THE CONFLICT BETWEEN REALITY AND IMAGINATION IN FYODOR DOSTOEVSKY’S “WHITE NIGHTS”
Keywords:
Fyodor Dostoevsky, White Nights, The Dreamer, Reality vs. Imagination, Romantic Idealism, Alienation, St. Petersburg Myth, Solipsism.Abstract
his research article examines the existential, psychological, and
structural
between reality (действительность) and imagination
(мечтательность) in Fyodor Dostoevsky’s early novella White Nights (1848).
Centering on the anonymous protagonist, universally designated as the Dreamer
(Мечтатель), this paper demonstrates how fantasy functions simultaneously as a
psychological sanctuary against social alienation and as an insulating barrier that
prevents genuine participation in human existence. By contextualizing the work within
nineteenth-century Russian romantic idealism, the urban topography of the
"Petersburg Myth," and Dostoevsky’s early journalistic writings—specifically his
1847 Petersburg Chronicle—the study analyzes how the Dreamer’s encounters with
Nastenka disrupt his solipsistic framework.
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