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3.51 AVERAGE
3.51 AVERAGE
Summary: "The Double centers on a government clerk who goes mad. It deals with the internal psychological struggle of its main character, Yakov Petrovich Golyadkin, who repeatedly encounters someone who is his exact double in appearance but confident, aggressive, and extroverted, characteristics that are the polar opposites to those of the toadying "pushover" protagonist. The motif of the novella is a doppelgänger (dvoynik).
Golyadkin is a titular councillor. This is rank 9 in the Table of Ranks established by Peter the Great. As rank eight led to hereditary nobility,[3] being a titular councillor is symbolic of a low-level bureaucrat still struggling to succeed. Golyadkin has a formative discussion with his Doctor Rutenspitz, who fears for his sanity and tells him that his behavior is dangerously antisocial. He prescribes "cheerful company" as the remedy. Golyadkin resolves to try this, and leaves the office. He proceeds to a birthday party for Klara Olsufyevna, the daughter of his office manager. He was uninvited, and a series of faux pas lead to his expulsion from the party. On his way home through a snowstorm, he encounters a man who looks exactly like him, his double. The following two thirds of the novel then deals with their evolving relationship.
At first, Golyadkin Sr. (the original main character) and Golyadkin Jr. (his double) are friends, but Golyadkin Jr. proceeds to attempt to take over Sr.'s life, and they become bitter enemies. Because Golyadkin Jr. has all the charm, unctuousness and social skills that Golyadkin Sr. lacks, he is very well-liked among the office colleagues. At the story's conclusion, Golyadkin Sr. begins to see many replicas of himself, has a psychotic break, and is dragged off to an asylum by Doctor Rutenspitz.
Review-
Nothing spectacular. Good for a lit paper reference, good for comparison with Gogol or Kafka or when looking at Dostoevsky's psychological views, but that's about it. It's an interesting idea but one that's been done better since. Not particularly enjoyable but it's a quick little read that holds your attention well enough.
Golyadkin is a titular councillor. This is rank 9 in the Table of Ranks established by Peter the Great. As rank eight led to hereditary nobility,[3] being a titular councillor is symbolic of a low-level bureaucrat still struggling to succeed. Golyadkin has a formative discussion with his Doctor Rutenspitz, who fears for his sanity and tells him that his behavior is dangerously antisocial. He prescribes "cheerful company" as the remedy. Golyadkin resolves to try this, and leaves the office. He proceeds to a birthday party for Klara Olsufyevna, the daughter of his office manager. He was uninvited, and a series of faux pas lead to his expulsion from the party. On his way home through a snowstorm, he encounters a man who looks exactly like him, his double. The following two thirds of the novel then deals with their evolving relationship.
At first, Golyadkin Sr. (the original main character) and Golyadkin Jr. (his double) are friends, but Golyadkin Jr. proceeds to attempt to take over Sr.'s life, and they become bitter enemies. Because Golyadkin Jr. has all the charm, unctuousness and social skills that Golyadkin Sr. lacks, he is very well-liked among the office colleagues. At the story's conclusion, Golyadkin Sr. begins to see many replicas of himself, has a psychotic break, and is dragged off to an asylum by Doctor Rutenspitz.
Review-
Nothing spectacular. Good for a lit paper reference, good for comparison with Gogol or Kafka or when looking at Dostoevsky's psychological views, but that's about it. It's an interesting idea but one that's been done better since. Not particularly enjoyable but it's a quick little read that holds your attention well enough.
Honestly I was just confused by this book. I'm still not 100% on what happened. I think I know... but I'd have to go reread the story and at this point that seems like a lot of work.
I really wanted to like this book. I downloaded it a long time ago on my Kindle after researching Doppelgangers. This year, I was determined to read something by Dostoyevsky (anything at all) and was so pleased to find that this book, already on my Kindle, was written by him.
However, I was unpleasantly disappointed. It felt like a rough draft, not a finished product worthy of being published. After some research, it seems even Dostoyevsky felt similarly about it, though others have given it high praise.
I really liked the idea behind it, but it left me with so many questions and little explanation. And the translation (by Constance Garnett, not the version above because I couldn't find the one I have) was very bad - myriad typos. I would not recommend this translation.
I won't lose heart, though; I still want to try other Dostoyevsky books.
However, I was unpleasantly disappointed. It felt like a rough draft, not a finished product worthy of being published. After some research, it seems even Dostoyevsky felt similarly about it, though others have given it high praise.
I really liked the idea behind it, but it left me with so many questions and little explanation. And the translation (by Constance Garnett, not the version above because I couldn't find the one I have) was very bad - myriad typos. I would not recommend this translation.
I won't lose heart, though; I still want to try other Dostoyevsky books.
It was a short novel but I still had trouble getting through it. Reading a man rapidly losing his sanity is not enjoyable or even interesting.
It’s interesting to compare The Double with Dostoevsky’s later work and witness his growth. However, at this point, Dostoevsky was yet to master the art of writing a likeable freak.
This book is such a strange and fascinating character study that leaves the reader wondering just what the Hell is going on with Yakov Petrovich Golyadkin. Is he insane? Is he the victim of a very weird prank? Or is his doppelganger actually working to ruin his life?
Golyadkin is a neurotic and rather insignificant man who works as a clerk in one Ministry or another in St. Petersburg. His valet doesn’t respect him, his employer finds him unremarkable, his doctor is worried about his nerves and the woman he loves will not receive him. One rainy November evening, he is walking off a particularly acute nervous “attack” when he crosses paths with a man who is his spitting image in every way. He invites this man over for dinner, and when he wakes up the next morning, it is only to discover that this strange double now works at the Ministry at the desk in front of his, that he takes credit for his work, accrues debts in his name and raises scandalous talk about him wherever he goes…
Having read Dostoyevsky later and denser works (https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1343574583 and https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1343572155), I found this one a breeze to read, but that doesn’t make it a straightforward affair! The narrative is frantic, paranoid and hallucinatory, and perfectly captures Golyadkin’s spiralling into madness, as his double goes about acting out in ways he would never have allowed himself to do. I do appreciate the fact that we never really get an explanation as to how this happens. Is the doppelganger a long-lost evil twin, a projection of Golyadkin’s id (à la Tyler Durden https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/226429139) or did someone go through the trouble of hiring an actor to torment a pompous and uninteresting clerk? Or is something even darker at play here? This is for the reader to determine. Personally, I love the ambiguity: the theme of Jekyll vs. Hyde has clearly been around for a long time, and forces us to think about our darker self, our shadow self – and there are never easy answers with that reflection.
This surrealistic little novella was clearly and inspiration for many (more famously Kafka, Nabokov and Saramago), and Richard Ayoade directed a fabulous movie inspired by this work (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1825157/). But it’s a fun read on its own, and I think people who are intimidated by Dostoyevsky’s work could start here and get a taste of his strange humor, his talent and his deep empathy. 4 and a half stars, well worth revisiting later.
Golyadkin is a neurotic and rather insignificant man who works as a clerk in one Ministry or another in St. Petersburg. His valet doesn’t respect him, his employer finds him unremarkable, his doctor is worried about his nerves and the woman he loves will not receive him. One rainy November evening, he is walking off a particularly acute nervous “attack” when he crosses paths with a man who is his spitting image in every way. He invites this man over for dinner, and when he wakes up the next morning, it is only to discover that this strange double now works at the Ministry at the desk in front of his, that he takes credit for his work, accrues debts in his name and raises scandalous talk about him wherever he goes…
Having read Dostoyevsky later and denser works (https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1343574583 and https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1343572155), I found this one a breeze to read, but that doesn’t make it a straightforward affair! The narrative is frantic, paranoid and hallucinatory, and perfectly captures Golyadkin’s spiralling into madness, as his double goes about acting out in ways he would never have allowed himself to do. I do appreciate the fact that we never really get an explanation as to how this happens. Is the doppelganger a long-lost evil twin, a projection of Golyadkin’s id (à la Tyler Durden https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/226429139) or did someone go through the trouble of hiring an actor to torment a pompous and uninteresting clerk? Or is something even darker at play here? This is for the reader to determine. Personally, I love the ambiguity: the theme of Jekyll vs. Hyde has clearly been around for a long time, and forces us to think about our darker self, our shadow self – and there are never easy answers with that reflection.
This surrealistic little novella was clearly and inspiration for many (more famously Kafka, Nabokov and Saramago), and Richard Ayoade directed a fabulous movie inspired by this work (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1825157/). But it’s a fun read on its own, and I think people who are intimidated by Dostoyevsky’s work could start here and get a taste of his strange humor, his talent and his deep empathy. 4 and a half stars, well worth revisiting later.
The Double is Dostoyevsky’s second novel. It was first published in 1846. The story focuses on Golyadkin, an office worker in St Petersburg, who is struggling to maintain any semblance of a normal life when a new employee, who has the exact likeness of him, appears one day in his place of work. Golyadkin is suspicious of the doppelgänger’s intentions.
The reader tries to follow the analytical, dread-filled nightmare. One is reminded of the works of Gogol, and indeed, Dostoyevsky was deeply influenced by him. This gives the impression that he was trying to find his own voice. Much of his psychological insights and obsessive focus on the suffering of the human mind are present, but they aren’t as finely tuned as they are in Crime and Punishment, The Idiot, Demons, or The Brother’s Karamazov.
Therefore, I wasn’t as enthralled by The Double as his later works. The repetitive nature of the story made it a slight chore,
Nevertheless, even if it pales in comparison to his masterpieces it’s a fine novel. It still manages to get under the skin. Even a lesser Dostoyevsky novel is a memorable one.
The reader tries to follow the analytical, dread-filled nightmare. One is reminded of the works of Gogol, and indeed, Dostoyevsky was deeply influenced by him. This gives the impression that he was trying to find his own voice. Much of his psychological insights and obsessive focus on the suffering of the human mind are present, but they aren’t as finely tuned as they are in Crime and Punishment, The Idiot, Demons, or The Brother’s Karamazov.
Therefore, I wasn’t as enthralled by The Double as his later works. The repetitive nature of the story made it a slight chore,
Nevertheless, even if it pales in comparison to his masterpieces it’s a fine novel. It still manages to get under the skin. Even a lesser Dostoyevsky novel is a memorable one.
deeply unsatisfying since there's really no certainty as to what's going on. it's also quite difficult as there are many massive sections without paragraph breaks and some of the sentances don't make any sense - though that's probably down to the translation.
A derrocada de Golyádkin rumo à irracionalidade é narrada entre o cômico e o trágico por Dostoiévski num sentido de que esse homem, fascinado e oprimido pelas castas sociais que o cercam, esconde na personalidade fofoqueira a doença que o levará ao fim. É um relato que se revela profundamente trágico e dolorido porque sabemos que não há outra escapatória além da insanidade, e o mistério que se revela ao longo da narrativa nada mais é do que o detalhamento excruciante de uma mente em colapso.