He critiques the "Crystal Palace"—a metaphor for a perfectly rational, utopian society—arguing that humans are inherently irrational and would destroy such a world just to prove they have free will. Part II: À Propos of the Wet Snow Format: A chronological narrative of the narrator's past.
Dostoevsky wrote the book as a rebuttal to Nikolai Chernyshevsky’s What Is to Be Done? , which argued that humans could be guided by rational self-interest. Notes From Underground
The "Underground Man" introduces himself as a bitter, isolated former civil servant. He critiques the "Crystal Palace"—a metaphor for a
Reading an edition with historical notes can help clarify the specific 19th-century Russian ideologies Dostoevsky was mocking. , which argued that humans could be guided
The book deeply impacted thinkers like Friedrich Nietzsche , who saw it as a psychological revelation, and later existentialists like Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus .