Fyodor Dostoevsky Quotes


Man is unhappy because he doesn't know he's happy. If anyone finds out he'll become happy at once.


Citations

Dostoevsky, Fyodor. Demons. Translated by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky, Vintage Books, 1995, p. 236.

Related Quotes

This seemingly abstruse philosophical statement actually found its way into one of the major political debates of the 21st Century when the Secretary of Defense was defending the management of the Iraq War and the interpretation of intelligence. See {586062}.


Fyodor Dostoevsky
Fyodor Dostoevsky
  • Born: November 11, 1821
  • Died: February 9, 1881
  • Nationality: Russian
  • Profession: Novelist

Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky, sometimes transliterated as Dostoyevsky, was a Russian novelist, philosopher, short story writer, essayist, and journalist. Dostoevsky's literary works explore human psychology in the troubled political, social, and spiritual atmospheres of 19th-century Russia, and engage with a variety of philosophical and religious themes. His most acclaimed works include Crime and Punishment (1866), The Idiot (1869), Demons (1872), and The Brothers Karamazov (1880). Dostoevsky's body of works consists of 12 novels, four novellas, 16 short stories, and numerous other works. Many literary critics rate him as one of the greatest psychological novelists in world literature. His 1864 novel Notes from Underground is considered to be one of the first works of existentialist literature.