It has just occurred to me that if I had at least one reader, he would probably burst out laughing at me, as at a most ridiculous adolescent who, having preserved his stupid innocence, barges with his reasonings and solutions into things he doesn't understand. Yes, indeed, I still don't understand, though I confess it not out of pride, because I know how stupid this inexperience at the age of twenty can be.
Thankless work and lacking in beautiful forms. And these types in any case are still a current matter, and therefore cannot be artistically finished. Major mistakes are possible, exaggerations, oversights. In any case, one would have to do too much guessing. What, though, is the writer to do who has no wish to write only in the historical genre and is possessed by a yearning for what is current? To guess... and be mistaken.
But 'Notes' such as yours could, it seems to me, serve as material for a future artistic work, for a future picture--of a disorderly but already bygone epoch. Oh, when the evil of the day is past and the future comes, then the future artist will find beautiful forms even for portraying the past disorder and chaos. It is then that 'Notes' like yours will be needed and will provide material--as long as they are sincere, even despite all that is chaotic and accidental about them... They will preserve at least certain faithful features by which to guess what might have been hidden in the soul of some adolescent of that troubled time--a not-entirely-insignificant knowledge, for the generations are made up of adolescents.
--Dostoevsky
Here lies a most ridiculous raw youth, indulging himself in the literary graces that he once vowed to eschew. Now he just rocks out.
