This Norton Critical Edition contains Michael Katz's new translation of the 1863 novel, introduced and annotated specifically for English-speaking readers. Backgrounds and Sources , also freshly translated by the editor, includes excerpts from Dostoevsky's letters and notebooks and from "Winter Notes on Summer Impressions," as well as a substantial extract from N. G. Chernyshevsky's novel What Is to Be Done? , the utilitarianism of which Dostoevsky replies to in Notes from Underground. Since its publication, Notes from Underground has been emulated and parodied. By assembling varied responses to the text, Michael Katz links this seminal novel to the Underground-man-inspired works of Mikhail Saltykov-Shchendrin, Woody Allen, Robert Walser, Ralph Ellison, and John Lennon and Paul McCartney. A broad selection of criticism includes the work of both Russian and western critics from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries-from Nikolai Mikhailovsky and Lev Shestov to Ralph E. Matlaw and Joseph Frank. A Chronology of Dostoevsky's life and career is included, as are a List of Principle Translations and a Selected Bibliography. No other series of classic texts equals the caliber of the Norton Critical Editions . Each volume combines the most authoritative text available with the comprehenive pedagogical apparatus necessary to appreciate the work fully. Careful editing, first-rate translation, and thorough explanatory annotations allow each text to meet the highest literary standards while remaining accessible to students. Each edition is printed on acid-free paper and every text in the series remains in print. Norton Critical Editions are the choice for excellence in scholarship for students at more than 2,000 universities worldwide.