“After the Event”: Freud’s Uncanny and The Anxiety of Origins

Abstract

This essay aims to revise Freud's theory of the uncanny by rereading his own essay of that name along with the key material Freud drew on in formulating his theory: E. T. A. Hoffmann's short story "The Sandman" (1816a) and Ernst Jentsch's essay "On the Psychology of the Uncanny" (1906a). While arguing, initially, both that Jentsch's work is fundamentally misconstrued by Freud and that it offers a better account of what happens in Hoffmann's story, the essay moves beyond Jentsch's account to offer a more philosophically oriented theory of the uncanny, one more in line with Freud's ideas in Beyond the Pleasure Principle (1920a).

Uncanny in the Horror Film: A Reconstructive Study of the Digital Puppet, Ondel Ondel

“…Furthermore, the concept of uncanny in Freud's view is something that has been recorded in the mind and stored in the subconscious, then when the individual returns to experience this but are different from the stored memory, he will experience an unnatural feeling. Uncanny (the unhomely) is something that is familiar (homely, homey) then reappears in the individual's perception under unnatural conditions (Barnaby, 2015).…”

The Uncanny: Development and Perspectives on the Future

“…Freud directly responds to many of those remarks in his "The Uncanny", commenting however that Jentsch's essay is "a fertile but not exhaustive paper" (Freud 1919, 1). In fact, ideas introduced by Jentsch form the basis for Freud's later study on the uncanny but eventually he decides to use the "theme of the 'Sand-Man' who tears out children's eyes" (Barnaby 2015, 980 after Freud 1919. It constitutes a significant shift from J entsch' s key concept of intellectual uncertainty to a short story written by E.T.A.…”