Sharon Meir

 

Freudian Delusion The intimidating twin in the novel Our Weddings (1999) by Dorit Rabinyan

 

The article examines the Freudian concept of 'the uncanny' (Das Unheimliche) as a theme and plot motif of the novel Our Weddings (1999) by Dorit Rabinyan, a contemporary woman writer identified with new feminine voices in the Modern Hebrew Literature.

In 1919 Freud published 'Das Unheimliche' (The Uncanny), an essay that has greatly influenced psychoanalytical research, literature, and other disciplines. The 'uncanny' refers to the sense of menace that can be aroused by human beings very much alike ourselves, as well as by objects, impressions, events, and seemingly pleasant and familiar situations. The inherent potential in all these things to make certain situations foreign and alien is the threat embedded within them. Freud's expansive definition of the concept includes the motif of the 'double' that is a twin or a person with a similar outward appearance to the subject who haunts him and confuses his mind. The article sets out to show how the existence of the disquieting double in the form of an intimidating twin in Rabinyan's novel realizes the potential of the threat and turns the protagonist's world into a never-ending nightmare in which she fights for her life until the surprising end.