Notes From Underground Read online

decency permits. I will push against him just as much as he pushes

  against me." At last I made up my mind completely. But my preparations

  took a great deal of time. To begin with, when I carried out my plan I

  should need to be looking rather more decent, and so I had to think of my

  get-up. "In case of emergency, if, for instance, there were any sort of

  public scandal (and the public there is of the most RECHERCHE: the Countess

  walks there; Prince D. walks there; all the literary world is there), I must

  be well dressed; that inspires respect and of itself puts us on an equal

  footing in the eyes of the society."

  With this object I asked for some of my salary in advance, and bought at

  Tchurkin's a pair of black gloves and a decent hat. Black gloves seemed to

  me both more dignified and BON TON than the lemon-coloured ones which

  I had contemplated at first. "The colour is too gaudy, it looks as though one

  were trying to be conspicuous," and I did not take the lemon-coloured

  ones. I had got ready long beforehand a good shirt, with white bone studs;

  my overcoat was the only thing that held me back. The coat in itself was a

  very good one, it kept me warm; but it was wadded and it had a raccoon

  collar which was the height of vulgarity. I had to change the collar at any

  sacrifice, and to have a beaver one like an officer's. For this purpose I

  began visiting the Gostiny Dvor and after several attempts I pitched upon a

  piece of cheap German beaver. Though these German beavers soon grow

  shabby and look wretched, yet at first they look exceedingly well, and I

  only needed it for the occasion. I asked the price; even so, it was too

  expensive. After thinking it over thoroughly I decided to sell my raccoon

  collar. The rest of the money--a considerable sum for me, I decided to

  borrow from Anton Antonitch Syetotchkin, my immediate superior, an

  unassuming person, though grave and judicious. He never lent money to

  anyone, but I had, on entering the service, been specially recommended

  to him by an important personage who had got me my berth. I was

  horribly worried. To borrow from Anton Antonitch seemed to me monstrous

  and shameful. I did not sleep for two or three nights. Indeed, I did

  not sleep well at that time, I was in a fever; I had a vague sinking at my heart

  or else a sudden throbbing, throbbing, throbbing! Anton Antonitch was

  surprised at first, then he frowned, then he reflected, and did after all lend

  me the money, receiving from me a written authorisation to take from my

  salary a fortnight later the sum that he had lent me.

  In this way everything was at last ready. The handsome beaver replaced

  the mean-looking raccoon, and I began by degrees to get to work. It

  would never have done to act offhand, at random; the plan had to be

  carried out skilfully, by degrees. But I must confess that after many efforts

  I began to despair: we simply could not run into each other. I made every

  preparation, I was quite determined--it seemed as though we should run

  into one another directly--and before I knew what I was doing I had

  stepped aside for him again and he had passed without noticing me. I

  even prayed as I approached him that God would grant me determination.

  One time I had made up my mind thoroughly, but it ended in my

  stumbling and falling at his feet because at the very last instant when I

  was six inches from him my courage failed me. He very calmly stepped

  over me, while I flew on one side like a ball. That night I was ill again,

  feverish and delirious.

  And suddenly it ended most happily. The night before I had made up

  my mind not to carry out my fatal plan and to abandon it all, and with

  that object I went to the Nevsky for the last time, just to see how I would

  abandon it all. Suddenly, three paces from my enemy, I unexpectedly

  made up my mind--I closed my eyes, and we ran full tilt, shoulder to

  shoulder, against one another! I did not budge an inch and passed him on

  a perfectly equal footing! He did not even look round and pretended not

  to notice it; but he was only pretending, I am convinced of that. I am

  convinced of that to this day! Of course, I got the worst of it--he was

  stronger, but that was not the point. The point was that I had attained my

  object, I had kept up my dignity, I had not yielded a step, and had put

  myself publicly on an equal social footing with him. I returned home

  feeling that I was fully avenged for everything. I was delighted. I was

  triumphant and sang Italian arias. Of course, I will not describe to you

  what happened to me three days later; if you have read my first chapter

  you can guess for yourself. The officer was afterwards transferred; I have

  not seen him now for fourteen years. What is the dear fellow doing now?

  Whom is he walking over?

  II

  But the period of my dissipation would end and I always felt very sick

  afterwards. It was followed by remorse--I tried to drive it away; I felt too

  sick. By degrees, however, I grew used to that too. I grew used to

  everything, or rather I voluntarily resigned myself to enduring it. But I

  had a means of escape that reconciled everything--that was to find

  refuge in "the sublime and the beautiful," in dreams, of course. I was a

  terrible dreamer, I would dream for three months on end, tucked away in

  my corner, and you may believe me that at those moments I had no

  resemblance to the gentleman who, in the perturbation of his chicken

  heart, put a collar of German beaver on his great-coat. I suddenly

  became a hero. I would not have admitted my six-foot lieutenant even if

  he had called on me. I could not even picture him before me then. What

  were my dreams and how I could satisfy myself with them--it is hard to

  say now, but at the time I was satisfied with them. Though, indeed, even

  now, I am to some extent satisfied with them. Dreams were particularly

  sweet and vivid after a spell of dissipation; they came with remorse and

  with tears, with curses and transports. There were moments of such

  positive intoxication, of such happiness, that there was not the faintest

  trace of irony within me, on my honour. I had faith, hope, love. I

  believed blindly at such times that by some miracle, by some external

  circumstance, all this would suddenly open out, expand; that suddenly a

  vista of suitable activity--beneficent, good, and, above all, READY MADE

  (what sort of activity I had no idea, but the great thing was that it should

  be all ready for me)--would rise up before me--and I should come out

  into the light of day, almost riding a white horse and crowned with laurel.

  Anything but the foremost place I could not conceive for myself, and for

  that very reason I quite contentedly occupied the lowest in reality. Either

  to be a hero or to grovel in the mud--there was nothing between. That

  was my ruin, for when I was in the mud I comforted myself with the

  thought that at other times I was a hero, and the hero was a cloak for the

  mud: for an ordinary man it was shameful to defile himself, but a hero

  was too lofty to be utterly defiled, and so he might defile himself. It is

/>   worth noting that these attacks of the "sublime and the beautiful" visited

  me even during the period of dissipation and just at the times when I was

  touching the bottom. They came in separate spurts, as though reminding

  me of themselves, but did not banish the dissipation by their appearance.

  On the contrary, they seemed to add a zest to it by contrast, and were only

  sufficiently present to serve as an appetising sauce. That sauce was made

  up of contradictions and sufferings, of agonising inward analysis, and all

  these pangs and pin-pricks gave a certain piquancy, even a significance to

  my dissipation--in fact, completely answered the purpose of an appetising

  sauce. There was a certain depth of meaning in it. And I could hardly

  have resigned myself to the simple, vulgar, direct debauchery of a clerk

  and have endured all the filthiness of it. What could have allured me

  about it then and have drawn me at night into the street? No, I had a lofty

  way of getting out of it all.

  And what loving-kindness, oh Lord, what loving-kindness I felt at

  times in those dreams of mine! in those "flights into the sublime and the

  beautiful"; though it was fantastic love, though it was never applied to

  anything human in reality, yet there was so much of this love that one did

  not feel afterwards even the impulse to apply it in reality; that would have

  been superfluous. Everything, however, passed satisfactorily by a lazy

  and fascinating transition into the sphere of art, that is, into the beautiful

  forms of life, lying ready, largely stolen from the poets and novelists and

  adapted to all sorts of needs and uses. I, for instance, was triumphant over

  everyone; everyone, of course, was in dust and ashes, and was forced

  spontaneously to recognise my superiority, and I forgave them all. I was a

  poet and a grand gentleman, I fell in love; I came in for countless

  millions and immediately devoted them to humanity, and at the same

  time I confessed before all the people my shameful deeds, which, of

  course, were not merely shameful, but had in them much that was

  "sublime and beautiful" something in the Manfred style. Everyone

  would kiss me and weep (what idiots they would be if they did not), while

  I should go barefoot and hungry preaching new ideas and fighting a

  victorious Austerlitz against the obscurantists. Then the band would play

  a march, an amnesty would be declared, the Pope would agree to retire

  from Rome to Brazil; then there would be a ball for the whole of Italy at

  the Villa Borghese on the shores of Lake Como, Lake Como being for

  that purpose transferred to the neighbourhood of Rome; then would

  come a scene in the bushes, and so on, and so on--as though you did not

  know all about it? You will say that it is vulgar and contemptible to drag

  all this into public after all the tears and transports which I have myself

  confessed. But why is it contemptible? Can you imagine that I am

  ashamed of it all, and that it was stupider than anything in your life,

  gentlemen? And I can assure you that some of these fancies were by no

  means badly composed .... It did not all happen on the shores of Lake

  Como. And yet you are right--it really is vulgar and contemptible. And

  most contemptible of all it is that now I am attempting to justify myself to

  you. And even more contemptible than that is my making this remark

  now. But that's enough, or there will be no end to it; each step will be

  more contemptible than the last ....

  I could never stand more than three months of dreaming at a time

  without feeling an irresistible desire to plunge into society. To plunge

  into society meant to visit my superior at the office, Anton Antonitch

  Syetotchkin. He was the only permanent acquaintance I have had in my

  life, and I wonder at the fact myself now. But I only went to see him when

  that phase came over me, and when my dreams had reached such a point

  of bliss that it became essential at once to embrace my fellows and all

  mankind; and for that purpose I needed, at least, one human being,

  actually existing. I had to call on Anton Antonitch, however, on

  Tuesday--his at-home day; so I had always to time my passionate desire

  to embrace humanity so that it might fall on a Tuesday.

  This Anton Antonitch lived on the fourth storey in a house in Five

  Corners, in four low-pitched rooms, one smaller than the other, of a

  particularly frugal and sallow appearance. He had two daughters and

  their aunt, who used to pour out the tea. Of the daughters one was

  thirteen and another fourteen, they both had snub noses, and I was

  awfully shy of them because they were always whispering and giggling

  together. The master of the house usually sat in his study on a leather

  couch in front of the table with some grey-headed gentleman, usually a

  colleague from our office or some other department. I never saw more

  than two or three visitors there, always the same. They talked about the

  excise duty; about business in the senate, about salaries, about promotions,

  about His Excellency, and the best means of pleasing him, and so

  on. I had the patience to sit like a fool beside these people for four hours at

  a stretch, listening to them without knowing what to say to them or

  venturing to say a word. I became stupefied, several times I felt myself

  perspiring, I was overcome by a sort of paralysis; but this was pleasant and

  good for me. On returning home I deferred for a time my desire to

  embrace all mankind.

  I had however one other acquaintance of a sort, Simonov, who was an

  old schoolfellow. I had a number of schoolfellows, indeed, in Petersburg,

  but I did not associate with them and had even given up nodding to them

  in the street. I believe I had transferred into the department I was in

  simply to avoid their company and to cut off all connection with my

  hateful childhood. Curses on that school and all those terrible years of

  penal servitude! In short, I parted from my schoolfellows as soon as I got

  out into the world. There were two or three left to whom I nodded in the

  street. One of them was Simonov, who had in no way been distinguished

  at school, was of a quiet and equable disposition; but I discovered in him

  a certain independence of character and even honesty I don't even

  suppose that he was particularly stupid. I had at one time spent some

  rather soulful moments with him, but these had not lasted long and had

  somehow been suddenly clouded over. He was evidently uncomfortable

  at these reminiscences, and was, I fancy, always afraid that I might take

  up the same tone again. I suspected that he had an aversion for me, but

  still I went on going to see him, not being quite certain of it.

  And so on one occasion, unable to endure my solitude and knowing

  that as it was Thursday Anton Antonitch's door would be closed, I

  thought of Simonov. Climbing up to his fourth storey I was thinking that

  the man disliked me and that it was a mistake to go and see him. But as it

  always happened that such reflections impelled me, as though purposely,

  to put myself into a false position, I went in. It was almost a year
since I

  had last seen Simonov.

  III

  I found two of my old schoolfellows with him. They seemed to be

  discussing an important matter. All of them took scarcely any notice of

  my entrance, which was strange, for I had not met them for years.

  Evidently they looked upon me as something on the level of a common

  fly. I had not been treated like that even at school, though they all hated

  me. I knew, of course, that they must despise me now for my lack of

  success in the service, and for my having let myself sink so low, going

  about badly dressed and so on--which seemed to them a sign of my

  incapacity and insignificance. But I had not expected such contempt.

  Simonov was positively surprised at my turning up. Even in old days he

  had always seemed surprised at my coming. All this disconcerted me: I

  sat down, feeling rather miserable, and began listening to what they were

  saying.

  They were engaged in warm and earnest conversation about a farewell

  dinner which they wanted to arrange for the next day to a comrade of

  theirs called Zverkov, an officer in the army, who was going away to a

  distant province. This Zverkov had been all the time at school with me

  too. I had begun to hate him particularly in the upper forms. In the lower

  forms he had simply been a pretty, playful boy whom everybody liked. I

  had hated him, however, even in the lower forms, just because he was a

  pretty and playful boy. He was always bad at his lessons and got worse and

  worse as he went on; however, he left with a good certificate, as he had

  powerful interests. During his last year at school he came in for an estate

  of two hundred serfs, and as almost all of us were poor he took up a

  swaggering tone among us. He was vulgar in the extreme, but at the same

  time he was a good-natured fellow, even in his swaggering. In spite of

  superficial, fantastic and sham notions of honour and dignity, all but very

  few of us positively grovelled before Zverkov, and the more so the more he

  swaggered. And it was not from any interested motive that they grovelled,

  but simply because he had been favoured by the gifts of nature. Moreover,

  it was, as it were, an accepted idea among us that Zverkov was a

  specialist in regard to tact and the social graces. This last fact particularly

  infuriated me. I hated the abrupt self-confident tone of his voice, his

  admiration of his own witticisms, which were often frightfully stupid,

  though he was bold in his language; I hated his handsome, but stupid

  face (for which I would, however, have gladly exchanged my intelligent

  one), and the free-and-easy military manners in fashion in the "'forties."

  I hated the way in which he used to talk of his future conquests of women

  (he did not venture to begin his attack upon women until he had the

  epaulettes of an officer, and was looking forward to them with impatience),

  and boasted of the duels he would constantly be fighting. I remember

  how I, invariably so taciturn, suddenly fastened upon Zverkov,

  when one day talking at a leisure moment with his schoolfellows of his

  future relations with the fair sex, and growing as sportive as a puppy in

  the sun, he all at once declared that he would not leave a single village

  girl on his estate unnoticed, that that was his DROIT DE SEIGNEUR, and that if

  the peasants dared to protest he would have them all flogged and double

  the tax on them, the bearded rascals. Our servile rabble applauded, but I

  attacked him, not from compassion for the girls and their fathers, but

  simply because they were applauding such an insect. I got the better of

  him on that occasion, but though Zverkov was stupid he was lively and

  impudent, and so laughed it off, and in such a way that my victory was

  not really complete; the laugh was on his side. He got the better of me on

  several occasions afterwards, but without malice, jestingly, casually. I