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Research Paper On Doppelganger

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Doppelganger or (the double) is defined or designated as the ghost of a living person. However, it has become a popular device in since the early nineteenth century in the works of some German writers such as E.T.A. Hoffmann and Heinrich Von Kleist In literature, it has gradually taken a profound meaning to represent not simply the double or twin, the mirror image of a character's personality, but often a kind of reversal of it, a negative image, a self which expresses all the darkness and normally in expressible and hidden aspects of the psyche." This study tries to explain the meaning of the double and to trace the germination and the development of this term and its use in world Literature in general and English Literature in…show more content…
Keywords:: Doppelganger, double, split-personality, consciousness, subconscious.
Introduction
In fact the origin of the doppelganger which means "double" is borrowed from German writers such as Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe, Tirck, klesit, and E.T.A. Hoffmann who identified "the double with a part of personality," and from there the craze for duality spread from Germany to the rest of the world. (Grook, 1982:13). This German word, which literally means "double-goer" is brought into the language and simultaneously into the literary tradition as a term used first by the novelist Joann Paul Friedrich Richter (1763-1825). His novel Siebenkas (1796) tells the
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In this respect, Kurtz reveals the hidden inner self, particularly of Marlow, and Conrad, in the sense that mysteries into the retice of human psyche has been achieved in this novel; Kurtz, as the alter ego of Marlow, was competent to reveal that hidden dark spot within his psyche. Undoubtedly, it is the same hidden dark spot in both Conrad and Marlow. Simply speaking, Kurtz, the alter ego, stands for the subconscious mind of Conrad, the cryptic, shadowy self which snoop beneath the surface of civilization. In particular, the novel ponders Conrad's state of mind and values about the nature of darkness which obsessed his thoughts for many years. For this obvious reason, David Daiches, in The Novel and Modern World, remarks that '' the heart of darkness is a symbolic experience of what lies at the heart of much human profession and activities.(Daiches, 1960: 41). Undeniably, Conrad works on his own psyche moral confusion. His experience during his trip to the Congo helped him in forming a base for the writing of Heart Darkness Conrad's goal, to be sure, is to manifest how a man can be
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