The Uncanny By Das Unheimliche

'A story of the supernatural cannot be taken apart and analysed too closely. The ultimate test of its rationale is whether it is good enough to raise the hairs on the back of your neck. If you submit it to a completely logical and detailed analysis it will eventually appear absurd. In his essay on the uncanny, Das Unheimliche, Freud said that the uncanny is the only feeling which is more powerfully experienced in art than in life. If the genre required any justification, I should think this alone would serve as its credentials.' (Stanley Kubrick). Use this quotation as the starting point for an analysis of the supernatural and/or the uncanny in one of the three texts you have read this term.

When subjected to a completely logical, detailed

According to Edward J. Parkinson, James appears to suggest if the ghosts are psychical as opposed to supernatural they would not be terrifying ‘because they do so little,’ however, it is arguably Quint and Jessel’s unnatural stillness during their appearances which creates the unsettling atmosphere. Quint is first described as ‘only standing and staring down at me,’ . If we immediately begin to deconstruct their appearances and conclude this manifestation can be nothing other than a hallucination, we ignore the lack of knowledge about Quint which the governess holds. The subsequent confirmation of this figure as a predecessor by Mrs Grose upon the governess’ description, ‘” Quint!” she cried,’ dispels the assumption the ghosts are anything other than hallucinations. Additionally, the governess is supposedly in control at Bly. She is the “supreme authority” appointed by the master, the children are her charges – only she can protect them. The physical positions and proximities of the ghosts to the governess within the novel, particularly how Quint appears above the governess at her first sighting of him suggests he has a higher level of power and authority. This implies his status is above the governesses; not simply physically. Quint’s higher status

The feeling of something not being quite right is repeated continuously, beginning as soon as the governess arrives at the house ‘I suppose I had expected, or had dreaded, something so dreary,’ and it is this expectancy which establishes the uncanny because of her lack of knowledge. It is argued by Freud in ‘The Uncanny’ that ‘the omnipotence of thoughts… turn something fearful into an uncanny thing’ as well as the idea the uncanny “is frightening precisely because it is not known and familiar,” . Moreover he furthers this by arguing ‘involuntary repetition which surrounds with an uncanny atmosphere what would otherwise be innocent enough, and forces upon us the idea of something fateful and unescapable,’ whereas logically it could be argued the governess’ thoughts have no control over the situation because she is not able to dictate when the ghosts appear simply by thinking about them, the strange reoccurrence of the ghosts appearance upon her expectations such as after the governess foreshadows how it would be “charming as a charming story suddenly to meet someone” thus creating an unsettling uncanny feeling, playing upon the ‘sense of helplessness’ the governess feels when the ghosts appear. When this is rationalised as a coincidence, it destroys the terror created by the familiarity of the