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Summary: More with the Mad Genius.........
Review: Quick read? I finished Crime and Punishment and thought I'd zip through Notes like a snack before going on to the Brothers Karamozov, afterall, it's barely over 100 pages. Quick read? Think again.Imagine being locked in a very small room with a verbose, insane, brilliant, jaded, before-his-times, clerk-come-philosopher....with a wicked sense of humor, and a toothache that's lasted a month. Pleasant company....are you searching for the door yet? For the first hour, he's going to rant about his philosophy of revenge, the pointlessness of his life, his superiority, his failure, oh yeah, and his tooth. FOr the second half of the book, he's going to tell you a tale, with the title "Apropos of the Wet Snow". Because of course, there's wet snow outside on the ground. I will leave you with this encouragement. If you can get through this book, you will appreciate Doestoevsky more, understand Crime and Punishment better, and probably enjoy a good laugh more than once. Notes from the Underground is not light reading, but it is well worth the effort. And the translation by Pevear, including the translators notes at the back, is excellent.
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Summary: A Celebration of Freedom and the Irrational.
Review: This short novel has relevance for any individual who chooses to grapple with the onslaught of information that pours forth from various institutions, including modern education and the media. I had read ~Notes from the Underground~ many years ago, and picking it up again proved to be a positive move, philosophically, politically and socially, on a very personal level. The narrator is a 19th century man who has chosen to withdraw from society and rant and rave in a kind of 'neurotic' protest against the ever-prevalent 'rational forces' or normalizing conditions that society is imposing. In brief, his protest is against the popular philosophical view of the time, deterministic materialism. He asks: Is man a free agent? Are his actions and desires his own; or conversely, is he endowed with some Universal nature, where his interests, desires and overall behaviour is predetermined? In his terms, are we "Piano keys", or merely "Organ stops" responding blindly to the 'rational forces' that continually bombard us on a daily basis? This book is an argument supporting the view that irrationality has its merits. We are in danger of ignoring our own desires in favour of a popular or dominate view. What the underground man is proposing is to be aware of the danger of buying into the proposition that there is a collective 'common good', that all people are essentially the same and desire the same things. He goes on to warn that if the men of 'science' are correct, if our desires and interests are the same, if our behaviour can be recorded on some central data base, where all we have to do to understand how we should behave is by logging onto this data base, what hope does humankind have of experiencing individual needs, creativity, adventure and innovation? According to the underground man, absolutely no hope at all. The American philosopher, William James, had grappled with the same argument around the same time that this novel was written. He recorded in his diary that his first act of free will was to believe he had free will, and began his new life on that simple but important premise. Freedom for William James and the underground man is the highest most valuable aspect of our existence. The underground man believed that it was absolutely imperative that we at times go against our 'best interests' even if our free will is an illusion. When considering the barrage of information that continually comes our way, we should attempt to separate the 'wheat from the chaff' according to our desires, beliefs and will - a word of advice from a 19th century 'neurotic'. It is impossible to illustrate the many facets of this important novel in the limited space provided. Therefore I urge you to open ~Notes from the Underground~ and submerge yourself into the ideas and arguments it proposes we consider.
Rating: 
Summary: A Soiled Diaper Is Life
Review: Fyodor Dostoevsky's Notes From Underground (1864) is predominantly a childish, intellectually dishonest, and edgeless tirade against life, living, and mankind. As such, it is entirely ineffective, and pales in comparison to genuinely gripping nihilistic works like Lautreamont's Maldoror (published only four years later in 1868), Louis-Ferdinand Celine's Journey To The End of The Night (1932), or any of Jean Genet's five classic novels (the first, Our Lady of the Flowers, was published in 1943). Today's readers may recognize that Notes From Underground might have more accurately been titled Victimology 101, since its anti - hero protagonist, who has willingly dropped out of society at the age of forty, seems to exist in a psychic state of what Carl Jung called "prehistoric kindergarten." The narrator builds a series of small, circular, and repetitive arguments over the novel's 29 initial pages, then gleefully deconstructs one after the other, mocking the reader along the way for ostensibly following his previous lines of anti - reason. Dostoevsky may have been attempting to make a larger point about a particular kind of aggrieved personality, but if so, the author, in conjunction with his narrator, fails entirely to say anything illuminating. That Dostoevsky's "underground man" ("I'm no longer the hero I wanted to pass for earlier, but simply a nasty little man, a rogue") is bitter goes without saying; he is also cowardly, immature, self - destructive, unobjective, irresponsible, bullying, and almost wholly defined by his petty envy and "everlasting spite" for the rest of mankind. The speaker continually states that he is "clever" and "cleverer" than everyone else; he repeatedly encourages whatever audience he has to laugh at him, since he takes such a reaction for granted as automatic. But there is nothing clever, acute, abrasive, or piercing about his diatribes, and his tepid experiences, as outlined in Part II, "Apropos Of Wet Snow," fail to vindicate his philosophical platform or the outcast position he has chosen for himself. Unsurprisingly, what sinks Notes From Underground is that its perceptions, debates, and critiques are absolutely without teeth. Is it accurate to summarize civilization as an engine that "merely promotes a wider range of sensations in man...and absolutely nothing else"? Are "all spontaneous men and men of action" active "precisely because they're so stupid and limited"? Do such men "mistake immediate and secondary causes for primary ones"? Are brave men and intelligent men mutually exclusive groups? It is a fact that "an intelligent man cannot seriously becoming anything" and that "only a fool can become something"? Do "normal and fundamental laws" inevitably leave mankind "unable to do anything at all"? Is personal integrity merely a hollow charade played for the benefit of others? Arguments like these may leave readers believing the narrator more than deserves his self - induced fate and that any society would be better off without him. Unfortunately, generations of lax, narcissistic personalities seeking some kind of self - justification have taken Notes From Underground as a blueprint and sacred text. But authentic defiance necessitates exactly the sort of conviction, fortitude, insight, diligence, and sense of the relative that are squarely beyond the limitations of Dostoevsky's text. Squabblers like 'the underground man' have always existed and probably always will. It's a waste that Dostoevsky made the effort to give voice to such a character, but little of appreciable merit to say.
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Summary: Notes from Underground
Review: Fyodor Dostoevsky's "Notes from Underground" is an existential classic. This book, like many of Dostoevsky's works, intertwines the notions of literature and philosophy, probing the depths of aesthetic contemplation through philosophy. Dostoevsky, used this manuscript as a testing or training ground for later ideas he would explore in his groundbreaking and notorious books such as "Crime and Punishment,""Brothers Karamazov," and "the Idiot." Also central to the theme of the writing one will enciounter many notions of autonomy, or freedom of the individual. The main character, "the Underground man," performs many absurd actions, often in spite of his own self. However, this deals with the notion as Sartre later expressed, is it better for the individual to choose for him or herself and be wrongs sometimes or once in a while, then to have others choose for oneself? The protagonist, is continuously struggling, with himself and the existential burden of constructing and being soley responsible for ones own existence, for owns own counciousness. "Notes from Underground" is a magnificent, psychological exploration, into the mind of the individual, free, autonomous and choosing completley for oneself, which is anything but an easy matter.
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Summary: logically fogged mind
Review: Notes from the underground is a wonderful book that helps expand the mind into things one might never have challenged before. I would recommend this book to anyone that enjoys overanalysing ideas to the point that it hurts. If you do plan on reading this book, I recommend you read just a few pages a day so as to keep yourself fresh and not overloaded with stuff. All in all i htink it is a genious book, hilarious at parts as well, and it deserves a salute from me!
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Summary: A study of human consciousness
Review: "So long live the underground. I already carried the underground in my soul." This best epitomizes Dostoyevsky's Notes from Underground. The book is not easy to read let alone to digest. Dostoyevsky again placed some of his favorite arguments in the moth of a character (the 40-year-old underground man) he despised. The underground man self-proclaims to be angry and sick at the very beginning and goes out of his way to offend his readers. The book reads like a delirious man's babbling, in his own shy, wounded, and exorbitant pride. While a novel usually needs a hero, but here Dostoyevsky had purposely collected all the features of an anti-hero: self-contempt, wounded vanity, conceit, and sensitive ego. Even though the underground man might be extremely egotistical and has no respect for others, Dostoyevsky never meant for him to have any surface appeal. The recurring themes of the narrative revolve around the underground man's alienation from society, which he despises, his bitter sarcasm, and the heightened awareness of self-consciousness. He larks to revenge himself for his humiliation by humiliating others. I don't think Dostoyevsky meant for the underground man to be liked and pitied by the readers. In fact, our anti-hero is inevitably targeted for Dostoyevsky's harsh satire. The first part of the book (titled The Underground) introduces the anonymous underground man and his outlook on life. The second part (titled A Story of the Falling Sleet) sees how the man with heightened senses of ego and awareness submerges voluptuously into his underground, motivated by many contradictory impulses. Dostoyevsky paints not only a complex portrait of an anonymous personage who lacks surface appeal, but also a society in which people are so unaccustomed to living and the manners of which that they feel a loathing for real life. Notes from Underground is an egocentric man's monologue that is abound with fascinating nuance which reveals itself only upon close reading. 2004 (5)
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Summary: Trapped in Subjectivity and Sensitivity
Review: Dostoyevsky is what he calls himself "a sick man, a mean man, there is nothing attractive about me . . I am horribly sensitive." pp.1, 95 In his story he is incredibly subjective, sensitive and becomes insulted over miniscule and slight actions of others, all interpreted in his mind in major proportion, the molehills become mountains, all in Dostoyevsky's mind. In his raised elevation of desire over reason, he appears to let his interior desires overlay his reasons, thus distorting them into hyper sensitivity. "I put desire over reason." His desires apparently distort his reason, in that he looses all self-confidence and objectivity.
"It seems to me that the meaning of man's life consists in proving to himself every minute that he's a man and not a piano key." p.115 And so it is, Dostoyevsky is constantly trying to prove to himself in that he is not a piano key, but importantly, and for this he is neither objective nor detached, he is continually becoming insulted by the slightest provocations of others, even though such remarks of others are completely unconscious and the result of their personal limitation. Unfortunately, for Dostoyevsky, he is not in the slightest sense "thick skinned," and it hurts him greatly. He is his own worst enemy, snowballing his thoughts into hypothetical scenarios that leave him emotionally distraught - all completely unnecessary - but this is Dostoyevsky. The only alternative for Dostoyevsky was to take refuge in his dreams. "I took refuge in the sublime and the beautiful - in my dreams, of course." p.136 His dreams are the only place where he cannot be insulted by others from his severe sensitivity and paranoia. And for this he could find no friends, as he became insulted at the slightest remark, even those rendered unintentional. "I did make a friend once, but I was already a tyrant at heart and wanted to be the absolute ruler of his mind. I wanted to instill in him contempt of all those around me; I demanded that he break with his world." p. 147 What a sad document of life. A man so sensitive, he became a "tyrant" to himself and to all those he attempted unsuccessfully to befriend. A deep thinker, dreamer and inside a man of great worth and wonder, but his own mind entrapped him in such negativity and despair. Unlike another dreamer, Marcel Proust, one of a positive nature, and by far the polar opposite to the legend of Faust, who was a man that lived in existential uncertainty with vigor, strength and the ability to transcend all subjectivity, Dostoyevsky was the Underground Man, who let his own mind destroy him. Note: Page numbers are from the Signet Classic paperback version that includes "White Nights," and other selections.
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Summary: The Man Who Doesn't Fit Into Society
Review: Our narrator is not so much disturbed as misplaced. In another dark, and somehow autobiographical, tale of Dostoyevsky, we get frightening look at our minds. Dostoyevsky leaves these pages naked with truth. It'll make you rethink almost everything you say, whether that be to yourself or to the persons around you, and it's horribly depression tone will give you chills even after you set the book down. Dostoeyevsky is the lord of dismal novels -- what could be more dismal than the mind? Some would argue the main character mad, but more than anything he just doesn't fit into society. The more you think about this novel, the more you'll see himself in you ... he exists in us all, that part of us that doesn't match up, that lurking in the corners, in "the underground," and the violent outrages we inexplicably have. Make a connection with reality, discover that terrifying aspect of your humanity, and read this book.
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Summary: Everything Dostoevksy writes is a Masterpiece!
Review: This is my third novel by Fydor Dostoevksy and I don't think I could rate it any less or more than the other two. All of his books seem to be landmarks in literature. All of them unique in thier own way. None of them can be overlooked. All of them are also way ahead of there time. And they are all not for the closed-minded 'logical' reader.
Notes From Underground is one of Dostoevsky's shorter works, it is very intriging so you will find that you finish it very quickly.
The first part of the novel offers little to no plot. It is basically just philosophical rambling from the first-person narrorator. Don't let the world, 'rambling' confuse you, this book is very serious and thought provoking.
In the second part of the novel we are introduced to some characters beside the narrorator and we see the reason for the rambling in the first part of the novel.
I think that most people who read Dostoevsky can relate to his feelings around other people. He is alone, he feels like people are judging him. People don't want him around, but he is too proud to admit any of this.
The novel deals with how much we can know before it becomes dangerous. When we know too much we might find things that we do not want to know. Does this mean we should stop our search for truth? What if in our search we discover that there is no truth? This is a very thought provoking novel. I highly reccomend this latest translation, it is very easy to read, much better than the old translation of Crime and Punishment that I read. I am in fact considering re-reading these novels just because these new Translators do a very good job. Buy this book alongside Hunger by Knut Hamsun as they deal with a lot of the same ideas and were written very close to each other in a timeline. Now I will rate the book from A-F like I do in all my reviews: Character Devolpment: A
Plot: B
Thought Provoking: A++
Suspense: A With an overall grade of an A, this book will be one that I will definetly return too.
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Summary: Man's Loathsome Habits for 'Living Life'
Review: "We've all grown unaccustomed to life, we're all lame, each of us more or less... We feel a sort of loathing for real 'living life.'" Yes! We learn "living life" by the words of others, by the power of others, by the presence of others! And this is "living life?" We common folk should be ashamed (129-30)! An excellent and witty book recommended for the real ethicist for valuing and living life.
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