# Notes from Underground by Fyodor Dostoevsky

Hacker Approved page: https://hackerapproved.com/p/notes-from-underground/

6 people recommended Notes from Underground by Fyodor Dostoevsky in Hacker News comments and none criticized it, November 2025 to October 2026. It was recommended in 3 of 12 months, in 4 threads. It does not meet the Hacker Approved badge rule.

3 of the 6 people who recommend it commented in one thread, “Dostoyevsky Isn't Difficult”.

**Verdict:** Recommended for its portrait of a self-destructive narrator who feels destined for greatness and its prescient views on people. Dark, so not for the easily affected.

Summary written by Claude from 6 comments.

## Why people recommend it

- Profound and prescient about many things (2 comments in the sample): "he was eerily prescient about many things" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46814831)) "I found it a profound book" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48673920))
- Narrator who sees himself as a genius (2 comments in the sample): "Notes From the Underground was a great example of this where the narrator feels that he's destined for great things" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48674939)) "Notes From Underground" about the lone genius" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50041144))

## Other novellas people recommend

- [Animal Farm by George Orwell](https://hackerapproved.com/p/animal-farm/): 17 recommend, 4 mixed, 4 criticize
- [The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry](https://hackerapproved.com/p/little-prince/): 15 recommend, 3 mixed, 4 criticize
- [Flatland by Edwin Abbott Abbott](https://hackerapproved.com/p/flatland/): 5 recommend, 1 mixed, 0 criticize
- [A Short Stay in Hell by Steven L. Peck](https://hackerapproved.com/p/a-short-stay-in-hell/): 5 recommend, 0 mixed, 0 criticize

## The badge

A product earns the Hacker Approved badge when at least 10 people recommend it, recommenders outnumber critics at least 2 to 1 (mixed feelings count toward neither side), it was recommended in at least 4 of the 12 months and in at least 5 different threads, and no single thread supplies more than half of the people who recommend it. Health and money products are never badged.

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "Notes from Underground by Fyodor Dostoevsky", https://hackerapproved.com/p/notes-from-underground/ (6 recommend, 0 mixed, 0 criticize; Hacker News comments, November 2025 to October 2026).

Counts updated 2 Nov 2026, with data through October 31, 2026.