This early novel about a dual personality is a pioneer example of modern psychological fantasy. The theme of The Double has haunted many writers, particularly in the present century when exploration of the "other self" which lives in all of us has become commonplace.

Dostoyevsky writes brilliantly in The Double (his second novel, which he later revised and which he referred to as a "confession") of a civil servant, Golyadkin, who comes home from work after a particularly frustrating day to see another man—his double—slipping into his room in front of him. With a mixture of anxiety, liking and aversion, he makes the acquaintance of his other self. The other self, after entreating Golyadkin's friendship and learning his secrets, turns ultimately into a formidable enemy.

"Here, in embryo," says Mark Spilka in his illuminating introduction to the present edition, "is the new idea which Dostoyevsky brought to Russian fiction: the combination of inward and outward pressures to produce a split in being which is somehow real. It was an idea which went beyond the simple good-and-evil equations behind other doubles of the age.... In Dostoyevsky's own work, it led directly to a host of doubles and divided selves."