Content report card
The Double parent’s guide: what’s inside
Medium confidence
Mild
· 1/5
Minor physical altercations and threats; no graphic depictions.
Mild
· 1/5
Period-appropriate profanity and crude language typical of 19th-century Russian fiction in translation.
Mild
· 1/5
Brief references to the protagonist's awkwardness around women and minor romantic embarrassment.
Moderate
· 3/5
Psychological horror and the protagonist's descent into madness, confusion about reality, paranoia, and existential dread; no graphic content but emotionally unsettling throughout.
Mild
· 1/5
References to alcohol consumption in social settings.
What it offers
Some
· 2/5
Limited; the novella is more a critique of human weakness than an affirmation of virtues.
A little
· 1/5
The protagonist is deliberately unlikeable and serves as a cautionary study rather than a model.
Good
· 3/5
Significant value for understanding 19th-century Russian literature, psychological fiction, satire, and themes of alienation and identity that influenced modern literature.
A note for parents
This classic Russian novella is a psychological exploration of identity and mental breakdown, not a children's book. The protagonist's descent into confusion and paranoia creates sustained psychological tension, and the protagonist himself is deeply flawed and unreliable. The satirical portrait of 19th-century Russian bureaucracy and existential anxiety requires mature reading comprehension. This is best suited for high school students or older who study classic literature.
Analyzed by AI · 1 month ago
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From the publisher
reprint
reprint
Shelved under
Fiction
Doppelgängers
Translations into English
Continental european fiction (fictional works by one author)
Russian fiction
Unloveable Characters
Weak Character Development
Not Diverse Characters
A mix driven
Character driven
physical
mysterious
ISBN 9781528708241 · Read Books
For your family
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The Double age rating: ready from about age 15.
For younger readers
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