Feeling Fictional: Metalepsis, Caprice, and the Uncanny in E. T. A. Hoffmann's "The Sandman".

The transgression of the boundary between narrative levels--metalepsis-- is frequently understood in terms of narrators entering the diegesis, but it can also describe a seeming impossibility: the movement of a character into the author's world. This essay explores the nature and affordances of metalepsis of this latter type--"character metalepsis"--and suggests that it offers a unique sense of what it means to "feel fictional." The feeling of fiction is shown to be closely aligned with paranoia and alienation as characters who seek such passage naturally have a sense of powerlessness and doubts about the source of their consciousness. Drawing on narrative theory and contextualizing metalepsis in Romantic aesthetics, this essay presents a new reading of E. T. A. Hoffmann's quintessential tale of paranoia, "The Sandman" (1816), revealing Hoffmann to have been interested in exploring the feelings of fictional characters--much as he was interested in the feelings of other non-human entities. Under this reading, the essay moves to reconcile the competing views of Freud and Jentsch (who famously disagreed over "Sandman") on the nature of the uncanny. Framed by reflections on the simulation hypothesis and conspiracy theory, the essay suggests that "character metalepsis" provides insight into a wide array of cultural and textual environments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]