crocodile

In this humorous tale, titled "The Crocodile," the reader senses Gogol's influence on Dostoevsky. It is reminiscent of Gogol's story about the wondrous adventure of "The Nose." This is something Dostoevsky himself acknowledges. Just as Gogol, for the sake of humor, imagined a nose taking on a human face, so too did Dostoevsky wonder, upon seeing a crocodile brought to St. Petersburg: what would a person do if swallowed alive by this animal?
Thus, Dostoevsky crafted a humorous tale that included a critique of the prevailing ideas around 1860. The protagonist, a liberal civil servant, finds comfort in the belly of a crocodile. There, he can formulate a new economic theory and deliver lectures on natural history in his wife's salon, to which the crocodile is taken. The high-ranking official, Timothy Semyovitch, to whom the man's terrified wife turns, replies that the crocodile cannot be disemboweled because its owner is a foreigner, and because Russia needs foreign capital.
This story attracted attention because Dostoevsky was accused of attacking the philosopher Chernyshevsky and the left-wing newspaper "The Voice," which Dostoevsky denied.

Dostoevsky intended his story "Another Wife and the Man Under the Bed" to be a farce, a kind of comedy. We see a jealous husband waiting for his wife to leave on a date, hoping to catch her in the act. He then engages in conversation with a young man, the wife's lover, who was also waiting for her. The wife then leaves with a third person. Afterward, the jealous husband enters an unfamiliar house, and upon the homeowner's arrival, he hides under the bed, where he finds a young man who had already hidden there.