This is the summary of all short stories in The Dream Of A Ridiculous Man by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

This is a summary of the first short story, The Dream Of A Ridiculous Man, whose title is also the title of this book.

What is the dream?

One night, he dreamed he shot himself with his gun, right through his heart. (Dostoyevsky, p. 11) In his dream, he was buried, and then exhumed, to be sent up into space.

He travels to different lands, where he meets nice people, who love him. He slowly drops his cynical self and learns to return love.

But alas! Like in the story of Genesis, the people became corrupted by sin and vices. They separated from one another and began speaking in different languages.The narrator regrets that he was the source of their corruption because he contaminated them with vices.

He remembers he saw a little girl, who has approached him for help to find her mother. He could not be bothered. He wanders around and talks to himself, on his philosophy of life. He changes his mind and decides to search for the small girl, presumably to help her.

Who is this ridiculous man?

He is the narrator.

Interpreting The Dream Of A Ridiculous Man

How to interpret this first dream:

Usually, dreams of dying and death are messages on change. The person “dies” and is reborn into a different one. This kind of dream can jolt the dreamer into changing and transforming.

It is believed that the inner consciousness can be responsible for inventing dreams, with the intention of bringing to attention a message. The man examined his inner consciousness during his dream. He was immersed in beauty and love, which led to his transformation into a caring man.

The second short story: The Meek One

A pawnbroker falls for a poor, young woman and marries her. He has some peculiar habits and his wife (The Meek One) is unable to fully understand him. She feels stressed in her marriage. She experienced too much change from being poor and without rights, to a wife who is much loved by her new husband. She is also friendless and nobody to share her thoughts. One day, she could no longer tolerate her own existence and jumps out of her husband’s apartment window. 🪟

This story reminds me of the proverb – you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink it. Likewise, the man married the woman to provide her with a better life, but he failed to make her understand she was his sun and moon. The husband couldn’t make her enjoy her married life. She retained her past trauma and eventually committed suicide.

The third short story: Bobok

A man attends a mass funeral and at the cemetery, he sits down to rest. He unwittingly hears the buried dead talking among themselves. They speak as though to continue their social life among the dead in the graveyard. The living man couldn’t help it when he didn’t suppress his loud sneeze. All the dead speakers grew silent as they became aware of his presence. The living man decides to leave this cemetery for now. He resolves to visit other cemeteries, where different social classes of dead are buried, because he wants to hear their conversations.

Fourth and last short story: A Christmas Party and a Wedding

The narrator attends a Christmas party of a rich man who has several children. One of which is a daughter of 11 years old. Among the guests is an esteemed man, Yulian Mastakovich, who becomes interested in the girl, after hearing gossip that her parents has set aside her dowry of 300,000 roubles. Yulian mumbles to himself how her principal can grow with interest, over time. He becomes fixated in talking to the girl, to win her friendship.

After the narrator leaves the Christmas party, he continues this story, by saying how he met Yulian and the girl, five years later, on her wedding day. Now the gossip is that the bride has presented her dowry of 500,000 roubles. The reader understands that Yulian had influenced the bride’s parents to invest the money and over the course of 5 years, the principal has acrrued an interest of 200,000 roubles. The parents have done their daughter proud by increasing her dowry through investment.

The lesson in this story is not to trust seemingly esteemed man or woman. Do not judge a book by its cover. The external appearance may look good, but there may be an ulterior motive. No parents in their right mind would agree to a Spring-Winter marriage. It is ridiculous.

Yulian is a ridiculous man because of his greed. He has fulfilled his dream desire, to marry into money. This short story satisfied the title of the book, being a story of how a man can realize his dream ambition while wide awake, by consciously scheming and working his way towards his goal.

The theme of males marrying for the bride’s dowry is a common one. It is still prevalent in the modern world. The other way round is also true.

One word review of this book:

Extremism.

One sentence review of this book:

Extreme ridiculous behaviors make the lesson exemplify the lesson.

This is my copy. I’ve opened it flat so that visitors can see the back cover too.

Yay or Nay?

3 reasons to read this book:

#1) It expresses common themes of self-awakening, shock awakening by second party, grred as the root of evil.

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• If you’re interested in dream interpretation, there’s a blog with a searchbox for you to find dreams, using your keywords. Please visit https://artmater.com