Notes From The Underground
Dostoyevsky is a sneaky bugger. He paints a portrait for us of a man so ugly he is beautiful. His opening lines are remarkable: "I am a sick man...I am a spiteful man. I am an unattractive man." (1).
Our underground man seems to do two opposing things at once. He tells us he doesn't care but seems to care. He tells us things to make us laugh and then tells us he is not trying to make us laugh. You can't trust him. He's a nasty little ball of rebellion. He's a delicious chunk of self-affirmation.
"I think man will never renounce real suffering, that is, destruction and chaos. Why, suffering is the sole origin of consciousness." (24). I wonder how much effort someone would put into understanding something like mankind's suffering and consciousness if he didn't really care for it. I read this as I read Nietzsche and Freud: something like this could not be written by someone who didn't care.
I'm not arguing that Dostoyevsky and the Underground Man are one and the same, but don't tell me you don't give a fuck about something when it appears you care quite a bit about it. I see through your misery and I suspect this is what you intended.
The Underground Man at least makes us ask some uncomfortable questions about who we are and why we do the things we do. And if you read this book and don't ask those questions, or give them a few seconds worth of thought, then the failure is yours not his. The Underground Man tries to assert himself in a bland world of pleasantries and falsities. He's just not very charming about it.
This is an exercise in free-will. Or perhaps free-won't. Either way, this exercise oddly resembles some of our greatest stupid decisions in everyday life. Over reacting to misinterpreted situations, thinking grandiose thoughts about our place on this planet and in this society, among others. Embarrassing? Well, the good news is you're not alone.
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