View source for The Double (Dostoevsky novel)

{{Short description|1846 novel by Fyodor Dostoevsky}}
{{italic title}}
{{Infobox novel 
| image = Dvoinik.png
| author = [[Fyodor Dostoyevsky]]
| country = [[Russia]]
| language = Russian
| release_date = January 30, 1846
| publisher = ''[[Otechestvennye zapiski]]''
| title_orig        = Двойникъ
| orig_lang_code    = ru
| genre             = [[novel]]
| english_pub_date  = 
| dewey             = 	891.7332
| congress          = 	PG3326 .D8
| native_wikisource = Двойник (Достоевский)
| wikisource        = 
|translator=[[Constance Garnett]]<br>George Bird<br>[[Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky]]<br>Evelyn Harden<br>Hugh Aplin
}}

'''''The Double: A Petersburg Poem''''' ({{langx|ru|Двойник. Петербургская поэма|Dvoynik. Peterburgskaya poema}}) is the second novel written by [[Fyodor Dostoevsky]]. It was first published on 30 January 1846 in the ''[[Otechestvennye zapiski]]''.<ref>{{cite book
|title=Dostoevsky: His Life and Work
|last=Mochulsky
|first=Konstantin
|others=Trans. Minihan, Michael A
|year=1973
|orig-year=First published 1967
|publisher=[[Princeton University Press]]
|location=[[Princeton, New Jersey|Princeton]]
|isbn=0-691-01299-7
|page=46
|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mDKphT8_XLsC
}}</ref> It was subsequently revised and republished by Dostoevsky in 1866.<ref>{{cite book |translator-last=Harden | translator-first=Evelyn J. |last1=Dostoyevsky |first1=Fyodor |title=The double : two versions |date=1984 |publisher=Ardis |location=Ann Arbor, MI |isbn=0882337572 |pages=ix-xxxvi |chapter=Translator's Introduction}}</ref>

==Plot summary==
In [[Saint Petersburg]], Yakov Petrovich Golyadkin works as a [[Table of Ranks|titular councillor]] (rank 9 in the [[Table of Ranks]] established by [[Peter the Great]]<ref>{{cite book |last1=Gogol |first1=Nikolaĭ Vasilʹevich |title=Plays and Petersburg tales : Petersburg tales, marriage, the government inspector |date=1998 |publisher=Oxford Paperbacks |location=Oxford |isbn=9780199555062 |pages=vii–xxx |chapter=Introduction |others=Introduction by Richard Peace |translator-first=Christopher |translator-last=English}}</ref>), a low-level [[bureaucrat]] struggling to succeed. 

Golyadkin's physician, Doctor Rutenspitz, fears for Golyadkin's sanity and tells him that his behaviour is dangerously antisocial. He prescribes "cheerful company" as the remedy. Golyadkin resolves to try this. Though uninvited, he proceeds to the birthday party of Klara Olsufyevna, the daughter of his office manager. 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.

At first, Golyadkin and 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.

==Influences==
[[File:Image dost 01.jpg|thumb|Dostoevsky in 1858/59]]
[[File:ThedoubleDOSTOYEVSKY.jpg.w180h281.jpg|thumb|right|Cover of ''The Double'']]
''The Double'' is the most [[Nikolai Gogol|Gogolesque]] of Dostoevsky's works; its subtitle "A Petersburg Poem" echoes that of Gogol's ''[[Dead Souls]]''. [[Vladimir Nabokov]] called it a [[parody]] of "[[The Overcoat]]".<ref>{{cite journal |author=Nabokov, Vladimir |title= Nabokov on Dostoevsky |journal= The New York Times |date= 21 August 1981|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1981/08/23/magazine/nabokov-on-dostoyevsky.html |accessdate= 18 October 2023}}</ref> Many others have emphasised the relationship between ''The Double'' and other of Gogol's ''Petersburg Tales''. One contemporary critic, Konstantin Aksakov, remarked that "Dostoevsky alters and wholly repeats Gogol's phrases".<ref>Konstantin Aksakov, qtd. in Mochulsky, Dostoevsky: zhizn I tvorchestvo (Paris, 1947): 59, qtd in. Fanger, Donald. Dostoevsky and Romantic Realism: A Study of Dostoevsky in Relation to Balzac, Dickens, and Gogol. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1965, 159.</ref> Most scholars, however, recognise ''The Double'' as Dostoevsky's response to or innovation on Gogol's work. For example, A. L. Bem called ''The Double'' "a unique literary rebuttal" to Gogol's story "[[The Nose (Gogol)|The Nose]]".<ref>{{cite book |last1=Bem |first1=A. L. |editor1-last=Meyer |editor1-first=Priscilla |editor2-last=Rudy |editor2-first=Stephen |title=Dostoevsky & Gogol : texts and criticism |date=1979 |publisher=Ardis |location=Ann Arbor, MI |isbn=0882333151 |page=248 |chapter=''The Double'' and ''The Nose''}}</ref>

This immediate relationship is the obvious manifestation of Dostoevsky's entry into the deeper tradition of [[German Romanticism]], particularly the writings of [[E. T. A. Hoffmann]].

==Critical reception==

''The Double'' has been interpreted in a number of ways. Looking backwards, it is viewed as Dostoevsky's innovation on [[Gogol]]. Looking forwards, it is often read as a [[psychosocial]] version of his later [[ethical]]-[[psychological]] works.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Chizhevsky |first1=Dmitri |editor1-last=Wellek |editor1-first=René |title=Dostoevsky : a collection of critical essays |url=https://archive.org/details/collectionofcrit0000unse |url-access=registration |date=1965 |publisher=Prentice-Hall |location=Englewood Cliffs, N.J. |pages=[https://archive.org/details/collectionofcrit0000unse/page/112 112]–29 |chapter=The theme of the dougle in Dostoevsky}}</ref> These two readings, together, position ''The Double'' at a critical juncture in Dostoevsky's writing at which he was still synthesising what preceded him but also adding in elements of his own. One such element was that Dostoevsky switched the focus from Gogol's [[social]] [[point of view (philosophy)|perspective]] in which the main characters are viewed and interpreted socially to a psychological context that gives the characters more [[emotional]] depth and internal motivation.<ref>Valerian Maykov in Terras, Victor. "The Young Dostoevsky: An Assessment in the Light of Recent Scholarship". In ''New Essays on Dostoevsky'', edited by Malcolm V. Jones and Garth M. Terry, 21–40. Bristol, Great Britain: Cambridge University Press, 1983, 36.</ref>

As to the interpretation of the work itself, there are three major trends in scholarship. First, many have said that Golyadkin simply goes insane, probably with [[schizophrenia]].<ref>Rosenthal, Richard J. "Dostoevsky's Experiment with Projective Mechanisms and the Theft of Identity in ''The Double''". In Russian Literature and Psychoanalysis, 59-88. Vol. 31. Linguistic & Literary Studies in Eastern Europe. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company, 1989, 87.</ref> This view is supported by much of the text, particularly Golyadkin's innumerable hallucinations. Second, many have focused on Golyadkin's search for [[Self-concept|identity]]. One critic wrote that ''The Double''{{'}}s main idea is that "the human will in its search for total freedom of expression becomes a self-destructive impulse".<ref>W. J. Leatherbarrow, "The Rag with Ambition: The Problem of Self-Will in Dostoevsky's ''Bednyye Lyudi'' and ''Dvoynik''".</ref>

This individualistic focus is often contextualised by scholars, such as Joseph Frank, who emphasise that Golyadkin's identity is crushed by the bureaucracy and stifling society he lives in.<ref>{{cite book |last=Frank |first=Joseph |date=1979 |chapter=The Double |title=The Seeds of Revolt: 1821–1849 |page=300 |publisher=Princeton University Press }}</ref>

The final context of understanding for ''The Double'' that transcends all three categories is the ongoing debate about its literary quality. While the majority of scholars have regarded it as somewhere from "too fragile to bear its significance"{{sfnp|Frank|1979|p=295}} to utterly unreadable, there have been two notable exceptions. Dostoevsky wrote in ''[[A Writer's Diary]]'' that "Most decidedly, I did not succeed with that novel; however, its idea was rather lucid, and I have never expressed in my writings anything more serious. Still, as far as form was concerned, I failed utterly."<ref>Dostoevsky, Fyodor. "The History of the Verb 'Stushevatsia'". In ''Diary of a Writer'', translated by Boris Brasol, 882–85. Vol. II. New York, N.Y.: Octagon Books, 1973, 883.</ref> [[Vladimir Nabokov]], who generally regarded Dostoevsky as a "rather mediocre" writer, called ''The Double'' "the best thing he ever wrote", saying that it is "a perfect work of art".<ref>Nabokov, Vladimir Vladimirovich. "Fyodor Dostoevski". In Lectures on Russian Literature, compiled by Fredson Bowers, 97–136. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich/Bruccoli Clark, 1981, 68.</ref>

== Adaptations ==
The story was adapted into a British film, ''[[The Double (2013 film)|The Double]]'', released in 2013, starring [[Jesse Eisenberg]].<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/jesse-eisenberg-mia-wasikowska-the-double-286385|title=Jesse Eisenberg, Mia Wasikowska Join 'The Double' Cast|work=The Hollywood Reporter|access-date=2018-11-05|language=en}}</ref>

A one-hour radio adaptation by [[Jonathan Holloway (playwright)|Jonathan Holloway]] and directed by Gemma Jenkins, changing the time period from Tsarist Russia to "a [[steampunk]] version of 19th-century St. Petersburg",<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0b5s5t6|title = BBC Radio 4 - Dangerous Visions, the Double}}</ref> was broadcast on [[BBC Radio 4]] as part of their ''Dangerous Visions'' series on 10 June 2018. The cast included [[Joseph Millson]] as Golyadkin/The Double and [[Elizabeth Counsell]] as Dr. Rutenspitz.

== References ==
{{mirsky}}
<references />

== External links ==
* ''[https://archive.org/details/threeshortnovels01dost/page/n5/mode/2up The Double]'' at [[Internet Archive]]
* ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=_l5cO6Zmk88C&dq=dostoevsky%20the%20double&pg=PP3 The Double]'' at [[Google Books]]
* [http://ilibrary.ru/text/18/p.1/ Full text of ''The Double'' in the original Russian]
* {{librivox book | title=The Double | author=Fyodor Dostoevsky}}

{{Fyodor Dostoevsky}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Double: A Petersburg Poem}}
[[Category:1846 Russian novels]]
[[Category:Existentialist novels]]
[[Category:Novels set in Saint Petersburg]]
[[Category:Fiction about bureaucracy]]
[[Category:Works set in workplace]]
[[Category:Works originally published in Otechestvennye Zapiski]]
[[Category:Russian novels adapted into films]]
[[Category:Russian novels adapted into radio programs]]
[[Category:Novels by Fyodor Dostoevsky]]