Ryan Cordero Post #1

Dostoyevsky opens Notes From the Underground with a somber mood, the first line of the novel is “I am a sick man”, that carries through the first fifteen pages. Dostoyevsky literally engages the reader by speaking using a second person point of view and addressing the reader directly. I assume that the society of Dostoyevsky was male dominated as he addresses the reader as either “you” or “gentlemen”. In the first paragraph the narrator establishes himself as both a sick and spiteful person, who needs the assistance of a doctor but refuses to out of spite, I think Dostoyevsky establishes a conflict of the logical versus the emotional. The narrator knows he needs to see a doctor, but refuses to for emotional reasons. The narrator does not establish a good sense of reliability. At first the narrator states and reiterates that he is a spiteful person, but a couple of paragraphs later he admits that he is not a spiteful person. As well, Dostoyevsky shows that he will toy with the reader, as he forces the reader to rethink their opinions and motives of the narrator.