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StillnessQuote

Man only likes to count his troubles. He doesn't calculate his happiness.

Fyodor Dostoevsky, Notes from Underground, 1864

Literature

The story behind the card

The line comes from Part II, chapter 6 of Notes from Underground, which goes back to the narrator's twenties. After a humiliating dinner with old schoolfellows he meets Liza, a young woman working in a St Petersburg brothel, and tries to shake her with pictures of the life she is throwing away: people count their troubles, he tells her, but not their joys, though every life holds enough happiness. Yet part of him is performing and enjoying his power over her, so the advice is sincere and manipulative at once.

Türkçe oku
İnsan yalnızca dertlerini saymayı sever; mutluluğunu ise hesaba katmaz.
Fyodor Dostoyevski, Yeraltından Notlar, 1864

Söz, Yeraltından Notlar'ın ikinci bölümünün 6. kısmında geçer; bu bölüm anlatıcının yirmili yaşlarına döner. Anlatıcı, eski okul arkadaşlarıyla yediği bir akşam yemeğinde küçük düşer. Ardından St. Petersburg'daki bir genelevde çalışan genç Liza'yla tanışır ve boşa giden hayatını gözlerinin önüne sererek onu sarsmaya çalışır: İnsanlar dertlerini sayar ama sevinçlerini saymaz, oysa her hayatta yeterince mutluluk vardır. Ne var ki bir yanı rol yapmakta, Liza üzerindeki gücünün tadını çıkarmaktadır; bu yüzden öğüdü hem içten hem de hesaplıdır.

Sources and further reading

Background reading: Fyodor Dostoevsky
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