IndexIntroductionBook AnalysisReferencesIntroductionE.TA Hoffmann never reveals the true nature of her protagonist Nathanael's childhood accident, and therefore, intentionally creates ambiguity within The Sandman . This ambiguity leads to two possible interpretations of the story, one reality and one fantasy. Neither interpretation dominates the story and is not intended to. However, Hoffman uses each of the two interpretations of The Sandman to criticize the Romantics and supporters of the Enlightenment; that is, each interpretation serves to reflect the two major movements that dominated Hoffmann's time. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essayErnst Theodor Wilhelm Hoffmann (1776-1822), better known as Ernst Theodor Amadeus Hoffmann, was a German Romantic author and a pioneer of the fantasy fiction genre. Drawing on "the English Gothic novel, 18th-century Italian comedy, the psychology of the abnormal and the occult, he created a world in which everyday life is imbued with the supernatural" and created characters who are placed in this palpably real world , a world still strangely unknown (“Ernst Theodor Amadeus Hoffmann”). Book AnalysisPublished in 1816, The Sandman embodies all of these above-mentioned characteristics; the story features the juxtaposition of fantasy and reality, grotesque, disturbing, hallucinatory characters, and horror beneath the surface of everyday life. In writing The Sandman, Hoffmann essentially reflects these elements to create a sense of ambiguity, leave the reader uncertain as to whether the story is reality or fantasy, and present his commentary on Romanticism and the Enlightenment. The ambiguity in The Sandman lies in Nathanael's traumatic childhood. episode with the manifestation of the imaginary sandman in a man named Coppelius. Until the end of the story it remains open whether the experience is real or just a dream, or whether the Sandman and his reincarnation exist or it is all a post-traumatic hallucination. In other words, Nathanael is either a sane protagonist who the reader can trust to find an objective view of reality, or Nathanael is a madman whose obsession only provides the reader with a subjective and distorted view of reality. Hoffmann consciously leaves room for both interpretations in the story and the reader is torn between reality and fantasy. The two interpretations are as follows: The first possible interpretation of the story follows from the letter addressed by Nathanael to Lothair. This interpretation is the fantasy explanation of the story, and it is obviously true that Nathanael's experience with the Sandman is real. Nathanael learns about the sandman at an early age and every night he hears "something slow and heavy coming up the stairs, he trembles with agony and alarm" (Hoffmann, p. 3). At the beginning the sandman limits himself to "guiding Nathanael and his brothers away from father" and creates a certain imaginary fear in the boy. However, one night Nathanael listens to the nurse's story: "The sandman is a man evil who comes to children when they do not want to go to bed and throws a handful of sand in their eyes, so that they begin to bleed from the head. He puts their eyes in a bag and takes them to the crescent moon to feed his children, who sit up there in the nest. They have crooked beaks like those of owls so that they can raise the eyes of naughty human children." At this juncture, the sandman becomes something more than just a boogeyman of folklore and transcends all the fear that Nathanael previously attributed to the sandman. Although Nathanael becomes old enough to reject folklore as theyears, the Sandman remains a frightening specter and an object of her obsession. Nathanael explains that the Sandman "introduced him to thoughts of wonders and wonders that captured his child's mind", a clear indication that the Sandman made a permanent impression on Nathanael. One night Nathanael decides to face the Sandman. Until the moment Nathanael faces the Sandman, the terrifying obsession is just a faceless character. When Nathanael finally identifies the Sandman as the old lawyer Coppelius, whom Nathanael knows well, the Sandman does not die, but instead manifests himself on Coppelius. Nathanael describes Coppelius as “a large, broad-shouldered man, with a disproportionately large head, a yellow ocher face, a pair of thick gray eyebrows, green cat's eyes sparkling with the most piercing luster, and a large nose curved above his lip superior". The Sandman takes shape and form, literally, he is no longer the bogeyman from the nurse's tale, but a ghostly monster, and Coppelius is the new Sandman. Now that the Sandman embodies a real, physical form, he is also capable of real, physical harm. Coppelius subsequently attacks Nathanael, knocking the young boy unconscious, and a year later, in the final encounter, kills Nathanael's father. There is no further news of Coppelius. This traumatic episode with the sandman not only leaves a permanent scar on Nathanael's mind, but also sees the death of his father. Although the Sandman disappears along with Coppelius, Nathanael struggles with post-traumatic stress throughout his life and the Sandman, now a physical entity, never truly dies. We hear no more about the Sandman until a barometer dealer named Giuseppe Coppola appears in Nathanael's house. Now an adult, Nathanael identifies many of Coppelius' dark and horrific characteristics in Coppola and believes that Coppelius disguised as Coppola is the returning Sandman. In fact, the sandman never died, he simply disappeared. Nathanael explains that "the barometer-dealer is the accursed Coppelius himself, he is dressed differently, but the figure and features of Coppelius are too deeply impressed upon my mind for such a mistake." Nathanael truly believes that Coppelius is Coppola, specifically citing the fact that Coppelius changed his name rather insufficiently, from Coppelius to Coppola, does not constitute a significant difference. If the argument follows, it can also be argued that Coppelius/Coppola, who is German, can easily fake his masked Italian accent, use his new profession as a pretext to return, and so on. Ultimately, in this interpretation of the story the Sandman is real and the dark and inexplicable forces that control Nathanael exist. Of course, if Nathanael is as mentally disturbed as his obsession and fear of the sandman suggest, there is an alternative interpretation. The second possible interpretation of the story follows from the letter addressed by Clara to Nathanael. This interpretation is the realistic explanation of history that dismisses the Sandman and all his manifestations with facts and logic. Clara explains that at first she too was touched by Nathanael's fear; "the fatal barometer dealer followed me at every step... he disturbed my healthy and usually peaceful sleep with all sorts of horrible visions... and yet the next day I was completely changed again". Clara clearly demonstrates that although fear exists, it is not real. In other words, the Sandman's fear is imaginary. Clara explains this to Nathanael: “all the terrible things you speak of simply happenedin your mind and had little to do with the real world. Coppelius may have been repulsive enough, but his hatred of children was what really caused the horror you felt towards him." In her letter, Clara essentially argues that Nathanael's fear is a psychological element, in which the young Nathanael unconsciously created a bond between a man he detested and a folkloric character he feared. For Nathanael, Coppelius and the Sandman are indistinguishable. Clara concludes by telling Nathanael that all his dark and hostile fears about the Sandman exist only because his belief in them gives them life. Clara also provides Nathanael with factual information proving that his childhood experience, while traumatic, was simply a misunderstanding and accident between two experimental alchemists. There were some psychological consequences on the young Nathanael, but nothing that cannot be explained by facts. Clara notes that Nathanael's father and Coppelius indulged in certain secret alchemical experiments, which were dangerous and unpredictable by nature. By participating in such experiments, Nathanael's father essentially caused his own death. To reassure Nathanael, Clara mentions her neighbor, the pharmacist, and explains that sudden and fatal explosions are possible and common, as is typical of alchemy, and that due to some careless error, Nathanael's father was the victim of an unfortunate accident. , not Coppelius. The reason Coppelius fled was not, by the same argument, because he killed his partner, but simply to avoid legal repercussions. This interpretation of history ultimately places reality above fantasy. In fact, Clara manages to clarify all the fantastic elements of Nathanael's letter with factual and logical proof. Once again, neither interpretation prevails, and this is expected. The reader is required to read the story with two possible interpretations, each designed to reflect on the two major movements in Hoffmann's life, Romanticism and the Enlightenment. The fantastic interpretation of The Sandman parallels German Romanticism. In ETA Hoffmann's time, German Romanticism was best understood as a vision of an ideal world. Indeed, German Romantic writers rejected their everyday world and instead sought an idyllic past. In Germany this past was synonymous with the medieval world, which was never what the Germans wanted it to be, and therefore led to a world of fairy tale and dream, a world of splendor. Romanticism has since been recognized as a philosophy of the imagination, where emotion is elevated above reason and the ideal above the real, and where the ordinary and prosaic are imbued with the extraordinary and incomprehensible. German Romanticism, however, did much more than celebrate the existence of the supernatural; in particular he saw the world and men through a dark lens and saw man as a victim of supernatural, hostile and unpredictable forces. German Romantic writers and Hoffmann in particular essentially combined these Romantic characteristics with concepts such as the mysterious and the grotesque to create something that was supernatural and imaginary, yet dark and hostile (Mahlendorf). The uncanny and the grotesque are two of Hoffmann's most important romantic elements and are directly related to the fantastic interpretation of The Sandman. The uncanny is an experience where something is familiar but foreign at the same time, or where something is hidden and then exposed, which almost always creates a feeling of the bizarre and strange (Steig). The uncanny is largely evident when young Nathanael first identifies the Sandman as old Coppelius. In that case Coppelius is the sametime familiar, having visited Nathanael in the past, and simultaneously foreign, becoming the physical manifestation of the Sandman. This also applies when Nathaniel sees a disguised Coppelius in the merchant-barometer. On the one hand Coppola is a stranger, on the other he is strangely familiar and reminiscent. The sandman, however, is not the only actor of the uncanny; Olympia is actually believed to be the other source of the eerie effect. Olympia is hidden for much of her early references and only revealed later in the story, presumably to hide her abominable existence from the public eye. Olympia, who is ultimately an automaton, initially appears as a silent and immobile, but nevertheless realistic, daughter of Professor Spalanzani. That his mechanical watch passes as real and his robotic existence as life is a combination of the familiar and the foreign or appearance and illusion, combining to create the uncanny. Essentially, the ease with which Hoffmann is able to blend and juxtapose the familiar with the foreign not only explains much of the horror and strangeness beneath the surface, but also demonstrates that the world of the fantastic and the supernatural is an inevitable dimension of life. daily. it erases the border that separates the human from the animal kingdom and, in doing so, reduces man to a puppet or a victim of the dark and hostile forces of the supernatural. Through personification, the grotesque extends its reach to include the mechanical and the robotic, which develops a threatening or abominable life of its own as in the case of Olympia. In The Sandman, the grotesque is given a reality that contradicts known reality and at the same time becomes the true reality, a higher reality, perhaps even the only reality. It is when fantasy and imagination become physical and the grotesque reveals the true absurdity of the world (Steig). Olympia is simply an imagination of its creators and becomes real. To Nathanael, she is alive and becomes even more real than Clara, who at one point Nathanael calls an automaton. The doll transcends all reality and Clara herself, yet Olympia is just a doll. The grotesque creates a chaotic worldview, where reality is not what it seems and where madness is the only sanity, because the world itself is a madhouse. In this sense, Nathanael is no more mad because he believes in the Sandman than Clara is because she rejects fantasy as part of everyday life. Nathanael's strange fears have power over him because they exist, his belief in their influence makes them real. Hoffman uses the grotesque to demonstrate that men are puppets on the grand stage of the supernatural world and are guided by forces they do not understand. Fantasy, imagination and dreams are part of their reality, perhaps they are reality, because their belief in them makes it so. German Romanticism was not only a philosophy in its own right, but also a protest against the precepts of the Enlightenment and a reaction to the scientific rationalization of the world. This perhaps explains why Hoffmann, being a German Romantic writer, wanted to leave these two interpretations in The Sandman; one for Romanticism and one for the Enlightenment. The interpretation of The Sandman that is fantasy reflects Romanticism and to the same effect is opposed to the interpretation of reality that reflects the Enlightenment. In essence, the realistic interpretation of history is simply everything that the fantastical interpretation is not. Romanticism is a polarized opposite of the Enlightenment in every aspect. The Enlightenment is a philosophy of reason and rational thought, explaining the world with science and facts and seeing reality for what it really is. The Enlightenment also values ​​form and structure over individual freedom and.