suffering, that is to say, destruction and chaos. cause

it's the sole

of consciousness!"

Within

text of Notes

from Underground,

same

as "masochism"

function

verted irony.

real

Suffering! Why the

"suffering"

ideological

con

clearly has the

or as the underground

man's

in

It is the only way left of keeping alive his "con

as a human

sciousness"

renounce

never

indi his personality, of asserting to the and moral in returning And viduality prob responsibility. at this point?the IX? lem of "consciousness" end of Chapter

brings his demolition of the Crystal Palace into rela

Dostoevsky tion with pears

being,

his

to be

earlier

chapters,

the underground

the unity of what establishing man's and disorderly spasmodic

ap ti

rade. with the late Herzen, chatting 5"0nce, From See Dostoevsky's the Other Shore" It ls likely this conversation 1873. Writer, in London. visited Herzen Dostoevsky

one of his works I praised article "Old Acquaintances" in the summer took place

to the skies? in Diary of a of 1862, when

FRANK

JOSEPH

The Palatial Hencoop

V.

the penultimate aware the reader becomes

In Chapter ground,

suddenly

ringing

self-torture

and

Still,

the

note

struck,

being

Up man man's

underground

Under

from

or

in the background to this point, the

remained

the others.

all

of the underground

suffering

evident.

amply

of a new

hitherto

had

out above

of Notes

section

X,

of a note which

rather,

19

had been made as

sacrilegious

sertion that he had found "delight" in his suffering, and the sar castic satisfaction with which he flaunts this "delight" before the horrified

his anguish. unbearable Torn his

of his

eyes

But the

in Chapter situation of

between

the

conscience

"Surely the conclusion

X, we become the underground

reason

of his

convictions

the

and

revolt

of

man cries out: the underground feelings, been made for the sole purpose of drawing I am made the way is a piece of rank deceit?

and not

I have

our sense of mitigates aware of how literally man is. really

somewhat

interlocutor,

that

I don't believe under it." The sole purpose? some to his rack is solution for searching ground desperately re and he makes very clear that the underground ing dilemma; means no volt of the personality, it may be, is by valuable though Can

this be

the

man

a positive answer. the Crystal Palace myself "I rejected to stick out one's not be allowed sole reason that one would a self-mocking

at it" (again

moral of

freedom).

image

for

the

tongue the revolt of

"But I did not say that because I am so fond

out my

sticking

and derisive

for

tongue.

. . .On

the contrary,

I'd gladly

have

let my tongue be cut off out of gratitude if things could be so ar that

ranged

I should

have

no wish

to stick

leaves us in no doubt that Dostoevsky all ideals, is desperately far from rejecting

would not

it would This

to revolt

lead to the willing

alternative

ideal

obviously

in rabid

at all."

the underground man, one that for searching

truly satisfy the needs of his spirit.

spur his personality

it out

Such an ideal would

frenzy;

on the contrary,

surrender of himself could

only

in its favor.

be one which,

recog

FROM

NOTES

20

UNDERGROUND

nizing the autonomy of the will and the freedom of the person to the moral

ality, appealed and self-interest

in the service we

Dostoevsky's

nature

know

of man

instead

of determinism.

that Chapter

X

of to "reason"

From

a letter

contained

originally

of

some

clear indication that this alternative ideal was that of Christ; but this part of the text was mangled both by the censors and by the of the proof readers. am not at all about my happy

carelessness "I

article,"

after the publication of the first part of Notes ground; have been

"there better

are not

wrote

Dostoevsky

from Under

and it would errors, proofreading to publish the penultimate chapter (the most terrible

important, where the very idea of the whole article is expressed) rather than to publish it this way, that is, with and contradictions. But what can one do? What

twisted swine

sentences the censors

I derided everything, and sometimes blasphemed for appearance, they let it get by, but when from all this I de duced the necessity of belief in Christ, they cut it out. Why, are are! Where

censors

the

the government?" perhaps against conspiring some of these we corrected may assume, Dostoevsky,

errors

when he revised the magazine text for publication in book form; but while the alternative ideal to the Crystal Palace is clearly some confusion in the final still remains indicated, enough in Chapter X, the underground arises when, This confusion to structure to another the Palace compare Crystal begins be a "real"

would "You

see" he

palace says, "if

of a hencoop. it [the Crystal Palace]

text. man that

instead

were

not

a pal

ace but a hencoop, and if it should rain, I might crawl into it to avoid getting wet, but I would never pretend that the hencoop me from the rain. to it for sheltering out of gratitude me even a hen that in circumstances and tell such You you laugh I reply, is if the it certainly coop is as good as a palace. Yes, not not to of It is the wet." usefulness in life is get only purpose was

a palace

but the that is impugned the hencoop man, by the underground a return in for its that for fact that it is mistaken i.e., palace,

FRANK

JOSEPH

it has been elevated

practical advantages But

the

21

man

underground

into mankind's

to accept

refuses

the

ideal.

hencoop-qua

palace as his ideal. "But what is to be done if I've got it into my head

that

that

[i.e.,

not

to get wet]

is not

the

only

of

purpose

life, and that if one has to live, one had better live in a palace?" as we

can

man a "true" poses underground the "false" and this is the point at which the con palace; occurs. man For the underground com this develops as follows: "For the time being," he says, "... I re

Here, against fusion

parison fuse to accept

a

the

see,

hencoop

for a palace.

The

Crystal

Palace

may

be

just an idle dream, itmay be against all the laws of nature, I may have

invented

it because

own

of my

because

stupidity,

of

certain

old and irrational habits of my generation. But what do I care whether it is against the laws of nature? What does itmatter so as it exists

long

exist?" Now "Crystal

in my

or rather

desires,

exists

it is obvious that something

Palace"

mentioned

it has stood

everything latter This

"Crystal

in this

for

while

my

is wrong

here:

is the opposite passage the rest of the text.

throughout Palace" is a structure

that

exists

the laws of nature instead of being their embodiment; answer the

to man's

underground

not

desires

and

man's

allusion

desires

their suppression. to "certain old

the of

against

it is an

Moreover, and irrational

habits of my generation" reminds us that he is a member of the of the Forties. This paves the way for part two of the generation indicates and also that the Forties work, Dostoevsky's recognition ?whatever else this era may have been guilty of from his point

of view?still

believed in the existence of the will and in the im

of

In any case, it is clear that the refers to the "true" palace which that Dostoevsky the same allows

portance

and desire. feeling Palace" of this citation

"Crystal but the fact is not a hencoop; to stand for both "palaces" designation

cannot

help

but baffle

the

reader.8 has pointed S. Borschevskii, eA Soviet that Dostoevsky out, quite scholar, rightly, uses two words he says for "palace." Sometimes and (dvorets) literally "palace" he speaks of a crystal sometimes On this basis, Borschevskii "building" (zdanie).

22

NOTES

FROM

indication of this alternative ideal, how

Despite Dostoevsky's the essence

ever, quires

the

latter

revolt

for

freedom.

UNDERGROUND

of his

of

the underground man in the negative phase of

conception to remain trapped He

longs

for another

it must

determinism exist, but?accepting not yet know how to attain it. "I know that I shall never despairingly:

?he

does

with

promise,

an

to the

according accept as the crown for

the poor

he knows

ideal, and

the

All

he

laws

that

of nature

can do

be content

re the

is affirm

with

a com

zero because and recurring it exists everlasting laws of nature and actually not I will exists. of all my

on a lease

desires

a

of ninety-nine

big house hundred

with and

model

flats

ninety-nine

years."

our last glimpse of the underground man, in the final Chapter XI, masterfully depicts this state of mind, in which he both denies and affirms his underground revolt and his "dark And

cellar"

in the space

Though of

of a few

lines.

I have said that I envy the normal man to the point

exasperation,

I wouldn't

circumstances in which

care

to be

I find him

in his

(though

place

in the

I shall never

cease

him. No, no, the dark cellar is, at any rate, of envying to me!). much In the dark cellar one greater advantage can at least. ... am I'm I I am afraid Sorry, exaggerating. as as I well that it is because twice-two, know, exaggerating not the dark cellar that is better, but something some else, I long for but cannot find. thing else altogether, something

To hell with the dark cellar! as the opposition to the crystal dvorets X of the crystal (false) interprets Chapter zdanie (true). to this theory. In the very first sentence is only one objection There of Chapter uses zdanie to refer unmistakably to the "false" palace. "You believe X, Dostoevsky Palace forever that is to say, in one at which in the Crystal {zdanie) indestructible, etc. See S. Borschevskii, Schedrin i Dos you won't be able to stick out your tongue," toevsky 1956), p. 97. (Moscow, seems to be no way of clearing up this matter There short of consulting the original We may that Dostoevsky at this point tried to link speculate, however, manuscript. the symbol of a "true" Crystal Palace with must Christ. But this have certainly and confused startled the censors, who had also read Chernyshevsky and took the a as Palace of atheistic Socialism. Hence Crystal symbol elim they systematically nated all the Christian allusions interwoven with the Crystal Palace.

JOSEPH

cannot

it, forms

attain

from

23

the underground man

else" is, and why

that "something

What

FRANK

the substance

the

of

second

of Notes

part

Underground.

VI. The

Idealists of the Forties

second part of Notes

is subtitled:

from Underground

of the Wet Snow." Since the snow plays no role what "Apropos ever in the story, one may wonder chose to high why Dostoevsky answer to heighten it in this manner. The is: the sym light This the quotation from bolic atmosphere. subtitle, along with serves to set this second part firmly used as epigraph, Nekrasov to evoke. that Dostoevsky It in the ideological wishes ambiance

had already been noted in the Forties

(by P. V. Annenkov)

that

"wet school" were of the "natural fond of employing as a typical feature of the Petersburg and Dos landscape; summon an uses to it in up instantly toevsky image of Petersburg most the Forties?an and premeditated "abstract image of the had become in the whole whose existence very sym world," city

writers

snow"

bolic

in Russian

the Russian by Nekrasov the period.

literature

for

the violence

toWestern

adaption also conjures

famous

Nekrasov's

poem,

the moral

up

to which

the pathetic

confession

Friend

of

the poem climate of

had

Dostoevsky

luded ironically in an earlier work?The (1859)?reproduces

and unnaturalness In addition, and spiritual

culture.

also

al

of the Family

of a repentant

prosti

tute redeemed from her degraded life by the author: a word When of fervent with conviction, the lowest dregs of dark affliction, From A soul from eternal doom I saved; Citing etc., was

some

further

etc.,?thereby completely

cuts it short with suddenly his that the poem indicating feeling chatter. The redemption-of-a~

lines, Dostovesky

indirectly conventional

NOTES

24

FROM

UNDERGROUND

prostitute theme, which runs from social Romantics like Eug?ne Sue, George Sand and Hugo right through to Tolstoy's Resur rection

had

(1899),

a commonplace

become

in the Russian

litera

ture of the Forties and also figures as a minor incident inWhat Is To Be Done?. The climactic episode in the second part of Notes

from man

ground

encounter

Underground?the and the prostitute

Lisa?is

and reversal of this social Romantic part of Notes the sentimental

second

The

to satirize

between

the

an

ironic

clearly

under parody

clich?. then, is intended of the Forties just

from Underground, social Romanticism

as the first part had satirized the Nihilism of the Sixties. And a good deal of light is thrown on this second part by articles that Dostoevsky published in his magazine Time in the years immedi ately preceding the composition of his novella. The Forties, wrote

Dostoevsky spirit of Then

analysis

everything

in

1860,

penetrated was done

the moment

been

had into

our

. . .

classes. we

to principle,

according

"the

when

intellectual

lived

ac

cording to principles, and we had a horrible fear of doing any thing not according to the latest ideas." All spontaneity and unself-consciousness was lost; not to live by the light of "the latest ideas" was literally unthinkable. And under the influence of "the

latest

a new

ideas"

sian

"Byronic

intelligentsia?the the Forties.

describes

As Dostoevsky

help "humanity"; their

powers.

become

angry

social

them,

said "They and curse?that

was worth

these

were

idealists

it was

more

not

really

was

everything

the

irony

trouble

so dirty

that

to

of to one

a single finger, and that a good

than anything." these when

even

worth

All

this was

idealists

taken

became

of despair, as sometimes even when, happened, rosy-cheeked?or were their hands to cheat at cards and caught with idealists were But since these else's pockets. always

fine

burning

but they could find no occupation worthy

hardly had the desire to wiggle dinner

the Rus among appeared idealists the liberal of natures," type

as the fat

and

they began in someone longing

to

FRANK

JOSEPH "sacrifice"

25

for "the

of humanity," good Dostoevsky at their word. he asks, tauntingly pretends Why, a sacrifice?and should go so they not really accomplish perhaps to read? "Sacrifice far as to teach a serf child O yourselves, . . . he bitingly "for the good of all. giants," them, enjoins with Sacrifice sublime your temperament yourselves completely, themselves

to take

them

to and your sublime ideas?lower shrink yourselves, yourselves, one this child." particular of the Forties, social Romanticism in Dostoevsky's The opinion,

had fostered an inflated "egoism of principle," which allowed the to intelligentsia while beneficence actually

live

Russian

in a dream-world

nursing the moral

of

own vanity task confronting

their

"universal" with

perfect these liberal complacency. idealists was to live up to their own pretensions, i.e., to turn their to heighten love of "humanity," abstract which served chiefly act of self-sacrifice their own self-esteem, into a concrete directed

moral

And

a

toward

concrete

particular,

individual.

and we

find

a

with

the new

been

harsh,

course

pre

from Under ground $

to accord of style and treatment the period. the irony had Earlier the final argument of the under

shift

corresponding of

atmosphere grating,

is of

This

cisely the theme of the second part of Notes

jarring;

ground man against the world of the Crystal Palace could only be the rage of madness and self-destruction. to the foreground comic tone is a lighter

But what of burlesque

now

comes

and

carica

ture.

The

underground

youthful

man,

as Dostoevsky

conceives

is stuffed full of bookish ideas culled from the European Russian

Romantics

says of himself,

Describing time

literary,

spent my

"except

I was

could reading

and tor excited, reading] delighted the second part there are constant al All through un to the artificiality of his responses ("how paltry, affair would the whole and commonplace be," he thinks at

reading me." mented lusions

...

from

"At home I mostly

social Romantics?"I cas though

and

speak" he a book.' "

and

his own life he writes:

not

him,

it

[the

NOTES

26

FROM

UNDERGROUND

but an extended burles Entire sections are nothing point). to and pedantic reactions man's stilted que of the underground to the power the simplest human and it is a testimony situations; one

of received ideas that Dostoevsky's sharply derisive comedy so should long have gone unnoticed. This comedy predominates in all the episodes preceding the meeting with the prostitute Lisa; for

in these

the underground

man

is caught

we may

in what

call

a "dialectic of vanity," which parallels the "dialectic of determin in part

ism"

one.

The

underground

man's

vanity

convinces

him

of his own intellectual superiority and he despises everybody; but when

he

realizes

that he

cannot

rest without

their

recognition

of

his superiority, he hates others for their indifference and falls into self-loathing at his own humiliating dependence. This is the inevitable dialectic of an egoism which cannot forget about itself for

a moment,

and,

in seeking

to wrest

recognition

from

the

world, only receives dislike and hostility in return. Psychologi that cally, this dialectic duplicates the conflict of all against all of arises socially from theWestern European principle egoistic under the that is individualism. And Dostoevsky's implication ground

man?an

"educated

man,

a modern

intellectual,"

as he

as a result of imbibing the European gleefully calls himself?has, culture popular in Russia in the Forties, lost almost all capacity for undistorted

and

selfless

moral

feeling.7

im the work on Summer Notes (1863), his Winter Impressions 7A11 through of the nature contrasts Notes Dostoevsky Underground, from mediately preceding man with that of the Russian. Western European of individuality, is "a principle he writes, in the Western nature, What predominates in self-definition of personal a principle intense egoism, of isolation, self-preservation, and all other people, to all nature this I in opposition terms of one's own I, in placing to valuable and equally as an autonomous, equal completely independent principle nature in to this, the Russian In contrast it." outside that exists everything feels individual each in which a response of true "brotherhood" possesses stinctively for the other. a part of all and is ready to sacrifice himself himself in the second part this contrast and dramatizes particularly transposes Dostoevsky of the "Russian that this view It might be observed of Notes from Underground. and those under his also shared by Herzen in origin, was though Slavophil nature," and the left-wing and by Mikhailovsky and Sixties, in the Fifties influence Populists in the Seventies.

FRANK

JOSEPH

27

Lisa

VII.

into tragedy, when the under however, changes comedy man encounters another human fails finally being who ground was aware to respond in the accustomed fashion. well Dostoevsky on in texture, while the second of this alteration and, working The

part

wrote

of his novella,

stand

is called

what

a

to his brother

In the first

here.

in music.

transition

"You

Mikhail:

under same

the

Exactly

there is just seemingly, two this chatter, but suddenly in the last is re chatter; chapters, solved the catastrophe by a catastrophe." (In the final version thing

happens

chapter,

is actually developed through Chapters V to X). This catastro phe is the incident with the prostitute Lisa, which resolves the conflict

between

sentimental

imaginary fashion.

and

idealism

re

ethical

of the con ality And, by the ironic paradox it reveals all the shabbiness of the intelligentsia's "ideals" clusion, when with spontaneous and unselfish confronted love. in dexterous

a girl

and

patron

enters.

in a mirror:

sight of himself to me:

revolting

on

begins

The

in the brothel.

rival

ar the underground man's treats him like any other proprietress As he goes out with her, he catches

Lisa

with

incident

The

"My flustered face looked utterly

evil, mean,

pale,

with

dishevelled

'It's

hair.

all right, I'm glad of it,' I thought, I'm glad that I'll seem repul sive

to her.

subdue weight

. . ." Not

that.

I like

been

having to insult

or earlier his companions the underground to be taken seriously,

them

with

man

to

either

able

sufficient

characteristic

ally anticipates revenging himself on the helpless girl. The more he

repulsive

is to her,

the more

his egoism

and need

for domina

tion will be satisfied by forcing her to submit to his desires. not by physical attains his

man

of her

hostile

submission

that

alone, however, over Lisa. For when

triumph and resentful

attitude,

"a peevish

It is

the underground aware he becomes thought

stirred

inmy mind and seemed to pass all over my body like some vile sensation."

This

thought

takes

the

form

of an effort

to play

on

NOTES

28

FROM

UNDERGROUND

Lisa's feelings, and to triumph over her not only physically but as well.

morally The

man

underground

to break

thus proceeds

the armor

down

of indifference and assumed cynicism by which Lisa protects her self against the debasing circumstances of her life. Mingling horrible details of degradation with banality

makes

Balzac's

Le

succeeds self

and

down.

them

P?re

the more

in the process?the to the surface Lisa's true

the

total

this was

humiliation of

of

course meant

her

on

drawing

poignant?and

Gorioi

in bringing causing of None

all

images of felicity whose man

underground feelings

about

emotional

seriously;

her

break

the under

ground man simply had been carried away by the power of his own

But this time his words is too hit home?Lisa eloquence. to see through naive and helpless "I worked their falsity. young, a a state" he says, "that I felt up into so pathetic myself lump ris . . . of a sudden I stopped ing in my throat and?all and, bending a violently over to listen with beating began apprehensively, bosom was heaving and she was Lisa's heart." spasmodically, efforts to contain her sobs. "She bit the pillow, harrowing making

she bit her arm till it bled (I saw it afterwards), or clutching at her dishevelled hair with her fingers, went rigid with that super human

effort,

holding

her breath

The sist

carried man, underground to the exalted role living up

and

clenching

her

teeth."

cannot re away by his victory, that he of hero and benefactor

had so often given himself in fantasy. When he leaves Lisa he gives her his address with a lordly gesture, inviting her to come see him; and it is on this gesture turns the that Dostoevsky moment denouement the under For the of the second part. man his charla haze of the from emerges ground self-adulatory and

tanism,

he

is stricken

with

terror.

He

cannot

bear

the

thought

stern man he was, but 8"You see, I once knew a father who was very strict, a very . . and feet. kiss her hands he used to go down on his knees to his daughter, ^ She at some party, in the and he'd stand for five hours would dancing spend the evenine ... same place without in a dirty old He would go about taking his eyes off her. to everyone he had," etc. coat, he was a miser else, but on her he'd lavish everything

FRANK

JOSEPH

that Lisa might dressing-gown,

29

see him as he really is?wrapped in his

living

squalid

in his shabby

"funk-hole,"

un

completely

der the thumb of his manservant Apollon, immersed in all the exterior poverty and ignominy of his daily life. Never for a moment does it occur to him that he might help her nonetheless; he is so absorbed in himself that the only thought of her as a is an obscure

reality heart

my

and

conscience,

and manifested a few

After

sense

of guilt. something

me,

not

would

stirring,

kept

in

down

deep

die,

itself in a feeling of poignant anguish." days

pass

ground

man

began

in rather indulging the process of Lisa's

cerned

"Inside

becomes

and Lisa

more

does

not

cheerful; sweet day-dreams."

he

says,

These

her

re-education,

the under

appear,

at times,

confession

"I

even

all

con

of

love

for him, and his own confession that "I did not dare lay claim to your heart was afraid

first

because

I knew

you were

that, out of gratitude, to respond to my love,

yourself

under

my

influence

and

force you would deliberately rouse a feeling that you would

in your heart which perhaps did not really exist, and I did not on my part? despotism . . . it would have been in short, here I got indelicate. (Well, a sort of European, in inex myself entangled George-Sandian want

this because

it?it

would

be sheer

pressibly noble subtleties)." are a slap both at with these reveries?which Interspersed Sand's in the Forties, and the strong Sandian influence importance Is To Be Done??is in What the low comedy of the under to bend to his will. man's efforts the stubborn Apollon ground as it were, here uses the classical theatrical technique Dostoevsky, one serious and the other farcical; and he of two identical plots, enter under Lisa when the them adroitly interweaves by having all of his hysterical is revealing ground man the imperturbable Apollon. By pitch

time, the underground frustration and nervous

this of

man

has

exasperation.

impotence reached He

in face of

a dangerous breaks down

FROM

NOTES

30

UNDERGROUND

completely before the bewildered Lisa, sobbing and complaining But all this is so humiliating that he is "tortured" by Apollon. that he cannot help turning on her in spiteful fury when, by to get

that she wishes

stammering

out of the brothel,

she reminds

him of all that has taken place. And here he breaks into a famous tirade, in which he tells her the bitter truth about their relation: "To

avenge

wounded

my

on someone,

pride

I vented my spite on you and I laughed at you. so I too wanted

miliated, cal

inversion you for . . . Nor

give

of his egoist's the tears which shall

ago to you!"

at this point,

But

to humiliate

underground man.

I ever

own

to get my

someone."

back,

I had been hu With

the typi never for

"I shall logic, he shouts: I was shedding before you a minute am I for what you confessing forgive

a strange

thing

occurs?strange

Instead of flaring up herself

to the

at least

and hitting

man to? is accustomed the underground back?the only response She throws and suffering. that he too is unhappy realizes Lisa

into his arms to console him, and they both break into

herself not

the character

but given

tears;

respond

to any selflessly . . . occurred "It

the underground man, who a cannot moment such feelings, of

can last

as I to me just then, overwrought long. that she was the changed, was, that our parts were now completely same crushed and humiliated was the I heroine now, while exactly four days before." to me that night as she had appeared creature very

And love

not out of love but out of hate, to her on the spot to revenge

into her Lisa

hand;

manages

makes

having to make his revenge more, note he slips a five-rouble her further, broken but though by this encounter, completely on the table unnoticed before to fling the money

to try to console and humiliate complete

dared

man the underground on her for himself

him.

Even

leaving. All revealed

man of the underground depravity so much scene?or in this climactic perhaps not

the moral

is starkly depravity

FRANK

JOSEPH as moral

impotence. the novella,

through

this

putting the five-rouble

awareness

snow-filled

silent,

For

he

retains

31 his moral

awareness

all

his egoism prevents him from ever although into practice. Even when he finds here, he distractedly rushes out after Lisa in the

note, street

to ask her

But

forgiveness.

then,

pull

ing himself up short, he realizes the futility of all his agitation. For he understands very well that "I could not possibly have loved

anyone

I repeat,

because,

to me

love meant

to tyrannize

and

be morally

superior." as he turns slowly he home, rationalization of all for his conduct. And

conceives

the most

diabolic

it not be better, [he thinks] suppressing the living pain

Will

. . . that she should now carry that insult [his] heart an with her for is What insult but a sort of puri ever? away It most is the and painful form of con fication? corrosive . . . The of that humiliation sciousness! will raise memory her and purify her by hatred, also by for and, well, perhaps . . . . . . which is better: giveness And, really cheap hap in

piness or exalted suffering? Well,

With

which is better?

this final stabbing irony, Dostoevsky man

allows his under

to use

the very idea of purification ground through suffering as a rationalization for his viciousness. In so doing, he returns to the main theme of the first part and a places it in new light. "Con sciousness"

and

were seen to be values when the "suffering" out of a need to preserve his human man, underground identity, to suffer himself wished rather than to rationalize as his conduct an effect main

of

the

a function

laws

of nature. of egoism,

But there

so long is always

as these

values

re

the possibility that only be devilishly cause to others to they will interpreted primarily a as we of their suffer souls. And here, way purifying might add, an has on but inadvertent Dostoevsky provided prophetic parody an all those critics who have so often accused him of advocating indiscriminate

"salvation

through

suffering."

NOTES

32

FROM

Conclusion

VIII. the second part the underground For one moment

As end, tion. his

racking

of Notes

to an

man

isola

comes from Underground to returns his frustrated again

he had Lisa's

dialectic.

the

sacrifice?is

When

centricity.

short,

a

caught

glimpse

complete disregard identification with

her whole-souled

miliation, man's torments?in

UNDERGROUND

of the way out of of her own hu

the underground selfless love and self

her

for capacity to break the sorcerer's

only way she rushes

into

the arms

of

of

ego the underground spell

man, not thinking of herself but only of his suffering, she is at the same

that "something else" which his egoism illustrating him to attain. This "something else" is the ideal of the voluntary out of love. self-sacrifice of the personality In man his encounter with Lisa, the underground has met this ideal

will

time

never

allow

in the flesh; and his failure to respond to its appeal dooms him for

irrevocably

the

Nonetheless, we whole, cultivation

future.

if we

see

look at Notes

as a

from Underground

its with of the Forties, egoism on noblesse and its of of spiritual emphasis a not have individual moral does consciousness, merely negative was It because of such "old and irrational habits" value. precisely that

the

idealistic

a sense

of his generation

that,

as we

out against the Nihilism tween

the Forties

sky's work.

the underground

noted,

man

held

of the Sixties; and this is the relation be

and Sixties

Egocentric

to prevail in Dostoev have been, the sentimental

that continues it may

though

idealism of the Forties still stressed the importance of free-will and preserved Such a sense ever;

and

a sense

of

the

inner

is the presupposition this s the basis on which

of the personality. autonomy for any human world what

Dostoevsky But so long as such egoism remains self-centered, a moral see in part as we more is act; required, man to achieve moral self-definition. ground relation Devils,

where

the

"egoism." it is not by itself two, for the under Exactly

was later portrayed two generations sentimental idealism of the old liberal

the

between

defends

the

same

in The Stepan

JOSEPH

FRANK

33

Trofimovitch Verkhovensky is far superior morally to the utilitar ian ruthlessness of Peter Verkhovensky; but Stepan Trofimovitch is himself morally impotent, and, like the underground man in part two, rhetorically longs for some contact with "reality." As a coda to the entire work, Dostoevsky offers some remarks

inwhich both ideologies of the radical intelligentsia are rejected; and

in which

that

echoes

we

the same plea to return to the Russian For these articles. in Dostoevsky's ideologies hear

the natural,

disoriented

instinctive,

spontaneous,

spiritual

"soil" have

reactions

intelligentsia to the point where, without such foreign ideas, they are totally helpless; but so long as they cling

of the Russian to

such

crutches, they us alone without

can never

to walk

learn

by

themselves.

man the underground any books," writes in a lose ourselves "and we shall at once get confused, caustically, on to we to not hold know what shall to, maze, cling to, what to de to respect to hate, what and what to love and what what "Leave

spise. We even find it hard to be men, men of real flesh and blood, our own flesh and blood." And to the reply that the underground

man

is only

speaking

for

himself,

Dostoevsky

re

affirms the "typicality" he had stressed in the opening footnote, at the same

the technique of satirical exaggera time defining "For my part," that he had used. caricature tion and parodistic to ex carried "I have remarks the underground man, merely

while

in my life what you have not dared to carry even half-way, for common in your cowardice you have mistaken and, addition, sense and have comfort in that, deceiving found yourselves." more seems to the interpre could it confirm me, Nothing, amply tremes

tation

of Notes

from

Underground

offered

in these

pages.