Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky (1821–1881) is considered one of the greatest Russian writers. His works have had a profound and lasting effect on twentieth-century literature. Dostoevsky's novels often feature characters living in poor conditions with disparate and extreme states of mind, and explore human psychology while analysing the political, social and spiritual states of the Russia of his time. Some scholars consider him to be the founder of existentialism for having published Notes from Underground (1864).