Notes from the Underground Notes

Vol. 1 Issue 40
Do we have free will? How do we go on living day to day without knowing the answer? Well, one way would be to put down the philosophy book, get up outta that armchair and go to Uganda. Try worrying about the existence of free will when you have to eat AIDS for breakfast. I agree with a farmer robot from the Robot Home World in the random Futurama episode I saw today, “philosophy is for those that don’t got ta work for a living.” Coincidentally, I’ve been off work for two months.

As usual, I have no idea what I’m talking about but I’m going to a book club tonight and we’re discussing Dostoevsky’s Notes from the Underground. Now for those of you that have never read it I’d say you should if only because it’s very short. Page length, the shorter the better, being an obvious determinant in a book’s reading appeal. I do have to admit alternately that reading it could be a huge waste of your time as it doesn’t answer any real questions, will never make you any money, and will likely make you more unhappy than you were before you read it (or just regular unhappy if you were happy to begin with). But ultimately I regress back to you should read it because it will give you an appreciation for the content of today’s blog.

It is safe to say that the main character of the book, whom I will call Main for the ease of the discussion, is somewhat concerned with this free will business; “Two times two will be four even without my will.” Knowing this, that his will means nothing, he is a miserable, pitiful, lying tormented bastard. He seems to hate everyone and everything. He backs up his crazy behaviour with faulty logic. I think he’s schizoid, and probably we all can find some characteristics of ourselves in Main.

At first Main blames his above average intelligence for his alienation, but it’s really just a lack of social skill in disguise. The theme, I think, is that there is some kind of societal disconnect between raw awareness, or consciousness, and behavioural norms. If we are conscious feeling thinkers, we are justified in being unable to function normally in the world. The idea of the tortured artist would be a tired, archetypal example of a person who is stacked so full of emotional horsepower that they can’t function in the day to day. Of course the fact that Notes exists, or any famous art works for that matter, contradicts this idea.  

It seems that today shameless self-promotion and gratuitous optimism, “the hustle,” are key components to any kind of success. I say this based only on the fact that I am living it myself. If all modern artists subscribed to, or allowed them selves to sink into this tortured artist mentality, if they didn’t try to “sell themselves,” we would never have any new art works, or very few anyway. That said, it has always been this way. The “hustle” has existed on Earth forever. For billions, even trillions of years.

Where do I get these facts about this so called “hustle”? Just common sense really.

Undoubtedly the emotions that Main feels are only useful because Dostoevsky was proficient enough to express them in an interesting way, i.e. writing the book, and he was also socially skilled enough to get the world to take notice. Without the document who would give a shit? For every one Main there must be tens of millions of people who feel the same awkward awareness, yet have no outlet for their expression. What good is the awareness then? Main asks, “Why do I want to write at all?” Because, otherwise you’d be just like every other depressed schmoe. By writing he makes something useful. At least as useful as writing has the capacity to be, which is not much when compared to a road or a bridge.

Main’s idea of courage is having the gall to get in a fight and get thrown through a window thus showing he is worthy of the attention of another existing entity; “Perhaps I too could get into a fight, and also get thrown out the window.” Through this acknowledgement, the actual throwing of said main characters out of said windows, the idea of free will would somehow be validated, but Main fails. He cannot even get thrown out the window.

Okay, I am not a Dostoevsky scholar, this is not a book report, and I’ve gotten way off topic. Come to think of it, I was never on topic. I’ll just say that I’m writing extra today because I missed my post last week, conveniently after patting myself on the back for never missing a post.

Writing this is giving me ideas for things to talk about at the book club, but much more interesting is that more than one person has told me that I remind them of Main himself.

Now it’s true that this book is revered as a great piece of literature. Main’s suffering is our suffering. Existentialists and Nihilists resound in wistful futilities or carpe diem like hazes as parts of themselves surface through Main’s misery. We relate to grandiose statements like “I would sell the world for a single kopek just so that nobody would bother me.” That said, I can’t imagine anyone wants to be compared to the actual dude Main himself! That would just be sad.

Here are some of the comparisons that have been made:

Main: His position in society is thus that he “could not become anything. Neither bad nor good, neither scoundrel nor an honest man, neither a hero nor an insect.” He can’t even be an insect.

Me: Surely I can at least be an insect.

Main: His office chief is the “only lasting acquaintance I’ve had in my life time.” “In general I was always alone.” In other words, he has no friends.

Me: Hmm, yeah well, I have tons of friends I just pretend I don’t. (Admitting you have no friends, true or not, is even too pathetic for me to write about).

Main: “As a writer he knows that “As for readers, I will never have any. I have already said so.” That’s not true at all. You have millions of readers. I'm reading your book now.

Me: I apologize to the twenty people that have read this blog, yes, you are my readers, but okay fine. You got me on this one.

Being compared to a great author would be one thing, but being compared to the horrible main character as a person…Hey, at least I got a thousand words out of it!

As I always say, and the moral of today’s lesson: I don’t know, therefore Aliens.

Note: I’m using the Dover Mirra Ginsburg Translation