Mixed Feelings on Dostoyevsky

I've really enjoyed Notes from Underground and wanted to share a few thoughts I've had on the work. I think it's a really interesting book especially in how modern it seems compared to some of the other works we've read. Not to bash the other works we have read, but the themes from Notes from Underground seem to more directly address issues relevant to modern life than something like Inferno. This is not that surprising as in many ways the contemporary world really took shape (with the industrial revolution and various artistic and philosophical movements) in the 19th century. The way Dostoyevsky explores themes like rationality and philosophy seem really applicable to modern life, but in reading Notes, I feel somewhat conflicted about the messages to take away. Both speaking through the Underground Man and in showing what his philosophy take to the extreme has led too, Dostoyevsky critiques a lot of ideas that are relevant and even held dear today, like rationality for example. I find the exploration of ideas such as the paralysis induced by modern self-consciousness relevant on a personal level. The way Dostoyevsky tears down some of these ideas and portrays such a sad life for the Underground Man has made me think about and consider my own life in a more pointed way than most books I've read. This feeling is somewhat mixed up with, however, by the sort of unsatisfying alternative offered by Dostoyevsky. I joked about this at the end of class yesterday I think, but the solution offered by Dostoyevsky for someone like the Underground Man is to be found in specifically Russian Orthodox Christian mysticism, which is not exactly that applicable to most of our lives. I read Crime and Punishment a couple of years ago, and in that book especially it is made clear that for someone as broken as the Underground Man or Raskolnikov, the protagonist of Crime and Punishment, Dostoyevsky feels the only available salvation is Orthodox Christian spirituality. I think the way that Notes from Underground tears down many of the enshrined ideals of modern Western thought while offering a distinctly Russian source of salvation makes reading the novella as a 21st century American an almost disorienting experience (in a good way though).