Nicholas PolitiOn Midnight in Dostoevsky

Don Delillos, Midnight in Dostoevsky, outlines a bleak world in which two

college-aged teens spend a period of time obsessed with hypothetical realities. Through
Robby and Todds conversations, the reader is able to gain a unique and valuable perspective
about the value of certainty and truth to modern society. DeLillo creates a plotline, which not
only explains the effects of losing certainty, but feeds into the readers innate necessity for
certainty. Along with Robby and Todd, their logic professor, Ilgauskas, also becomes an
integral part of the young persons search for certainty, but never caters to the truth. The
atmosphere assures that we as readers come farther and farther away from a world of truth,
only to become engulfed in a plot that is solely based on the subjectivity of the human
imagination. DeLillo means to convey, through Midnight in Dostoevsky, that as society puts
more value on certainty, it shifts toward escapism as a means to an end, albeit, via pretzel
logic.

Among various aspects of certainty in DeLillos story, a feature that is somewhat

subtle is the use of doubling, or pairs. Historically, doubling has been a common factor in the
plotlines of famous novels. Shakespeare, for one, catered to the Elizabethan public by using
doubling to create a dynamic contrast. Such doubling, however, was expected at the time,
and to this day remains a certainty in literature. In fact, Elizabethan actors doubled
characters themselves; an example of this comes in A Midsummer Nights Dream, where the
same actor would often played both the parts of Oberon and Theseus, as well as Hippolyta
and Titania. In this way, the above-mentioned characters can be seen as united, merely
because the same actor played them. DeLillo played into this historic certainty and
expectation of doubling by including various dichotomous pairs in his own writing. Perhaps
the most obvious and significant of DeLillos pairs is Robby and Todd, the dynamic duo who,
together, decipher their own subjective truths about hyperreality. Robby and Todd can
hypothetically be seen as one organic whole, making it easier to understand the dichotomy of
their personalities. If one sees Robby and Todd as one, the occurrence an internal conflict
becomes clearer to the reader. This conflict is not a petty one of friends fighting, rather, the
conflict of truth and reality versus their own situation. Robby and Todd traverse the streets of
their town in a constant state of wonder and curiosity, bouncing small factoids off of each
other as if they were somehow contained in one entity. Through a meta-lens, Robby and
Todd, a pair themselves, speak of pairs in their own conversations. An example of Robby
and Todds use of pairs is when they spot a hooded figure in the distance, running. A
dialogue ensues where the duo argue about the possibilities of the coat. To Robby and Todd,
the coat can either be a loden coat or an anorak. The idea of pairs inside of other pairs
transcends even simpler Shakespearean dichotomies by making logic illogical, and opening
up the audience to new and consequential hyperrealities. Even so, it seems that DeLillo is
satirizing certainty by implementing a more pairs within an already existing pair, and poking
fun at the modern need for certainty by creating more opportunities for curiosity. Such satire
feeds into the idea that DeLillo believes that the modern public is shifting away from
certainty and into a world of escapism, which can be very ambiguous. The case of the
hooded man and his coat, be it a loden coat or an anorak, is extremely ambiguous. However,
the concept that the audience would never know the true premise of the coat caters also to the
public need for curiosity and escapism, as it leaves a mystery, which is favorable in writing.

Robby and Todd, as members of this hypothetical audience themselves, also have no idea
what the coat really is, but have already convinced themselves of a side in their dichotomy
because of mental subjectivity. Both are adamant about their own opinions because they do
not want the other option to be true, and to either person, there exists an amount of certainty
that cannot be reversed, even by fact itself.

DeLillo also caters to a certain amount of certainty by including in his plotline

elements of public expectation. An important and extremely understated example of this is
embedding his story with a female character, Jenna, who becomes a curiosity of Robby, only
to lead to the twos inevitable meeting. The idea of a female and male character somehow,
violating the rules, as DeLillo puts it, is an incredibly Romantic concept. It is evident that
DeLillo has imbued Midnight in Dostoevsky with another historical satirization, this time
moving into a seemingly romantic interpretation of the interest between Robby and Jenna.
The modern audience, upon reading Robbys description of Jenna, automatically creates a
situation and world in which the two are together before they even meet for the first time.
This is because modern society is treated so much to this particular situation as a certainty of
literature and film. The concept of romance between two characters occurring, in fact, is
almost inevitable with most Hollywood productions. Essentially, the story caters once again
to the needs and expectations of the public to create hypothetical situations, and turns the
public on its head when Robby and Jenna do not eventually develop any kind of romance and
fall away from each other. Jenna is pulled out of the plotline almost as quickly as she is
pulled in, leaving the audience yearning for more of her involvement as the one romantic and
inevitable character in the story. DeLillo criticizes and decides not to fulfill this yearning in
order to show that, even when the audience develops a certain prospective reality for the
story, it may not be fulfilled, no matter the level of adamancy of the audience.
A last example of DeLillos catering to certainty in Midnight in Dostoevsky is his use of
Ilgauskas, the incredibly one-sided logic professor of Robby and Todd. Although his class is
dependent on the purest form of logic, a concept which Robby and Todd rely only loosely
upon, Robby, Todd and the other students adhere strictly to a certain code or order in his
classroom. Ilgauskas is worshipped by Robby and Todd as almost a god-like character, but
also becomes the least dichotomous character of the story. Of the many pairs that Robby and
Todd consider (among them the aforementioned Loden Coat vs. Anorak, Mary Frances vs.
Isabel, F vs. Not-F), Ilgauskas is the one that the duo is able to agree on as being a singlesided entity. Ilgauskas was once spotted by the pair in a diner reading a book by Dostoevsky,
and by the pairs pretzel logic, this mustve meant that the professor was Russian. They use a
form of completely illogical logic, one that transcends the type discussed in Ilgauskass class,
in order to decipher the identity of Ilgauskas himself, which they are both ultimately able to
agree upon. Ilgauskass single identity according to Robby and Todd allows him to function
as, in his purest symbolic form, the crossroads between the duos hyperreality and absolute
truth. Ilgauskas acts as the singularity which Robby and Todd are never really able to
ascertain, but refer to as a singular and certain being. The professor represents a version of
certainty that is created for the audience in the story through pretzel logic, none of which is
credible and is ambiguous in and of itself. Whatever certainty there was in the story, DeLillo
tried to encompass in Ilgauskas, who is himself not even a certainty.

Ultimately, Don DeLillo is trying to prove to us that our need for certainty as a
society leads to our creation of an uncertain hyperreality through illogical logic. Best
represented by the escapades of Robby and Todd, the quest for absolute truth can never be
fully ascertained because the public is so adamant about their pre-conceived hypothetical
realities. The closer we move as a society to this way of thinking, the less chance there is
that absolute truth will ever exist in the future. As for a society that lacks absolute truth, we
as a society are left to form hypothetical situations as to what that futuristic society would be.
This process is even an example of leaving behind the boundaries set by pure logic and
setting forth a new kind of truth, one that exists not in reality, but is created rather by human
beings in their own quest for certainty.
Grade(largely)granted:B+
Funtoread,Nick!

Rubric/Grading Key:
1. The Essay has a clear and logical (pun intended) motive that is recurrent and clear.
Grade:9/10
I tried to imbue my essay with as much of the illustrated concept as possible. My recurring
motive (to use artistic terminology) was the idea of certainty becoming less and less certain,
an idea which I believe to have been nicely developed throughout the essay. I used
understandable and clear examples to illustrate my interpretation of DeLillos story, which
was the central goal of this Lit-Crit. Another motive was DeLillos satirization of historical
novel writing, which was prevalent in body paragraphs 1 and 2.
2. Any outside reference is clear and elaborate. Grade: 8.5/10
I actually really enjoyed researching the idea that DeLillo somewhat satirized a
Shakespearean way of thinking in body paragraph 1. It lead me to make interesting
connections between history and modern literature, which I believe to be true in the cases I
presented.
3. The essay and rubric are both, in themselves, self-referential. Grade: 9/10
Turning our attention to body paragraph 2 of the essay, the paragraph discussion Jenna and
Robby, I am including a hypothetical situation of what a modern audience might think about
when viewing Robby and Jennas relationship, when really this interpretation is solely my
own. In a sense, I tried to illustrate the same concept that DeLillo denounces, that of
adhering so much to ones own perspective of certainty that actual certainty is lost. I have no
clue how a modern audience would have actually reacted to Jenna and Robby in the story.

Secondly, if you look towards section 4 of the rubric, Grammar and Spelling choices, there
exists another element of certainty that a category as such would be featured in a common
English class atmosphere. I wanted to feed into my own certainty by including this section as
a reference to DeLillos concept of certainty, only I am creating a concrete certainty by
including the category. It is almost certain that you wouldve included a category like that
anyway, but in the same way not certain because I describe certainty from my interpretation
of reality.
4. Grammar and Spelling choices. Grade: 8.3/10
One of my most prevalent errors is my overuse of commas as punctual devices in sentences.
I realize this and will try to improve upon it in the future. Another recurring concept in my
writing is that of redundancy in sentences and in the overall form of paragraphs. I awarded
myself a B in this category thinking hypothetically of what you would have given me
otherwise in a section such as this. As for spelling, I ran spell-check through this essay so that
correct spelling could remain a certainty.
5. Mr. Phillipson had fun reading the essay. Grade: N/A
I was not able to give myself a grade on this section, as whatever grade I wouldve given
myself was directly dependent on my hypothetical reality of you sitting in a chair and reading
this Lit-Crit in full. This concept derives itself from DeLillos ultimate thesis that society is
driving itself into the ground by losing touch with absolute truth. Because I know that
whatever situation I imagined had the possibility of being both true and false led me to use
this section of the rubric to further illustrate my interpretation of DeLillos concepts.
Therefore, I will leave this section of the rubric blank because I chose not to adhere to my
version of reality in which you gave me a spectacular grade on this essay, even though my
mind wants to adamantly accept it as truth.
Grade: B+/A(Grade is also hypothetical)