What It Is
Clothing is the measure that the underground man uses, in Part Two, to weigh his own dignity before others. Three items carry it: the collar of the greatcoat, which he swaps from raccoon to beaver so that he can bump into an officer as an equal; the yellow stain on the knee of his trousers, which he supposes strips him of nine-tenths of his dignity on the day of the dinner; and the threadbare dressing gown that does not close, in which Liza finds him. Each appears at a moment when he knows he is going to be seen.
Where It Appears
In chapter I of Part Two the plan to bump into the officer calls for a costume. Black gloves, because the lemon-colored ones look too flashy, a decent hat from Churkin's shop and, above all, the collar: the raccoon collar on his greatcoat is, for him, the height of livery, and the beaver collar, like the officers', is to be bought with what he sells and with a loan asked of Anton Antonovich Siyetochkin, head of section, who gives it only after hesitating and taking a receipt to deduct from his salary. It is a cheap German beaver, which soon wears out but looks good at the debut, and he needs it only once. In chapter II of Part Two, among his heroic dreams, he does not recognize himself in the anxious man who was sewing the collar onto his greatcoat.
In chapter III of Part Two, on the day of the dinner, the examination of his clothing becomes an examination of himself: everything old and threadbare, and on his trousers, at the knee, an enormous yellow stain. In chapter IV of Part Two he assumes that Zverkov saw it, when the other notes that he has grown thin and changed and looks at his clothing.
In chapter VIII of Part Two what distresses him, between the dinner and Liza's visit, is the apartment: the oilcloth sofa with the stuffing coming out, and the dressing gown that does not close. In chapter IX of Part Two she finds him like this, and he tries to close the flaps of the dressing gown, as he had imagined, and says afterward that the shame of being seen matters more than having stolen.
так знай же, что стыжусь, больше всего стыжусь, пуще всего боюсь, пуще того, если б я воровал, потому что я тщеславен так, как будто с меня кожу содрали, и мне уж от одного воздуха больно, Then know that I am ashamed, and how ashamed I am, that above all else I dread it, even more than if I had stolen, because I am vain as though my skin had been stripped off, and even the air hurts me.
What It Means
Clothing is what the other sees, and that is why, in Part Two, the narrator prepares it like the plan of a scene. The beaver collar was meant to give him what Part One denies the man of consciousness, a place as an equal in the street, and the text shows the result in proportion: much preparation and a loan for a shock with eyes closed. The stain and the dressing gown show the opposite side, clothing that exposes him without being asked. Two readings: the vanity of someone who measures dignity in centimeters of fur, or sensitivity to a world that does in fact measure people by what they wear, as Zverkov does when he examines his clothes on noticing how much he has changed. The narrator calls it vanity, and the scene shows the world around him behaving as he fears. It connects to Pride, because clothing is where the shame of being seen takes hold.
Relationships
- Themes: Pride.
- Characters: the underground man, Zverkov, Liza.
- Related symbols: the mouse, the fly that the beaver collar tries to undo.