Notes from Underground

Fyodor Dostoevsky · 1864 CE · Novel · Russian · Victorian

A retired civil servant of forty writes from a Petersburg basement to prove that a man will act against his own interest simply to demonstrate that he can. The second half recounts how he forced himself on old schoolfellows at a farewell dinner and then took the evening out on a prostitute. The first modern anti-hero talking himself in circles.

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Lineage

• responds to ↑ What Is to Be Done?
  Nikolai Chernyshevsky · 1863 CE · Novel
• ↓ Invisible Man
  Ralph Ellison · 1952 CE · Novel — influenced by this
• ↓ Taxi Driver
  Martin Scorsese · 1976 CE · Film — influenced by this
• ↓ Steppenwolf
  Hermann Hesse · 1927 CE · Novel — influenced by this
• ↓ We
  Yevgeny Zamyatin · 1924 CE · Novel — influenced by this
• ↓ Portnoy's Complaint
  Philip Roth · 1969 CE · Novel — influenced by this
• ↓ Nausea
  Jean-Paul Sartre · 1938 CE · Novel — influenced by this

Attributes

Closest analogues

• Under Western Eyes
  Joseph Conrad · 1911 CE · Novel

  65% · 13 shared
  NovelPsychologicalIsolation & AlienationIndividual vs SocietyGuilt & ConscienceAnti-HeroConfessionUnreliable NarratorWintervs Selfvs SocietyIronicRealist
• Bartleby, the Scrivener
  Herman Melville · 1853 CE · Short Story

  61% · 12 shared
  PsychologicalSatireIsolation & AlienationIndividual vs SocietyExistential AbsurdityVictorianConfessionThe Prisonvs Selfvs SocietyIronicAbsurdist
• Adrift on the Nile
  Naguib Mahfouz · 1966 CE · Novel

  59% · 12 shared
  NovelPsychologicalSatireIsolation & AlienationIndividual vs SocietyExistential AbsurdityAnti-HeroUnreliable Narratorvs Selfvs SocietyIronicAbsurdist
• Wings
  Yi Sang · 1936 CE · Short Story

  56% · 11 shared
  PsychologicalSatireIsolation & AlienationExistential AbsurdityAnti-HeroConfessionUnreliable Narratorvs Selfvs SocietyIronicAbsurdist
• No Exit
  Jean-Paul Sartre · 1944 CE · Play

  56% · 10 shared
  PsychologicalIsolation & AlienationGuilt & ConscienceExistential AbsurdityAnti-HeroConfessionThe Prisonvs SelfIronicAbsurdist
• Portnoy's Complaint
  Philip Roth · 1969 CE · Novel

  54% · 11 shared
  NovelPsychologicalSatireIndividual vs SocietyGuilt & ConscienceAnti-HeroConfessionUnreliable Narratorvs Selfvs SocietyIronic