I've just finished reading The New Uncanny: Tales of Unease edited by Sarah Eyre and Ra Page (Comma Press), which makes use of an essay by Freud from 1919 setting out his definition of uncanny tropes, that is, “irrational causes of fear deployed in literature.” Those eight tropes are:
1. inanimate objects mistaken as animate (dolls, waxworks, automata, severed limbs etc) 2. animate beings behaving as if inanimate or mechanical (trances, epileptic fits, etc). 3. being blinded 4. the double (twins, doppelgangers, etc) 5. coincidences or repetitions 6. being buried alive 7. some all-controlling evil genius 8. confusions between reality and imagination (waking dreams, etc)
Interestingly, in the anthology no fewer than five of the fourteen stories focus on dolls.
It's a very good original anthology and I highly recommend it.
no subject
1. inanimate objects mistaken as animate (dolls, waxworks, automata, severed limbs etc)
2. animate beings behaving as if inanimate or mechanical (trances, epileptic fits, etc).
3. being blinded
4. the double (twins, doppelgangers, etc)
5. coincidences or repetitions
6. being buried alive
7. some all-controlling evil genius
8. confusions between reality and imagination (waking dreams, etc)
Interestingly, in the anthology no fewer than five of the fourteen stories focus on dolls.
It's a very good original anthology and I highly recommend it.