The sniveling lower court councilor Lebeziatnikov always addresses Major-General Pervoyedov as вЂњYour Excellency,вЂќ even after the observation that вЂњas we all know, things are different down hereвЂќ regarding the equality they all share in death (to which His Excellency replies, вЂњBut stillвЂ¦вЂќ). The varied group underneath Ivan consists of individuals of different social ranks, and this is clear from the mannerisms of those at both ends of the spectrum despite the irrelevance of social status in such a situation. The characters on whom Ivan Ivanych eavesdrops discovered that there is some sort of life after death, and with this extraordinary information, they simply continue to act as they did when their bodies lived. In Bobok, Dostoevsky also presents a critique on humanity. Similarly, conscious corpses playing cards seems like a stretch, but the reader (in DostoevskyвЂ™s age without brain scans) has no way of proving that is not the case, especially when the corpses grow silent as soon as Ivan IvanychвЂ™s presence is known. This explanation ties back to reasoning Ivan Ivanych mentions after helping to bear the coffin of his distant relation, that corpses weigh so much more than living bodies вЂњdue to some sort of inertia,вЂќ a justification that he believes to be вЂњnonsense in opposition to the laws of mechanics and common sense.вЂќ However, though Ivan Ivanych denounces this hypothesis as the product of inadequately-educated people who вЂњventure to solve the problems that require special knowledge,вЂќ he can think of no better explanation. By his estimate, вЂњeverything is concentrated somewhere in consciousness and goes on for two or three monthsвЂ¦sometimes even half a year,вЂќ at which point the mind also begins to decompose and the вЂњbobokвЂќ muttering period begins. Platon Nikolaevitch, the graveyardвЂ™s resident вЂњphilosopher, scientist, and Master of Arts,вЂќ theorizes that вЂњthe body revivesвЂќ in the grave, where вЂњthe remains of life are concentrated, but only in consciousness,вЂќ and life goes on by inertia. After all, if a chicken can live for 18 months without a head, why is it so preposterous to think that the human brain dies at a different pace than the body? Dostoevsky even lays out an explanation of the phenomenon when new bodies arrive in the graveyard and do not understand what is happening. With a good argument, one could be convinced (at least in DostoevskyвЂ™s age) that the human mind still functions for a time after a person has died. The primary characteristic of DostoevskyвЂ™s magical realism is that even the fantastical part of the story is not outlandish. The ridiculous premise of the story is tempered by details which seem plausible, such that the reader need only accept one magical element in order to believe the rest, as opposed to entirely fantastical stories which present so many impossibilities that one cannot take them seriously at all.

The idea that a man might lie down in a graveyard and begin to hear voices below-from the bodies buried in the earth-would be entirely implausible if not for the way in which Dostoevsky carries it out. In his short story Bobok, Fyodor Dostoevsky provides a perfect example of one of his favorite devices, magical realism, which paints a realist view of the modern world with the addition of magical elements.

Dostoevsky bobok