The narrator displays signs of anxiety, depression, and anti-social behavior; he describes these psychological phenomena as the sign and substance of his awareness that life is meaningless. He even goes so far as to say that nothing really exists. These parallel ideas—that there is no meaning, that there is nothing at all—are hallmarks of nihilism, from Latin nihil, meaning nothing. Nihilism became both a topic of intellectual debate and a serious personal concern for many in Russia in the 1860s following the publication of Ivan Turgenev’s Fathers and Sons. Some critics have thought that Turgenev coined the word, although it is attested before him. The ridiculous man adopts nihilism with gusto, a response—the story suggests—to his deep existential dread.

The man describes having felt miserable already in his youth, being somewhat of a social outcast: Everyone laughs at him because of his ridiculousness, and the narrator is too proud to share his feelings with others. In his opinion, it is his pride and incapability to communicate that eventually lead to suicidal thoughts: “This pride grew in me with the years; and if it had happened that I allowed myself to confess to any one that I was ridiculous, I believe that I should have blown out my brains the same evening” (226).