Uncanny Analysis

“The Tell -Tale Heart” by Edgar Allan Poe, was released in 1843. It is one of Poe’s shortest stories and provides a look into paranoia and mental deterioration. “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, was released in 1899. This story also provides a look into mental deterioration and had been misinterpreted when it was first published. The Poe and Gilman stories discussed in this essay will help readers comprehend the credibility of the narrators and the different symbolisms used to create informative yet suspenseful content.

Another big literary device used by Shirley Jackson in her short stories is imagery. One piece of evidence revealing that she uses imagery is in “The Lottery” when she states, “The morning of June 27th was clear and sunny, with the fresh warmth of a full-summer day; the flowers were blossoming profusely and the grass was richly green”(Jackson 1). This imagery gives the reader a descriptive image of how beautiful the day was and makes them feel like they are in the scene. In “The Possibility of Evil” Shirley Jackson opens a similar way by claiming, “The sun was shining, the air was

Trapped in the upstairs of an old mansion with barred windows and disturbing yellow colored wallpaper, the main character is ordered by her husband, a physician, to stay in bed and isolate her mind from any outside wandering thoughts. “The Yellow Wallpaper”, written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, describes the digression of the narrator’s mental state as she suffers from a form of depression. As the story progresses, the hatred she gains for the wallpaper amplifies and her thoughts begin to alter her perception of the room around her. The wallpaper serves as a symbol that mimics the narrator’s trapped and suffering mental state while she slips away from sanity reinforcing the argument that something as simple as wallpaper can completely

The principal idea in Sigmund Freud’s interpretation of The Uncanny theory centres around the Heimlich, translating to ‘homely’ and thus, what is familiar, and the Unheimlich, which is often translated to what is ‘Uncanny’ defined as ‘what is […] frightening precisely because it is not known and familiar’ (Freud, 1919) or later described as something that is ‘secretly familiar which has undergone repression’. He extends the theory further by placing the uncanny in to two classes, those are, thoughts that have been ‘surmounted’, for example, superstitious beliefs that have been discarded but re-emerge when an event occurs that could potentially confirm these beliefs. The second class being that of the ‘repressed complexes’ such as recalling repressed trauma, most specifically from childhood, fear, and unconscious desires.

Contemporaries Edgar Alan Poe and Nathaniel Hawthorne published their respective short stories The Tell-Tale Heart and The Birth-Mark only a couple of months apart. The Tell-Tale Heart is the personal account of a young man’s descent into madness as he becomes increasingly fixated on the eye of an older man, presumably his father. Similarly, The Birth-Mark narrates the story of a young couple, Aylmer and Georgiana, and how the latter’s birthmark becomes the obsession of the former. Poe and Hawthorne’s literary genre of Dark Romanticism opposes human perfectibility, and both writers employ symbolism, irony, similar characters and plot to convey the theme that obsessions will inevitably lead to destruction.

In “The Birth-Mark” by Nathaniel Hawthorne and Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart,” the symbols of the birthmark and the old man’s eye influence the plots of the stories. Through different ways, the characters in both stories feel compelled by these objects to do something. The main character, Aylmer, in “The Birth-Mark,” was obsessed with his wife’s birthmark which he saw as a flaw in her beauty, as well as a symbol of human imperfection, and tried to remove it. In “The Tell-Tale Heart,” the narrator sees the old man’s eye as “evil” and holding mysterious powers which symbolizes the narrator’s deepest fear and his obsession where he chooses to destroy it. The characters’ interpretation of these things created conflict, and both stories are formed by the symbolic meanings that the characters attribute to those things.

Shirley Jackson, the author of the short story “The Lottery” is an unusual story of a town caught in a trap of following tradition. Shirley Jackson uses many symbols in the story to relate to the theme. By doing this it helps the reader understand the story and the message she is trying to get across. Jackson uses tone, setting, and symbolism to conduct a theme for her readers. By doing this she creates connections to the theme by using the black box and old man Warner as a symbol.

To a first time reader, Shirley Jackson's “The Lottery” seems simply as a curious tale with a shocking ending. After repetitive reading of Jackson's tale, it is clear that each sentence is written with a unique purpose often using symbolism. Her use of symbols not only foreshadow its surprise and disturbing ending but allows the reader to evaluate the community's pervert traditional rituals. She may be commenting on the season of the year and the grass being “richly green” or the toying with the meanings of the character's names but each statement applies to the meaning and lesson behind her story.

The concept of the uncanny can be a difficult one to comprehend; this is why Freud begins his essay with an analysis of the different definitions of the uncanny in various languages. Ultimately Freud rests that the German terms “heimlich” and “unheimlich” best match the definition of the uncanny because it is translated as familiar and unfamiliar. The uncanny can be defined as something that creates a feeling of familiarity but also unfamiliarity, and this unfamiliarity is what is fearful to the individual. Freud’s essay “The Uncanny” can be related to the field of literary criticism because he explains how the feeling of the uncanny relates to the author’s attempt to convey a certain response from their audience. This type of analysis

The Dark Romantic texts “The Black Cat” by Edgar Allan Poe and “The Birthmark” by Nathaniel Hawthorne are similar and different in many ways. The similarities of the two pieces are very plentiful. To begin, obsession is a supernatural force that has taken over the main characters in each piece. The narrator in “The Black Cat” is on death row and is trying to rid the guilt he has accumulated through his wrongful acts. He has become obsessed over these actions and he says, “these events have terrified-have tortured- have destroyed me” (Poe 3). They have taken up so much of his thoughts that he no longers thinks of anything else. This similar obsession of it taking over the mind is also present in “The Birthmark”. Aylmer is obsessing over his wife’s birthmark. Thinking to himself, “At all the seasons which should have been their happiest, he invariably...reverted to this one disastrous topic” (Hawthorne 4). Nature is beautifully changing which should bring joy to Aylmer, but all that he can think about it the mark upon her face. Similarly to the narrator in the previous text, the object of Aylmer’s obsession fills his mind and becomes the only thing that he thinks about. Also featured in both pieces is the inability to distinguish fantasy and reality. The narrator in the first text cannot tell the difference between his two selves. He described the feeling as, “a demon instantly possessed me. I knew myself no longer. My original soul seemed, at once, to take its flight from my

What is humanity 's true nature? Are people basically good, or basically evil? Over the centuries, many people have tried to find the answers to these questions, to no avail. Author Charlotte Perkins Gilman and Tennessee Williams take a definite stance on the issues throughout their work, arguing that people are basically evil hiding their truths. Many times, this theme is obviously stated in the stories, but sometimes it is woven in more subtly. When reading the scenes in, A Street Car Named Desire, and the short story, “The Yellow Wallpaper,” the symbolism struck as the most prominent aspect of the stories. Discussed in the article, “Literary Movements for Students”, “Their use of imagery often exemplifies states of mind, the imagination, the human psyche, and dreams” (Milne). Williams and Gilman both use symbolism as a technique to show how the characters may be feeling and what they really represent.

In Charlotte Gilman’s short story "The Yellow Wallpaper," Jane, the main character, is a good example of Sigmund Freud’s Studies In Hysteria. Jane suffers from symptoms such as story making and daydreaming. Jane has a nervous weakness throughout the story.

Aside from Hawthorne?s use of symbolism, his extensive use of imagery also contributes to the notion that man cannot perfect nature. Aylmer?s true goal in this story is to force Georgiana to believe that her birthmark is ?a symbol of [her] liability to sin, sorrow, decay, and death? (204) and she must rid herself of it. He creates this image in order to brainwash her into believing that it is a ?dreadful hand? (207), and she, too, should wish it away. Finally, after gazing at, and studying the birthmark, this horrible image in which Aylmer had implanted in the mind of his lovely wife has become all too unbearable. Georgiana, feeling unworthy of her husband, freely surrenders herself to Aylmer and his science. ?Either remove this dreadful hand, or take my wretched life,? (207) she tells him, while rationalizing the validity of science on such a thing. Another image Hawthorne makes use of, in order to potentially change the mind of Georgiana, is that of the geranium, once diseased with yellow spots of death, is now full of life. The diseased flower symbolizes, in the eyes of Aylmer, a diseased Georgiana.

Freud’s concept of the “uncanny” is a highly influential and valued in psychoanalysis and literature. As Freud explains, it reveals much about his understanding of human beings as being essentially determined by their fears and unconscious desires. His interpretation of uncanny can be analyzed in two ways: linguistic and actual. In the beginning, he starts with the term “uncanny”, which is taken from German word “unheimlich”, literally meaning “un-home-like” – something unfamiliar and unknown, never experienced before. The problem is that the definition of the word and the linguistic peculiarities take half of the whole reading, so we get to the point after the second half.

Cathy Caruth’s “Psychoanalysis, Culture, and Trauma” claims that “to be traumatized is precisely to be possessed by an image or event” (Caruth 3). This idea of possession is seen in Edgar Allan Poe’s “Ulalume” through the narrator’s enigmatic journey toward his dead lover’s grave. Throughout the poem, the narrator unknowingly works to overcome the trauma that is associated with “surviving” the event of his lover dying. The narrator is seemingly able to understand the true cause of his trauma through the use of the paradoxical duality of attraction/repulsion and familiar/unfamiliar contained in the “Uncanny” as described by Sigmund Freud in “The Uncanny.” The narrator uses the information gained from his trance-like walk to realize his