Notes From Underground

Notes from Underground by Fyodor Dostoevsky is a foundational work of psychological and philosophical fiction. Its unnamed narrator is an isolated former civil servant who reflects bitterly on society, free will, reason and his own contradictions. The book is divided between his philosophical reflections and memories of encounters with other people, revealing a deeply conflicted consciousness. Dostoevsky explores individuality, alienation, pride, suffering and the desire to resist systems that claim to explain human behaviour. Its intense interior voice influenced later existential and modernist literature.