Talk:Notes from Underground/Archive 1

Beatles song
I removed the sentence referring to a Beatles song "describing the protagonist of the novel" pending the unveiling of the name of the song. --TM (talk) 03:45, 11 November 2005 (UTC)

Changes
I should just start fixing it, but first I thought I'd start a discussion and make some notes... on Notes.

For instance, The Underground Man does not disagree with the notion that 2 and 2 are four. He believes that 2 and 2 are 4 is very important but that 2 and 2 are 5 is also very charming.


 * He doesn't disagree with the notion, but when I read it, it seemed that he didn't think it was possible to attain the 2 and 2 equals four society, and even if we did it would not last long before someone asserted their existence in a spiteful way. --КровиссерTalk 18:30, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

The book is poking fun at the utopian socialists of his time. Dostoevsky particularly picks on Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Nicholai Chernishevsky. "What Is To Be Done?" was written by Chernishevsky while in jail and is practically unreadable.

The Underground Man refutes the accusation that man naturally does what is best and uses logic. He bases this on human history.

He is not incapable of action. He romanticizes the idea because he is very capable but knows that action will result in reprecussions. His spite is the spite in all people. His anger and hatred is that which we all carry.

In the end he refuses to be a tyrant by his own will, th eone thing man does have and the thing that destroys us. He can not love because love is an act of tyrany. It all comes from his dissillusionment with the utopian socialists.

All men are tyrants is the final message.:I read it as that man is irrational, and can never attain the goals that society promises. Perhaps really that is the same as "all men are tyrants". --КровиссерTalk 18:30, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

--jenlight 11:18, May 7, 2005 (UTC)

& What is to be done?
Should include some mention / analysis of parallels to What is to be done?- Notes from Underground is strongly influenced by that work —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Brain (talk • contribs).

Just wanted to let ya'll know, I speak Russian and the literal translation of this book is "Notes from the dead house" —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 69.118.13.132 (talk • contribs).

The literal translation of the title of this book is not "Notes from the Dead House". The Russian title is "Записки из подполья" is literally Notes from "a place under the floor or field". —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 72.79.65.129 (talk • contribs).


 * That seems more like it, I even read a critique that said "Notes from a mousehole" or something of the sort was even more proper. --КровиссерTalk 18:30, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

Chronology of the parts of the book
The way the article reads, it seems like the second part of the book comes chronologically after the first, when it is really the other way around. That is, the beginning ranting and raving occurs after the stories, with Zherkov and Liza and such. It is those stories that drive him in his "hole", where he writes himself and then the stories. Oy, I think I have made this rather more complicated than it really is. --КровиссерTalk 18:39, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

Plot Summary
I would just like to bring to attention the lack of links to other entries in the plot summary. I rarely see a section so sparse, but I like the asthetic ease in reading. Does Wikipedia have a rule/suggestion on what we should do? I think it looks good now, but I know that linking to other entries is encouraged. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 71.236.227.103 (talk) 00:10, 19 January 2007 (UTC).

Gender of servant
What is the gender of Apollon, the narrators servant?

In the beginning of the book, his servant is described as an "old country-woman". However, when the narrator talkes about sending money back to Simonov after the dinner party, for instance, Apollon is described as a "he": "[...]and asked Apollon to take it to Simonov. When he learned that there was money in the letter [...]".

Am I missing something here? Has D. mixed up the gender of the narrators servant on purpose?
 * The first section of the book is set years after the second section. Apollon, the narrator's servant at the age of 24, is male.  Seven years later, the narrator finally dismisses him, and replaces him eventually with the old woman mentioned in part I.  --Clay Collier (talk) 06:51, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

Officer Obsession - A problem
Problem in "Part Two" There is mention with the obsession with the taking of revenge with the Officer by walking down the street and having to move around him. In fact what the "Underground Man" does is CLose His Eyes while walking toward the Officer and the officer does not not notice but he had moved aside for the Underground Man. Thus symbolizing the lack of awareness(consciousness) by the closing of the eyes, as reason for the ability hold steady in his path.

If you a bumping taking place - which you have described - please let me know of the translation.

jisaacflores@hotmail.com —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.160.41.5 (talk) 15:48, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Page 2

 * He recalls this moment as making him unhappy whenever he thinks of it, yet again proving the fact from the first section that his spite for society and his inability to act like it makes him unable to act better than it.

Oh god no. Someone should re-write this line. I would if I could understand what it means. Oddity- (talk) 11:02, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Well what is to be done?
I agree the plot summary needs to be further simplified (after all it is extremely simple to tell it), and the analysis (or interpretation or whatever) moved out to at least two sections corresponding to Part I focused on the limits of rationalism, and Part II on the existential problem.

I do not feel the proper weight is given in this article to the encounters with Liza. Underground Man accidentally made himself fall in love with Liza, on the spur of the moment, thinking he was playing a game, while describing the evils of prostitution as well as the joys of respectable family life. That quasi-love, which Liza unsuccessfully tried to return to him on her visit to his apartment, then haunted him the rest of his life, producing the obvious bitterness of the first part. These plot elements underline that Dostoevsky is strongly contrasting the protagonist's ability to think with his inability to act, which sets up the existential dilemma.

But much more, the character of Liza heads a string of female characters who in some way prostitute and then reclaim themselves, or are reclaimed, or not, in various ways, in successive Dostoevsky novels: the shepherdess Maria in The Idiot, also Nastasia, Sonia in Crime and Punishment, Lizaveta in Brothers Karamazov, and Grushenka, and perhaps Katerina. Liza is one of these "fallen women" which Dostoevsky uses repeatedly to illustrate the strong sexual aspect of existence for both genders, who must decide deep existential truths about life in exactly such moments of tenderness and despair as Liza and the Underground Man share in her bed in the brothel. Can we suggest this?

KTyson (talk) 00:34, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
 * ?? I think you can over analogize and analyze. At some point the article will then approach the length of the novel. As there is no mention of "the swallows" by Saltykov-Shchedrin, this is but yet another deficiency of the article. But then Dostoevsky's response to him would make it clear Saltykov-Shchedrin was out of his league.

LoveMonkey (talk) 01:17, 19 August 2008 (UTC)


 * OK. But citing an obscure (pardon me) literary dispute hardly seems clarifying to me, while addressing Dostoevsky's framing of his female protagonists in general, beginning with Notes, does.  I do not believe the critics adequately understand Dostoevskian sexual undercurrents, and their connection to spirituality.George Steiner for instance, attributes them to the overly florid Gothic novel of the period.  If Steiner misses the point (or do critics like Steiner, or you LoveMonkey, serve to define the point?) then the rest of us have little hope.


 * Please explain what Underground Man is doing to himself and Liza here: "Do you like little children, Liza? I'm terribly fond of them. You know - a little rosy boy suckling at your breast, and any husband's heart will turn towards his wife, seeing her sitting with his child!"  Of course, he's playing with her emotions, but then adds narratively, to himself, "'Little pictures, little pictures like that, that's what's wanted for you!' I thought to myself..."  They have just finished copulating for money in a brothel, for heaven's sake!  Our inability, as rational men, to reconcile these human actions, one real and one ideal, is the crux of his existential argument.  One must act to do so.  Underground Man is not better off by not acting, by not becoming a tyrant, as some (Krovisser|Кровиссер above) would have it, but infinitely less well, less human.  If we can't simply say this, succinctly, and specifically about sex, which Dostoevsky literally drubs into his reader, without being guilty of over-analyzing, why bother reading it? KTyson (talk) 14:52, 25 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Ahhhh Lots of words, lots and lots of words. The point being the article should be as tight and short as possible since it (the article) is not the novella and is just an encyclopedia article. Very simple. Let the readers read it for themselves and draw their own conclusions. Since the article is after all about Dostoevsky's short story and not me or you. the Swallows is a very big thing by the way. Since it clearer shows Dostoevskys anti-socialist side and his rejection of the left wing press at his time and the rather hateful way they attacked him on this novel. But does that all need to be added to the article. No.
 * Too much over analysing will remove the reader from the actual work itself.

LoveMonkey (talk) 13:27, 26 August 2008 (UTC)

Coming to this page with no knowledge of the work, I am immediately plunged into

"War is described as people's rebellion against the assumption that everything needs to happen for a purpose, because humans do things without purpose, and this is what determines human history. Secondly, the narrator's desire for pain and paranoia is exemplified by his liver pain and toothache. This parallels Raskolnikov's behavior in Dostoevsky's later novel, Crime and Punishment."

What does this remark about war have to do with a description of the work? Or is the point of this section just to give an itemized, ordered list of the contents? "Secondly," what? What's firstly? Why bring Dostoevsky into it before the reader has any sense of what Part I is about? I can only imagine that this is the result of an incremental series of changes to something that once made a lot more sense. And nobody notices how incoherent it is now because they've read the novel and have prior understanding of all that is being vaguely referred to.

To all experts on this book--- help! Reread the entry as it is at this very moment. It doesn't hold up as a coherent whole to people who don't already know the book. Micro-managing the thematic details should be secondary to this real problem with a reference on what I understand is a very important book. 128.255.45.77 (talk) 21:40, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

To be sure, it is a cryptic and complex novel. Relating the meaning of the novel in a few sentences to a layman would be exceedingly difficult. --larz (talk) 07:04, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Five rubles?
It doesn't mention the fact that he had sex with Liza before giving her the five rubles. This seems like an important thing to include, in light of his reflections of love & dominance within the same chapter. 76.179.65.253 (talk) 00:58, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

The novel doesn't explicitly state that he had intercourse with her--it is merely implied. Likewise, it is implied in the plot summary. --larz (talk) 07:05, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

different extant english translations; a listing

 * Constance Garnett (1918)
 * Andrew R. MacAndrew (1961)
 * Serge Shishkoff (1969 or before) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Boombaard (talk • contribs) 12:29, 5 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Jesse Coulson (1972)
 * Mirra Ginsburg (1974)
 * Michael R. Katz (1989)
 * Richard Pevear & Larissa Volokhonsky (1993)
 * Jane Kentish (1991)
 * Ronald Wilks (2006)
 * Boris Jakim (2009) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Samboha (talk • contribs) 15:23, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

I don't know if this is of any use to include in the article, but it at least seems that it can stay on the talk page (as it doesn't violate any rules i'm aware of and is fairly pertinent to the eng-language wiki page on Notes) boombaard (talk) 21:27, 3 August 2009 (UTC)
 * I would think that a list of translations would be useful to include, since this is an English site about the page, and translation is not insignificant to how the work is interpreted by English readers. I wasn't certain if other works included lists of translators, so i looked at the Iliad, and it includes a section on English translations, but not a list. Could do both? or either, I would think... It would need the full citation for each translation.AnieHall (talk) 20:59, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

Plot Summary
The plot summary is way too full of interpretations and literay cricitisms. That should be sieved out and in another section or altogether deleted. As it stands now the plot summary is almost unreadable. JesseRafe 22:15, 8 April 2007 (UTC) The plot summary also glosses over the fact that the Underground Man basically rapes Liza, he doesn't just 'act terribly towards her and then throw 5 roubles at her' they "embrace" (Part 2 chapter IX)and before they do so he has a feeling of "mastery and possession" and then it cuts to a half an hour later where she's sobbing in a corner, THEN he throws the money at her. Big frickin'clue that it was more than just the rant he had (which she saw right through...) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Letitbeginger (talk • contribs) 23:04, 28 January 2015 (UTC)