The Sandman

Uniquely, Hoffmann’s “The Sandman” story is just as notable as Sigmund Freud’s (1856-1939) psychological analysis of it. Freud used the story in his theorization of das unheimlich, or what is now commonly called “The Uncanny.” Das Unheimliche is a term that is difficult to translate, given its polysemy: the word can mean hideous, ominous, or sinister. Freud’s essay, published in 1919, highlights some of the central motifs of “The Sandman,” particularly as a way to explore the ambivalent feelings that accompany experiences with “the Double” or Doppelgänger. There are several doubles within the story: Coppelius/The Sandman, Coppelius/Coppola, and Olimpia the woman/Olimpia the automaton. Freud’s analysis of the story—and subsequently his theorization of the uncanny—focused on the role of the eye in the text. The references to blinding, along with the fact that “coppa” in Italian means “eye socket,” led Freud to conclude that the story was ultimately about the fear of castration. In psychoanalytic thought, vision and sight are related to one’s agency and potency, which are related to one’s sense of genital wholeness.

“The Sandman” is narratively structured by doubles. Through the protagonist’s unbridled imagination, it is suggested that Coppelius and Coppola are the same person; similarly, there is a resonance  between Coppelius and Nathaniel’s father, and even between Clara and Olimpia. The narrative strives to arouse uncertainty regarding identity, pointing to the theme of Reality Versus Fantasy. This tone of apprehension is furthered by Nathaniel’s difficulty in distinguishing what is automaton from what is organic and human. Coppelius and his father, as well as, later, Coppola and Spalanzani, are looking to create an automaton that is human in every way, but they always come up against the difficulty of producing eyes that truly appear and function like human eyes. As if anticipating Freud, Coppola and Spalanzani recognize the authenticity of humanity in the eyes.

“The Sandman” reflects the time period’s notion of science as a developing discipline, which included the development of several pseudo-sciences. “The Sandman” includes symbols of both, such as barometers, lunettes, and spyglasses, as well as alchemy, magnetism, and hypnotism. Just as the time period reflected a world in which knowledge was changing, “The Sandman” presents the effects of these changes. Nathanael is shown to initially be a university student, or someone engaged with the world of rationality and logic. Yet, even he is shown to be vulnerable to the promises of pseudo-science, which seem to offer explanations for things out of reach of the scientific world, such as Nathanael’s fears and certainty about the doubles in his life. The writer exploits the zone of uncertainty between the scientific use of the instruments and their manipulation by charlatans, in order to create the atmosphere of terror and hallucination that surrounds the protagonist.

As such, “The Sandman,” Nathanael in particular, reflects Hoffmann’s great interest in psychiatry and the relationship between one’s mental state and their culpability for their behavior. During his stay in Bamberg between 1808 and 1813, Hoffmann delved into reading authors who stood out in their research into mental illness. Additionally, Hoffmann studied law in Konigsberg (now Kaliningrad), graduating in 1795. From 1815 to 1822, he served as a criminal judge in Berlin, where he also had to deal with cases in which the acquittal or penalization of the accused depended on a report on their mental health. Hoffman believed that mental illness can be incredibly difficult to diagnose, given the struggle that many defendants or patients might have in verbalizing or communicating their experiences. In this way, Hoffmann’s decision to begin “The Sandman” with three letters written by Nathanael is unique in that they give readers a first-person perspective of someone navigating the uncertainties about reality that may characterize some forms of mental illness.

Romantic literature often used the epistolary format to create a sense of authenticity and intimacy, giving readers “direct” access to the internal life of characters. In “The Sandman,” the reader is initially placed in the situation of experiencing Nathanael’s state of terror, as opposed to the rational and thoughtful attitude of Clara and her brother Lothar. However, a narrator eventually does take over the telling of the story from Nathanael, which helps Hoffmann establish the wide chasm between Nathanael’s experiences and the experiences of everyone else around him. The narrator’s direct address to the reader gives them a sense of not only Nathanael’s frustration with not being able to explain his experiences, but also his family’s frustration with not understanding him.

As Nathanael’s story unfolds, Hoffmann’s narrator introduces the relationship between art and communication. “The Sandman” was first published as part of Hoffmann’s collection Night Pieces, which takes formal inspiration from paintings. It is no coincidence that the narrator makes a remark about Nathanael’s difficulty in exposing what is going on inside him: if he were a skilled painter, instead of wanting to explain everything at once, he would first have to “sketch the outline” (98) of his inner image with a few “bold strokes” (98), which he would then color in so that his friends would have a vivid impression of what is going on inside him. This is nothing less than the strategy followed by the narrator himself, who professes it immediately after transcribing the initial letters.

“The Sandman” also has another of its constitutive elements in music and dance: Olimpia skillfully plays the piano, singing an aria with “clear, almost shrill voice like a glass bell” (108). Of enormous impact, the scene in which Nathanael dances with her is a kind of climax to his equivocal projections. Further, Hoffmann’s incorporation of music and dance highlights the collapsing boundary between the mechanical and the organic, a phenomenon that creates anxiety—as in Nathanael and even Clara—and that inspires bad actors who intend to exploit this increasingly fuzzy distinction—such as Coppelius and Spalanzani.

In the end, “The Sandman” is a story that integrates a variety of social concerns and genre conventions. It is similar to the narrative structure of a fairy tale, in which a mythical figure of the Sandman manifests in the life of a protagonist who must overcome such evil. It is also a coming-of-age story in which Nathanael is challenged to “become an adult” by giving up the anxieties of childhood. The story also includes elements of romance, horror, and the ghost story. In combining all these details, Hoffmann’s famous tale speaks to the complexities of how humans experience reality, which often conflict with how others experience that “same” reality. In the end, Hoffmann uses the tragic end of Nathanael to highlight the stakes of the mind’s incommunicability to others.