Customer Reviews

The Double

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

Dostoevsky's second novel comes pretty late in the day of the first European doppelganger/double cycle. it's the usual thing - a complacently respectable civil servant, Mr. Golyadkin, is publicly humiliated. Soon, an exact replica of himself enters his life, receiving undeserved favour from the hero's superiors, while behaving atrociously and getting Golyadkin blamed. Does the second Golyadkin really exist? Does he represent the hero's dark side, the Id lurking in his subconscious, performing the transgressions his bourgeois public persona would dare not? Is it all a nightmare? Is Golyadkin a schizophrenic? Mad? All par for the course.

The novel's subtitle gives a clue to its real worth - 'a poem of St. Petersburg'. Dostoevsky's descriptions of this snow- and wind-lashed city, with its dank, claustrophobic, labyrinthine streets, squelching with mud, its menacing tenements and restaurants, and the bordering restless, gloomy river, are a vivid backdrop to Golyadkin's circular nightmare - the storm scene when he discovers his double is an atmospheric tour de force.

Dostoevsky's style in this novel was apparently modelled on Gogol - certainly it is immediate, intrusive, sarcastic, ironic, bathetic, fast, very funny, yet always unsettling, even poetic. Golyadkin should deserve our sympathy, yet his self-importance, long-windedness and cowardice are rendered comically ridiculous, and from the beginning, with the strange ball, the elliptical narrative and ambiguous point of view, the reader's sympathies and interpretations are constantly shifting.

Written in 1846, before the arrest and spiritual crisis, there is no contrived redemption here, and the novel's resolution is more satisfying than some of the later work's, although the author himself was surely right when he said later that the first half is far superior to the second. Best of all are the public set-pieces that frame Golyadkin's identity crisis.

(I recommend Jessie Coulson's fluid Penguin translation, which, a few infelicities aside, captures something of the book's rapidity and playfulness).

The Double was Dostoyevskys second book. The author thought it was his greatest work yet, but to the literary critics, who considered it weird and insane, it was a disappointment. This was not strange, because D. had really started to explore new territories of the human mind. The language and style was close to that of Gogol, but what D. wrote here was simply revolutionary! He describes insanity from within, a person who is followed by a double through the cold streets of StPetersburg. It's no wonder this book amazed Freud and the psycho-analysts of the 20th century. You can also clearly see who Kafka learned from... However, this is a great book and it is invaluable if you want to get further into the genius of Fyodor Dostoyevsky.

Mr Golyadkin is something of an odd fish. He hires a carriage to take himself to a party he has not been invited to, only to retreat from an attack of nerves before he is even halfway there. Following an abortive trip to his doctor (who doesn't appear to like him very much), he goes shopping. Or at least he attempts to create the impression of shopping (in that he enters several shops, makes a lot of noise and invariably leaves without having made a transaction). You learn one or two things about Golyadkin pretty quickly. He appears to have enemies. Or at least, he refers to his enemies (and thinks about his enemies) quite a lot. There is also a woman somewhere thereabouts in the shadows who may or may not believe that Golyadkin has wronged her.

Way before any double appears on the scene, you understand that (a) Golyadkin is an odd fish and (b) you should not quite trust everything he tells you. There is something more than a little neurotic about Golyadkin, and that sense of unease only increases as you read.

It is like you find yourself in the middle of a crowd (and it is like you have been asleep), and there are people all around. There are so many people that you cannot see beyond them. You do not know where you are. You just know that you are in the midst of people. Next thing, they have their hands on you. There are hands on your arms and hands on your legs and feet. You find yourself hoisted off the ground as the people around you start to swing your body as if they thought you were a hammock. You have no control over anything. They swing you backward and forward, each arc hoisting you just that bity higher. When you think you cannot go any higher, they let you go and you fly, out over the top of the crowd and into the sea. It isn't until you hit the sea that you realise you cannot swim.

That feeling (the tension, the lack of control, the blank incomprehension) sits on your shoulder like an enormous black bird all the time you are reading "The Double."

Golyadkin sneaks into the party he was not invited to, and finds himself rather rudely ejected. Wandering through a stormy night (a storm akin to the fog that opens "Bleak House"), he sees another version of himself and gives chase. The phantom Golyadkin appears again at work the following morning. Only it is not a phantom. It is another man. Just because the man shares his face and his name, just because the man happens to have been born in the same place. There is no need to worry. It is all just coincidence. (You can hear Golyadkin reassuring himself.) Only it seems he does have reason to worry. His job is under threat. People look at him oddly. He does not understand what it going on (and we, as readers, share the puzzle with him: why is everybody behaving so oddly?).

This is an oddly contemporary nightmare, the story of a man lost in the fog of the modern world. Whatever your expectations of this book (or for that matter Dostoyevsky), you will be surprised. Where books like "Crime and Punishment" or "The Brothers Karamazov" share a direct novelistic lineage with the great novels of Dickens, "The Double" is more at home in the company of Kafka or Sartre (specifically "Nausea"). The ground beneath your feet is never sure, the peculiarities you are faced with mount up, the book is like extreme drunkenness.

There may well be a great tradition of doppelganger fiction, but I guarantee you: nothing is quite like this.

This short Dostoyevsky novel, his second published work, is a classic of psychological realism and also paved the way for some of his later work. The tradition of the doppelganger story in literature is far from an original one, but Dostoyevsky deals with it here in a unique new way. Rather than focusing on the supernatural or fantastic aspects of the story, Dostoyevsky here explores the human mind, laying down, for the first time, the mastery of psychological realism which he would come to perfect in his later, more ambitious works. One of the things that really makes the book work is that it is told in the first-person. We hear the story of the man who meets his double in his own words, and we get to watch his mind as it continually unravels. This book epitomizes the concept of the "unreliable narrator": Golyadkin's speech becomes increasingly feverish, paranoiac, and less credible as the story winds along. It is fascinating to watch the disintegration of his mind. His rambling, incoherent speeches, characterized by incomplete thoughts and repetition, is drawn out by Dostoyevsky to almost comic levels, foreshadowing his masterful use of comically divergent dialogue in his later novel Demons. The story is told in a very fast-paced, fly-by-the-seat-of-the-pants manner, with the narrator's mind racing along at a feverish pitch, which his words seem scarcely able to keep up with. His rambling narrative leaves a lot of things in doubt, and the reader is left to ponder certain questions which are never fully resolved: does the double actually exist? just what happens at the end? While this ambiguity might be slightly frustrating on a superficial level, it actually adds to the overall feel of the book -- it is narrated, after all, by a crazy man -- and helps to give the book its distinctively paranoiac, schizophrenic feel. Dostoyevsky herein explores such fascinatingly elusive psychological concepts as paranoia, insanity, jealousy, and mystery. A great classic that clearly both fascinated and influenced everyone from Freud to Kafka to Philip K. Dick, The Double is a great treat for the Dostoyevsky reader.

This being Dostoevskys second book doesnt really achieve the peak use of language he would later attain. However this is a fascinating book for its paranoid overtures and glimpse into the roots of psychosis. There is much in this book which goes unexplained which I feel lends to the overall feel of the book. After all, how much of neurosis and psychosis is following normal reason? One does come to feel a certain pity for one Yakov Petrovitch Golyadkin. One certainly doesnt want him to be committed. (the apparent but unknown conclusion.) It creates a creepiness and eeriness that makes most modern horror flicks seem amateurish and groping.

I read one of Dostoyevsky's longer novels a few years ago and I got lost in it - a lot of names, really long, and confusing writing. The Double, I think is also a difficult read to the casual reader (like me) - it is a hazy line between fantasy and reality in The Double as other reviewers have aptly noted. But it is short (comparably at least) and the characters are easily discernible. I didn't follow everything, but enough to enjoy it. And enough to give me confidence to tackle his other short stories and then Brothers.

As I believe is true of many of Dostoyevsky's characters, you will see traces of yourself in Golyadkin senior and junior - in the insecurities and indecisiveness to name a couple of his traits. For that reason, The Double is not only a interesting story but also a piece that forces the reader to introspect.

Dostoyevsky has always been one to over describe (which is a positive attribute) but, this particular book seemed to be low in that area and lacked. Actually, the (entire) book seemed to be unfinished.
I enjoyed the parts where Golyadkin would do things and then in great fear would leave - the party for instance - or go shopping, as the reader thinks but, it is just another insane gesture on Golyadkin's character.
Golyadkin Senior and Juniour would see people, but these people were either not described or never heard of again. One person was even brought into the plot within the last two pages of text. It can be quite confusing and rather unpleasant; not something I like to see in a literary work.
It almost seems as though this was one of Dostoyevsky's first books. The mystery and intrigue were there but definetly not at his best like in 'The Gambler' or 'Netochka Nezvanova'.
I would put this book forth to someone who has read other Dostoyevsky books and enjoys him but, not to someone who is a first time reader.

I would not recommend this particular book. In the first 11 pages there were 4 typos. (I have not read further yet). When I read, I immerse myself into the story line and when a typo pops up it not only takes away from the meaning but it is also very distracting.

I would perhaps recommend buying from a different publisher.

I strongly advise against ordering this particular translation. It is awkward and deviates significantly from the original text. In addition, there are several typographical errors throughout the book. Since the translator isn't even listed, I'd be willing to bet the translation is so old it's out of copyright.

`The Double', Dostoevsky's second publication, was a vast improvement on his first short novel in letters `Poor Folk'. The latter had a poor intrigue, had no real characters (only types), was a would-be tearjerker and was pure expression of rather childish emotions without real impact on the reader.

`The Double' is already an excellent character study of a `double' personality: a (too) good, servile one and its counterpart, an evil, cynical parasite.

However, Dostoevsky's book is no challenge for Gogol's formidable masterpiece with the same theme `The Diary of a Madman'. His book is too long; the intervention of the protagonist's human environment seems to be too slow. The scenes are not incisive enough and not always convincing.

This book is not a good introduction to Dostoevsky's major works. His short novels, like `White Nights', `The Eternal Husband', `The Gambler', `Uncle's Dream', are real gems.

Only for Dostoevsky fans.