The first words. About the preface by F. M. Dostoevsky. Bagby L.

The study is devoted to the topic of little studied in literary criticism - the use of preface in the work of F. M. Dostoevsky. The preface in his work appears only after the exile and is preferred by the most difficult works - “Notes from the Dead House”, “Notes from the Underground”, “Demons”, “Brothers Karamazov” and “Mild”. L. Bagby offers the answer to the question of the function of these paratakers, their construction, interaction with subsequent text, demonstrating the techniques of virtuoso coding and decoding of meanings used by Dostoevsky.