The Double and the Evil Eye
The Uncanny Double and the Evil Eye All that is portrayed as beyond the ordinary suggests evidence of supernatural influences. According to natural laws, everything that is beyond the preternatural is unexplainable since there is still no logical answer to corroborate the facts. In James Hogg’s novel, The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner, Robert Wringhim takes extreme measures to conquer the ultimate satisfaction of being one of the elite, chosen by God. Robert believes that no matter what the consequence will be he is predestined and will be saved after all. Robert explores the uncanny, particularly through the evil eye and the double as Sigmund Freud identifies in his essay, The Uncanny. The uncanny can be described as rather fearful and “all that is terrible” (Freud 1). The uncanny remains fearful as it represents elements of uncertainty that cannot scientifically be explained. Freud suggests that something can become uncanny when a certain object or person experiences a change. It is the uncanny elements that appear to be familiar, this is frightening since it is not known or remembered. Furthermore, Freud seeks to define how the subconscious change of certain familiar objects instigates terror to human beings. “The uncanny is that class of the frightening which leads back to what is known of old and long familiar” (Freud 1), this also suggests that the uncanny can be a familiar object that has been repressed through fear into the unconscious and temporarily forgotten because of desires or even fears from one’s own personal mind. Freud evaluates the German word “heimlich”, the opposite of “unheimlich” as a conflicting idea of all that is familiar, and all that is unfamiliar. The uncertainty of certain objects can appear through “things, persons, impressions, events and situations” (Freud 3). The uncanny can also suggest a dreamlike experience, Jentsch goes as far as to state, “whether an apparently animate being is really alive; or