Compare And Contrast The Underground Man By Dostoevsky

320 Words1 Page
bulb-icon

Recommended: Knowledge vs ignorance

Dostoevsky’s narrator points out that while the “direct” people have certain, desirable qualities, they lack the advantages that accompany one with a conscious mind. The direct person, what the Underground Man refers to as, “the real normal man,” can act on instinct and perform an act of revenge or some other action without contemplating the implications. As such, the “direct” person is stupid according to the Underground man. However, he states there is beauty in this stupidity. A sort of, “ignorance is bliss.” The Underground Man then contrasts the direct person to its antithesis. This antithetical individual is like the Underground Man. This person is completely incapable of performing an act of revenge or any other kind of action

Show More
Related

  • Fyodor Dostoevsky's Crime And Punishment

    1920 Words  | 4 Pages

    As Rodya analyzes Luzhin’s character, he realizes that intellect unrestrained by moral purpose is dangerous due to the fact that many shrewd people can look right through that false façade. Luzhin’s false façade of intellect does not fool Rodya or Razumikhin, and although they try to convince Dunya into not marrying Luzhin, she does not listen. Rodya believes that Luzhin’s “moral purpose” is to “marry an honest girl…who has experienced hardship” (36). The only way he is able to get Dunya to agree to marry him, is by acting as if he is a very intellectual person, who is actually not as educated as he says he is. This illustrates the fact that Rodya knows that it is really dangerous because he knows that people can ruin their lives by acting to be someone they are not. Rodya also knows that people will isolate themselves from others just so that no one will find out their true personality. This is illustrated in through the fact that Luzhin tries to avoid Dunya and her mother as much as possible. The way he writes his letter, exemplifies his isolation, for Luzhin does not know how to interact with society. He has no idea how to write letters to his fiancée and his future mother in law. This reflects on Rodya’s second dream because he is unable to get Dunya married off to a nice person. He feels isolated from everyone else because his intellect caused him to sense that Luzhin is not telling the truth about his personality. However, it was due to his lack of moral purpose that Rodya berates his sister’s fiancé. He is unable to control himself, and due to his immoral act of getting drunk, Rodya loses all judgment and therefore goes and belittles Luzhin. Although Rodya’s intellectual mind had taken over and showed him that Luzhin wa...

    Read More

  • A Comparison Of Abraham In Fear And Trembling

    1155 Words  | 3 Pages

    Like Abraham, the underground man’s “most profitable profit” (Ibid.) acts as a suspension of the moral, and as a rejection of determinist philosophies. Ostensibly, the underground man’s refusal to be “nothing but a sort of piano key” (Dostoevsky 19) seems incompatible with Di Silenctio’s portrayal of Abraham, but this is not the case. The underground man and Abraham share an identical belief in the absurd nature of human behavior and both reject the universal ethics of

    Read More

  • The Man Who Lived Underground ( Summary/Response)

    675 Words  | 2 Pages

    Why did the black race have thoughts of their lives as a white person? Racial discrimination was very popular before and after the slave trade was issued, In Richard Wright's short story “ The Man Who Lived Underground” the main character's search for an identity involves his struggle for meaning in this judgmental world. The story concerns Fred Daniels, an African American accused of killing a white woman named Mrs. Peabody . As he attempts to make a new life in the sewers, he examines his assumptions about guilt and innocence and comes to believe that people are inherently guilty and isolated from one another. This short story was deeply discussed along with other authors and critics who included their thought's on how the story was contradicted. These critics acknowledge only the controversy themes , but Wright however frequently dealt with practical and universal themes that were disregarded throughout, based on the topics written in these essay's.

    Read More

  • Why Is There Evil Dostoevsky

    239 Words  | 1 Pages

    Furthermore, Dostoevsky makes a distinction between the suffering of adults, who are knowledgeable and understand the nature of the world, to the suffering of children, who have not yet learned the nature of the world and suffering. Dostoevsky is fundamentally asking, What incentive does an all-powerful

    Read More

  • Fyodor Dostoevsky's Crime And Punishment

    1732 Words  | 4 Pages

    As the story unfolds, Dostoevsky introduces the reader to Raskolnikov, a troubled young man who is extremely isolated from those who surround him. He lives in a small, dingy, dusty, and dirty room in a small unattractive house. He lives in an abstract world neglecting the real. He is quite separate from all the people with whom he has contact. In the opening chapter, Raskolnikov is said to be, "so completely absorbed in himself, and isolated from his fellows that he dreaded meeting, not only his landlady, but any one at all" (1). People come physically close to him, but everyone is forced to remain distant mentally. He walks through the crowded, noisy, dirty streets of St. Petersburg physically but somehow he never does so mentally, moving through the streets like a zombie, not a man. He is not aware of his location and often jostles bewildered pedestrians. Therefore, at the outset of the novel Dostoevsky illustrates the apparent schism between the mind and body of Raskolnikov.

    Read More

  • Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment

    1270 Words  | 3 Pages

    In Crime and Punishment, Dostoevsky gives the reader an inside look to the value system that he holds for himself, as well as the type of characteristics that he abhors in people as well as the characteristics that he admires in people. He uses characters in the novel to express his beliefs of what a person should be like in life to be a “good'; person. Specifically he uses Raskolnokv to show both good and bad characteristics that he likes in people. Also he uses Svidriglaiov and Luzin to demonstrate the characteristics that people should shun and his personal dislikes in people.

    Read More

  • Fyodor Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment

    2299 Words  | 5 Pages

    Fyodor Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment begins with Rodion Romanovich Raskolnikov living in poverty and isolation in St. Petersburg. The reader soon learns that he was, until somewhat recently, a successful student at the local university. His character at that point was not uncommon. However, the environment of the grim and individualistic city eventually encourages Raskolnikov’s undeveloped detachment and sense of superiority to its current state of desperation. This state is worsening when Raskolnikov visits an old pawnbroker to sell a watch. During the visit, the reader slowly realizes that Raskolnikov plans to murder the woman with his superiority as a justification. After the Raskolnikov commits the murder, the novel deeply explores his psychology, yet it also touches on countless other topics including nihilism, the idea of a “superman,” and the value of human life. In this way, the greatness of Crime and Punishment comes not just from its examination of the main topic of the psychology of isolation and murder, but the variety topics which naturally arise in the discussion.

    Read More

  • Analysis of Dostoevsky and Nietzsche's Literature

    5388 Words  | 11 Pages

    Friedrich Nietzsche once said, “Dostoevsky, the only one who has taught me anything about psychology.” The two writers share many similarities and differences. Dostoevsky clearly had an effect on the thinking of Nietzsche. The two would be considered both philosophers and psychologists. Both writers became prominent in the late 19th century in Germany and Russia respectively. Dostoevsky was noted for his Russian literary classics and would be responsible for a flowering of late 19th century Russian literary culture. His Russian contemporaries include Leo Tostoy and Anton Chekov. Dostoevsky’s most famous works include The Brothers Karamozov, The Idiot, and Crime and Punishment. Nietzsche is most famous for his philosophical works such as thus spoke Zarathustra. The two writers have many similarities in their philosophy. They both see a changing role in religion. Nietzsche and Dostoevsky also differ sharply on some other aspects of life. One of these being the differing views on the role of the fatherland. Nietzsche’s beyond good and evil and Dostoevsky’s crime and punishment are two works that can be compared and contrasted to show the similarities and dissimilarities of the two geniuses. The two men offer great insights in these books on morality and the affect it can have on the actions of the individual and the society as a whole.

    Read More

  • Dostoyevsky's Notes From the Underground and Martin Scorcese's Taxi Driver

    1562 Words  | 4 Pages

    He constantly attempts to seek out revenge, but the concept of revenge, paired with the underground character’s actions and inertia, becomes problematic with the underground ideal. The underground character is steeped in contradiction, and how one interprets his actions, or his inactions, is what ultimately determines whether the he is, truly, an underground man. Notes from the Underground and Taxi Driver both depict a protagonist, the underground character, who scoffs and scorns at those aboveground, termed the “normal man” (PDF 15). Notes describes the normal man as someone with “normal interests,” who “act[s] in accordance with the laws of reason and truth” (). Notes were written at the time of the Enlightenment, and used to criticize the then-popular theory of material determinism: that “all choice and reasoning can be.calculated” by science, and if this is applied to human behavior, it is possible that “there will some day be discovered the laws of our so-called free will” (PDF 42)....

    Read More

  • Dostoyevsky ‘Notes from Underground’ Critique

    1600 Words  | 4 Pages

    ..., his physical inertia thwarts his aggressive desires and he has compulsive talk of himself but has no firm discussion (Frank 50). Moreover, the underground man is full of contempt for readers but is desperate that the reader understands, he reads very widely but writes shallowly, he depicts the social thinkers as superficial and he desires to collide with reality but has no ability to do this. Therefore the underground man is completely emotional, babbly with no real form.

    Read More

  • What Is Social Determinism In The Note From Underground?

    836 Words  | 2 Pages

    The underground man is the product of the social determinism due to all the personal experiences that he had throughout his life with the society. He is a person who always wanted act in a different way but he stops himself and act as how the society wants him

    Read More

  • Freedom in Dostoevsky's Notes from Underground

    1805 Words  | 4 Pages

    Dostoevsky, Fyodor. Notes from Underground: A New Translation, Backgrounds and Sources, Responses, Criticism. Norton Critical Edition. New York: Norton, 1989.

    Read More

  • Underground Man Inertia

    414 Words  | 1 Pages

    Chapter V – “Oh, gentlemen, perhaps I really regard myself as an intelligent man only because throughout my entire life I’ve never been able to start or finish anything.” Just prior to this point in the novel, he has asserted that his intelligence is the cause of his inertia; now he suggests that his inertia is evidence of his intelligence. This reversal demonstrates the Underground Man’s belief that intelligence, or consciousness, must cause inertia and indecision in the modern era. According to the Underground Man, a man must be completely confident that he is doing the right thing before he can take action. He needs a “primary” cause, something solid by which he can justify what he does. A stupid man can imagine that he has found a primary

    Read More

  • Comparing Crime and Punishment and Notes from the Underground

    490 Words  | 1 Pages

    Dostoyevsky's characters are very similar, as is his stories.  He puts a strong stress on the estrangement and isolation his characters feel. His characters are both brilliant and "sick" as mentioned in each novel, poisoned by their intelligence.  In Notes from the Underground, the character, who is never given a name, writes his journal from solitude. He is spoiled by his intelligence, giving him a fierce conceit with which he lashes out at the world and justifies the malicious things he does.  At the same time, though, he speaks of the doubt he feels at the value of human thought and purpose and later, of human life.  He believes that intelligence, to be constantly questioning and "faithless(ly) drifting" between ideas, is a curse.  To be damned to see everything, clearly as a window (and that includes things that aren't meant to be seen, such as the corruption in the world) or constantly seeking the meaning of things elusive. Dostoyevsky thought that humans are evil, destructive and irrational.

    Read More

  • Character Development in Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky

    1278 Words  | 3 Pages

    In his novel Crime and Punishment Fyodor Dostoevsky uses Raskolnikov as a vessel for several different philosophies that were particularly prominent at the time in order to obliquely express his opinions concerning those schools of thought. Raskolnikov begins his journey in Crime and Punishment with a nihilistic worldview and eventually transitions to a more optimistic one strongly resembling Christian existentialism, the philosophy Dostoevsky preferred, although it could be argued that it is not a complete conversion. Nonetheless, by the end of his journey Raskolnikov has undergone a fundamental shift in character. This transformation is due in large part to the influence other characters have on him, particularly Sonia. Raskolnikov’s relationship with Sonia plays a significant role in furthering his character development and shaping the philosophical themes of the novel.

    Read More

More about Compare And Contrast The Underground Man By Dostoevsky

Open Document