Le motif de la mine ou le voyage merveilleux et initiatique au centre de la terre. Esthétique de la profondeur chez Tieck, Hoffmann et Novalis

2017

Extraordinary, eerie, magical, indeed mystical, the mine presents a world of fantasized chance encounters, of dreams and nightmares, where the individual falls prey to his inner demons. The descent into the mine amounts to a descent to the bowels of the earth, to be confronted by one’s own self, by one’s own questioning, anguish and wounds. The mine may induce a loss of any sense of reality, a fracturing, a dissociation, indeed a dislocation of identity. Seductively dangerous, the journey to the heart of the mine corresponds both to an attempt at introspection and at the same time to a potential death, aspects that can be found in the work of Tieck (Der Runenberg), of Hoffmann (Die Bergwerk…