FYI Corner: Das Unheimlich
- literally 'the un-homely'; more often understood in English as the uncanny, this refers to any instance which seems familiar and strange simultaneously, and the unsettling effect that creates in the reader/viewer.
First coined by Ernst Jentsch in 1906:
In telling a story one of the most successful devices for easily creating uncanny effects is to leave the reader in uncertainty whether a particular figure in the story is a human being or an automaton and to do it in such a way that his attention is not focused directly upon his uncertainty, so that he may not be led to go into the matter and clear it up immediately.
It was popularised by - and is probably connected for all time in the popular consciousness with - Sigmund Freud, who expanded on Jentsch's idea to (typically, one supposes) bring in the maelstrom of emotions that arise from social taboo, such as disgust, prurience, envy, lust, fear, et al. For Freud, the uncanny is a representation/reminder of our id, of the baser feelings that drive us and hence our experience of it necessarily is both familiar & strange.
The uncanny in literature:
The uncanny in life:
