Reading Dostoyevski′s Notes From Underground Through Georg Simmel′s Criticism of Modernity

Abstract

This study reads Dostoyevski ' s Notes From Underground through the lens of Georg Simmel ' s critique of modernity. Simmel, the 19th century sociologist, felt the pulse of modern life based on the daily flow of large and small interactions between people. He argued that modern life, which is a dynamic and sophisticated community, is moulded by the monetary economy of metropoles. However, he did not unconditionally embrace modernity as he believed that the quantitative nature of money influenced not only economy but the entirety of life. He particularly criticized the blockading of modern age by quantification via the elements of computability/quantifiability, scientificness, and rationalism. A contemporary of Simmel ' s, the 19th century writer Dostoyevsky also excluded himself from the age he lived in and made this evident in his literary output. For example, the protagonist of his Notes From Underground published in 1864, known as the underground man, pours out furious and sarcastic criticisms throughout the novel based on his experiences and observations of Saint Petersburg. These criticisms stem from the transformation caused by the modern age and its reflections on modernizing Russia. Although Dostoyevsky and Simmel lived in different decades of the 19th century in different countries, and wrote in different genres, their overlapping spatial and social impressions offer a profound and comparative insight into that age.