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Klimoff Alexis,
PhD in Russian literature; Emeritus Professor of Russian Studies,
retired in 2012.
Department of Russian Studies, Vassar College, Poughkeepsie NY, USA.
E-mail: klimoff@vassar.edu
In his “White Nights”, Dostoevsky’s focus is on the psychology of day-dreaming, seen as a characteristic trait of some denizens of Petersburg. According to the author, such individuals tend to live in a fantasy world, preferring their invented visions to grey reality. A textual analysis of “White Nights” reveals a number of utterly unlikely coincidences and situations that point to the fact that the dreamer-narrator creates the entire episode of his meeting with Nastenka in his imagination.
Keywords: Dostoevsky, White Nights, day-dreaming, fantasy, imagination, sentimentalism.
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