Fred in the Underground
The man himself living in the sewers, navigating through the darkness through a series of adventures that each provide knowledge gained from experience is unquestionably an extended metaphor constructed from various individual symbols. The mythic symbolism of darkness and light and a climax in which seeing the light ironically leads to the final inescapable darkness death indicates that the metaphor here is applicable to any search for the truth.
The Dead Baby
Generally speaking in the grand history of literary symbolism, babies tend to represent innocence. A dead baby, therefore, is an ironic commentary upon the death of innocence. Fred—the underground man—comes across the naked, lifeless infant trapped within the darkness of the sewer after having been caught by debris—early in the story. Overcoming his anxiety at the sight, he carefully dislodges the baby so the current can carry it forward. Thus, the dead baby becomes specifically a symbol that foreshadows Fred’s own loss of innocence as a result of being trapped by circumstances in the sewer.
The Movie Audience
From his elevated position in the reserved section of the cinema, Fred finds that the audience collectively responding emotionally as a single unit to the manipulations of the film flickering on the screen becomes the real feature attraction. For the first time, he is not part of that collective crowd and this new perspective allows him to see the experience in a completely different way. His awareness allows him to understand for the first time that audiences “were laughing at their lives...shouting and yelling at the animated shadows of themselves.” The sequence is a direct allusion to Plato’s allegory of the cave and the symbolism is inherently clear: his view from underground has become a revelation of the truth which they never see as long as they remain content to mistake illusion for reality.
Lawson
Lawson is the most aggressive of the three cops who beat a confession out of Fred and then subsequently try to beat a confession out of Thompson. Ultimately, they only succeed in beating that latter into committing. Finally, he will be the who shots Fred to death. Even his name is indicative of his symbolic role in the story. It is an ironic commentary upon the pervasive theme of the moral world above the sewer being unfair and fixed. The “law’s on” the side of those charged with enforcing it; no matter how abominably and unethically that enforcement takes place.
The Rat
When asked why he shot Fred, Lawson’s response is a less intellectually articulated idea that giving people like Fred the opportunity to go unpunished is like handing them an opportunity to destroy that natural order that allows men like Lawson to thrive in positions of authority. This assertion thematically connects back to one of the first events that takes place once Fred goes into the sewer: the face to face confrontation with a rat. Only within the context of Lawson’s reasoning about having to “shoot his kind” does the symbolism of the rat become clear. Men like Lawson make it their job to treat men like Fred as animals. Thus deprived of their essential humanity, the rest of society can feel better out their mistreatment—even a beating at the hands of dirty cops. By forcing him down into the sewer, Lawson has made Fred equitable with the vermin that must society feels must be driven from polite society.
