Genre and type of hero in Dostoevsky's novel Notes from Underground

The main idea of this work is research of the genre of ''notes'' and self-identity of the hero in Dostoevsky's novel Notes from Underground. This is a very difficult and significant novel which discusses the main problems of Dostoevsky's novels and which is connected with works of writers of the 19th century (Gogol, Goncharov, Chernyshevsky). The story is connected with philosophy of existentialism because the hero of the novel has a broken consciousness and he can understand the absurdity of the world. The novel has a complex genre characteristic. There are many different genres in this novel: fragments of confessional notes, a polemic with Rousseau and Chernyshevsky, features of philosophic and anti-scientific novels. Speaking about the specifics of consciousness of the hero it is necessary to note that the structure of his personality is formed by the following components: absence of personal characteristics, attempt of self-identity with the help of writing, Gogol's hints, partially perception of life as games and rebellious moods. It is possible to put Dostoevsky's hero in one row with "superfluous people'' who having powerful internal potential could not find a worthy application to it. We can call the hero the forerunner of Dostoevsky's denying rebels: Raskolnikov, Ivan Karamazov, heroes of Demons. The idea of reasonable benefit in Notes is connected with the polemic with Chernyshevsky's novel and is denied by the hero and the author. Ideal society can be constructed not by means of rational researches, but only by faith in God. The second aspect of the hero is an attempt of self-identity with the help of writing. It is very important for the hero to understand the opinion of him by the other, since without any personal description and protesting against all completeness, he still tries to somehow identify himself. An important aspect of the analysis of consciousness of the hero is the game beginning in his behavior which was especially brightly shown in his relations with Liza. Conversation with her happened in a special, marginal and, in fact, game place where he established the rules. The game carried him away so that he gave Lisa his address, what made this game a real life. The last aspect of the hero is the philosophy of revolt considered through the prism of Camus's The Rebel. Besides, the specific of consciousness of Dostoevsky's hero allows considering him in the context of works of existential philosophy, in particular, Camus's The Stranger.

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