The thrilling conclusion:
Dostoevsky and Ellis share the feature that they are exploring the ways out of these modern conundrums. How salvation and transcendence can be reached despite all the shortcomings of the larger world. Dostoevsky places all his characters in situations where they have to suffer and hurt before they are redeemed. This is particularly the case in Crime and Punishment, The Idiot, and the Brothers Karamazov. In all of these texts he places the protagonists in situations where they must go through their days in a non-Catholic confessional nature, in which people get salvation through recognition. Their personal morality is higher than law. They will personally sacrifice for others. They are asexual beings that live for things larger than flesh. They are on this quest before they are even aware of it. Here is a quote from Brothers Karamazov in summation,
Gentlemen, we're all cruel, we're all monsters, we all make men weep, and mothers, and babes at the breast, but of all, let it be settled here, now, of all that I am the lowest reptile! I've sworn to amend, and every day I've done the same filthy things. I understand now that such men as I need a blow, a blow of destiny to catch them as with a noose, and bind them by
a force from without. Never, never should I have risen of myself! but the thunderbolt has fallen. I accept the torture of accusation, and my public shame; I want to suffer and by suffering I shall be purified. Perhaps I shall be purified, gentlemen?(Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov)
Ellis has a much bleaker view on the outcomes of these personal quests for salvation. Clay from Less Than Zero is left a burnt out mess by the end of the story without any connection to his home town of Los Angeles or his former acquaintances. Patrick Bateman makes a heartfelt confession at the end of American Psycho where he is then laughed at and it is unclear as to whether or not he even committed any of the crimes he had just described; there is no catharsis. Rules of Attraction ends as it begins, in mid-sentence however on a note where all three of the characters involved in the love triangle realize that they will never truly know one another or anyone else on the planet.
While Ellis and Dostoevsky are very similar in many ways; they both gained fame at young age (Dostoevsky at 23 and Ellis published his first novel at a tender 19 years old), they both cover similar ethical and moral pitfalls, and both even have the same criticisms – being potboilers and churning out books to make a buck. There are some subtle differences other than time and place that separate them. Ellis tends to write about the effect of these issues on the higher stratas of society – the stockbrokers, the movie producers, the models, the college students. Dostoevsky was focused, for the first time in Russian history, on the lower class common folk who had never had their stories told before. Ellis also had the luxury of having Dostoevsky as a reference and an archetype to fall on and reference. Even despite these reasons, they still very much line up on the key components of being a social critic.
Whether o
r not you agree with them or like them, the world needs the type of person who is able to step outside the confines of their surroundings – time and place- and look in and make a deeper statement on what it is that drives the human spirit. The eye of the author is able to truly take in the modern human condition in such an elegant way that it never truly loses relevance, even after the time it was written has come and gone. Ellis and Dostoevsky are not the end of this cycle either, for every generation there will be a voice of dissent that will make the people who read their work question the lives they are leading and for what purpose they are making their way through the world. I’ll conclude with a list of the most prominent reoccurring Ellis phrases from his books that seem to overlap with Dostoevsky’s world: “Disappear Hear“, “this is not an exit“, “we just slide down the surface of things“, and “Deal with it.“
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