In Russian, дважды два (dvazhdy dva), literally "twice two" (our translation), is the multiplication table: дважды два четыре, "twice two is four". The narrator makes the formula the image of mathematics, before which one cannot argue back, of a truth that closes the search and looks like the beginning of death, and he answers it with the jest that twice two makes five is also, at times, a charming little thing.
Where It Appears
Quotes
because twice two is mathematics. Try to argue back.
Part One: The Underground, the underground man
and twice two is four is no longer life, gentlemen, but the beginning of death.