“The Underground Man” as an anthropological type in F.M. Dostoevsky’s works
Authors:   Moscow State University named after M. V. Lomonosov, Kholodnova Ksenia 
Published: November 2024

Introduction. F.M. Dostoevsky called the under- ground type the most important thing that he brought out in his work. “The Underground Man,” in his opinion, is the main Russian person. In the “un - derground” type F.M. Dostoevsky revealed the idea of the duality of a person who cannot be pleased with any progress or reason, because he only needs, as the character of “Notes from Underground” noted, to declare his will. Thus we can talk about a person with a reverse perspective, i.e. about the one who is determined by internal causation, acts on himself, dreams and does not live among things. The purpose of the study is to demonstrate an un - derstanding of the dual nature of man in F.M. Dosto - evsky’s philosophy. Traditionally, starting with Plato, the duality of man in philosophy was understood as a division into soul and body. However, in our opinion, F.M. Dostoevsky’s “dual man”, who is called the underground type, thanks to the presence of consciousness, creates a second plane in the world, doubles reality to his dreams, belonging to subjec- tivity. Thus, we can say that the duality of human nature is a division within one human consciousness. What then can we say about consciousness? This is the presence of a person who exists in the world not according to the laws of the world, in relation to himself. Consciousness is what glues existence and the objects of our dreams together. Trying to keep his own dreams in reality, a person endows reality with meaning, overcoming the meaninglessness of the world. Methods. One of the main methods is literary analy - sis of the works of F. M. Dostoevsky and the interpre - tations of his ideas in the space of thought of L. I. Shestov and S. A. Nikolsky. The study also involves a targeted reference to the works of V.V. Zenkovsky, V.V. Rozanov, K.V. Mochulsky, L.P. Grossman and M.M. Bakhtin. These types of analysis are aimed at identifying connotations and discrepancies in the philosophical systems of the thinkers under study, both at the level of textual analysis of their works and at the level of studying their concepts. Textual analysis is used as an auxiliary method. Scientific novelty of the research. The article traces the development of the “underground man” type in the creative space of F. M. Dostoevsky. The first attempt to conceptualize it comes from the story “The Double.” The continuation of the type is found the work “Notes from Underground”. The sci - entific novelty of the study lies in the fact that, refut - ing the already existing interpretations of this type by Russian philosophers, the author proposes an alternative one, the essence of which is as follows: the “underground man” is a dual person, who is characterized not by the classical split in philosophy into soul and body, but by the split within one’s own consciousness. In addition, the article, for the first time in scientific literature, proves the idea that the main character of the novel “Teenager” also belongs to the type of “underground man.” Results. The author explores the anthropological configurations of the philosophy of F. M. Dostoevsky and identifies the “underground man” as a special anthropological type, conceptualized in F. M. Dostoevsky’s works. The latter it is under - stood as a person with a split self, who lives not in the world, but in a picture of the world, to which he doubles reality through imagination. Such a person is characterized by a priority of the internal level over the external one and a desire for a radical reduction of the present world. Conclusions. The philosophy of F. M. Dostoevsky, whose task was to try to comprehend, defend and justify man, is characterized by a special understand - ing of the latter as one who lives only by internal causation and refuses to obey the deterministic connections thanks to which everything exists in the world of the present.