Tuesday, December 31, 2013

Is "Notes from the Underground" by Dostoevsky a tragedy?

I think that one can look at the ideas presented in
Dostoevsky's work as one where tragedy is present.  The tragic condition in this novel
is one where individuals seek to appropriate the world around them in accordance to
their own subjectivity, only to find despair and pain as a result.  This is enhanced by
the narrator figure.  While he is obviously intelligent and insightful, while he is well
read and quite perceptive about his own sense of self and the world, he is limited in
what he can do within it.  While science and progress envelops his world, rationality
cannot save the narrator from the reality that he feels powerless despite free will. 
The narrator is presented as a modernist tragic figure, one who is unable to pinpoint
the source of his unhappiness, yet knowing that he is unhappy.  In this light, I would
say that tragedy is present in that individuals find themselves at the pitch of
prosperity, replete with free will and autonomy, and yet are incapable of being able to
find happiness in their lives or their world.

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