2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43
The article reproduced here is a revised chapter from the author's book The Legend of the Werewolf. In which the origins of human aggression are explored using the examples of werewolf legends that existed in different cultures. And it is proved that some of these people were those who in our time are called serial killers. Who are, in the overwhelming majority of cases, persons with narcissistic pathology.
In Charles Perrault's fairy tale "Bluebeard", there is one interesting, and perhaps the most intriguing moment. When, leaving, Bluebeard gives his young wife the keys to all the rooms of the castle, but at the same time says that there is a door that cannot be opened under any circumstances. Shows this door, and, leaving the lock, leaves his wife the key to the door. This is the most important moment in the whole history. There is a similar story in the tales of other peoples.
In Russian culture, a fairy tale story about the door to the forbidden closet, or to the forbidden room, is also known. In some fairy tales, the key to this room hangs on the wall, separate from all the keys from the bunch, but is quite accessible.
In all fairy tales, the same idea is carried out: something terrible, and at the same time alluring, is locked in some kind of limited space and can easily be released. A person is forbidden to open this door, but such an opportunity is given to him. As a rule, curiosity overcomes the ban, and the hero decides to open the door. You can imagine how the heroine of a fairy tale is worried, walking under the vaulted ceilings of an empty castle, not completely knowing whether she will open the door, or change her mind at the last moment. As the echoing footsteps under the stone vaults merge with the beats of the heart, and the anticipation becomes more and more anxious. Having already approached the door, and picking up the key, doubting whether to open the door or not, studying the keyhole, trying to look into it, a person thinks about anything, just not about the fact that on the other side of the door, something is studying him … Although Nietzsche guessed about this, warning the overly curious.
At this point, when the key creaks into the keyhole, we, according to all the laws of the detective genre, must interrupt for some time, leaving the hero at the door and transfer our attention to another part of the same story. What we will do. It turns out that in the traditions of different cultures there is a story about evil, which is locked in some kind of space and can break free very easily, it is enough to show curiosity and violate the prohibition. Perhaps one of the most famous stories about Pandora's box. “Pandora” translated from Greek means “Gifted to All”. Since she was truly gifted generously by the gods. Aphrodite endowed her with irresistible charm, Hermes gave a cunning, cunning mind, deceit and deceit, Athena weaved beautiful clothes for her. It was created by the craftsman Hephaestus from earth and water at the behest of Zeus.
Pandora captivated by her beauty the brother of Prometheus - Epimetheus, and became his wife. But in addition to all her qualities, Pandora had another outstanding trait - curiosity. When she got to her husband's house, she found out that there was a jug in the house (later legends say that it was a box) that was never opened because it was strictly forbidden. History is silent on how long Pandora hesitated. It is only known that curiosity won, Pandora discovered it, and all kinds of evil contained in it spread among people, settling in their souls. So Zeus took revenge on people for the insolence of Prometheus, who stole fire from heaven. He did not follow the direct path, pouring out all the misfortunes from the top of Olympus on the heads of people, but for some reason he did it by the hands of the people themselves, and through the family of the one who brought fire to people. A similar story is told on the African continent, where it is told of a pumpkin in which evil forces were imprisoned. And which was freed by the woman's curiosity. This is the story of a catastrophe of a universal scale, when evil, uncorked by a person from some space, penetrates the world. But it's time for us to return to the threat of personal disaster for someone who has come to the door and has already put the key in the keyhole.
The turn of the key also turns out to be a turning point in history itself. The heroine of Perrault's fairy tale is horrified to find there the severed bodies of Bluebeard's ex-wives. In folk tales, the picture is more varied, but no less creepy. It turns out in the room: blood, dismembered bodies, sometimes a boiling cauldron with resin, an old woman bathing in blood, or a chained snake. But in all fairy tales there is always an important element. In the room, most often there is someone alive, or someone alive is shown immediately after the hero enters this room. When the old door is opened, it turns out that the cauldron of resin is boiling, the old woman is bathing, the chained snake is alive, albeit weakened, although it is assumed that the door has not been opened for a long time. It turns out that the hero was expected. The moment of the revival of the figures, until that time stayed in a kind of lethargic dream, is the element that turns the simply scary into something creepy.
There is a fundamental difference between “creepy” and “scary”. S. Freud devoted his article to this, which he called: "Unheimlich" which in translation from German means "Creepy". If fear repels, then the eerie has one more additional feature, it attracts, attracts, as it were, draws into itself. This is what the owner of the coveted key is experiencing, who is literally pulled to open the door. Freud believed that this is a trace of the alluring pleasure associated with him in the past. In ordinary human life, the eerie suddenly arises when something familiar, what you see every day, suddenly turns into an unexpected side. This is the moment when the door starts to open. The sensation can appear when the motionless, or dead, suddenly comes to life. As if they came to life, and suddenly the dolls began to move. Or as if someone sat on a log on which he had sat many times, and it suddenly began to move. Stephen King talked about a rather ordinary event that happened to his sister as a child. As she read the book, she chewed gum, then put it aside to continue reading. Without looking, after a while she put it in her mouth again. She did not see that a butterfly sat on her. And when, cut in half in her mouth, she fluttered, the girl experienced an emotional shock, which Stephen King had been striving to convey throughout his life in his books.
Perhaps a similar experience was experienced by many in nightmares, but in dreams there is also a mirror situation when a person suddenly loses the ability to move and cannot run. At the moment of the eerie experience, the familiar suddenly becomes dangerous. At the same time, there may not be a direct, immediate threat, but something speaks to a person from darkness and depth. Freud writes that the eerie is what was previously a psychic reality, previously familiar, even desirable, but now repressed as unacceptable. In this way, it looks like the gods who were alive and whom people used to worship, and now revived in the form of demons. Moloch, who is now known as a bloodthirsty, cruel idol, was an object of worship, that is, reverence and love, as a powerful god.
Freud believed that there are two types of eerie:
1. The eerie, associated with our ancient ways of perceiving the world, thinking and fantasies, which have not been completely overcome, but live in the depths of the psyche, waiting for confirmation. This is how unexploded bombs await since the war that ended long ago.
2. The eerie that arises from the repressed children's complexes. It is experienced when the repressed infantile complex is again revived by some impression, or when the primitive convictions that have been overcome seem to be confirmed again.
To confirm his assumption, S. Freud refers to the semantics of the word "creepy", which sounds in German as "unheimlich". And it shows that it is not only the antonym of the word "heimlich" "cozy", "home", but also acts in the meaning of "hidden", "hidden", "mysterious". That is, everything that should be hidden, but comes out, becomes creepy. All that is alienated is enlightened. “Unheimlich” can also be translated as “not at ease”. Which tells us about the impossibility of accepting the repressed part of ourselves. “Heinlich” means “to domesticate animals” and its opposite is “unheimlich” which is “wild beast”. Sometimes it is also used in the sense of the word “hide”. In Arabic and Hebrew, "macabre" coincides with demonic and terrifying. In English, the word "creepy" is "uncanny", formed, like the German word unheimlich ", by the negative particle" un ", from can" - "to be able", "prudent", "careful", "skillful", " pleasant.”That is, something opposite to“prudent”,“what can be done.”In his article about the creepy, Freud, although he relies on completely different sources, but very accurately describes the content of the forbidden room. As if he had been there together with the hero. "Torn off limbs, a severed head, a hand separated from the shoulder, as in Hauff's tales, legs dancing by themselves …" dance by themselves. Freud gives other examples of the creepy. Epileptic seizure or a fit of insanity seems creepy, as a sign of something contained within, and as a result of loss of control, breaking out. embodies something reprehensible, the opposite of the obvious, but at the same time something that was dreamed of, but did not come true. It is understood that the double is doing it. The appearance of the double can be so frightening that in the traditions of many peoples, it is a sign of the approach of death.
In some Russian fairy tales, the eerie element of dismemberment of bodies is softened. The girl who enters the room sees a cauldron of boiling resin, puts her finger there, "and he fell away from her." For Russian fairy tales about the forbidden room, it is characteristic that the owner of the room is either a beast or robbers living in the forest, that is, wild people violating prohibitions. In the Vyatka fairy tale, this is a bear who says: "You go to two rooms, but don't go to the third - which is locked with a bast."
As a product of the unconscious, the tale itself speaks of the source that gave birth to it. That is, it speaks of the content of the unconscious itself. Talking about the forbidden room, countless storytellers talked about such rooms, which symbolize something repressed into the depths of the psyche. Usually, in fairy tales, the forbidden room is located in a castle that stands far from crowded places, or is located in a robber's hut hidden in the wilderness of the forest. Which in itself is significant. After all, the creepy images that fill the room require precaution.
It can be assumed that fairy tales of this type tell us about forbidden desires for some wild attraction. But to suggest that the tales of the forbidden rooms speak simply of a ban on wild, archaic forms of aggression would be a superficial conclusion. There is clearly something else in these tales. As on old parchment found in ancient archives, often torn or decayed, we saw only part of the story. The missing piece can be found in other tales of the forbidden room, describing what a door is opened for. Propp, examining the motive of the forbidden room, says that there are animal helpers. Usually it is a horse, dog, eagle, or raven.
“Helpers” is a neutral word that says little about the essence. These are not just helpers, but animals that, with the help of magical powers, provide omnipotence. Most often in Russian fairy tales, this is a heroic horse. The search for omnipotence is the goal of the curious. Although there is another hint in the presence of animals. And it becomes clear when the word “animal” is replaced with the word “beast.” This version of fairy tales emphasizes power, leaving destructive fantasies in the shadows. They tell about what is called "cunning science" in the Russian tradition. That is magic. In one Perm tale, a father brings his son to study in a house where an old man has lived for 500 years. The house has seven rooms, but the seventh is not ordered to enter. Of course, the ban is being violated.
The Russian fairy tale “Wonderful Shirt” tells how the hero finds himself in a house in the forest where three brothers live in animal form - an eagle, a falcon, and a sparrow, who can turn into good fellows. They take him for theirs. The eagle allows him to walk everywhere, but not to take the key hanging on the wall. After breaking the ban, the hero sees a heroic horse in the forbidden closet, and immediately falls asleep for a year. This is repeated three times. After which he receives a horse as a gift.
But even in these tales, the element of violence and death is present in a latent form. For example, a dream lasting a year in which the hero falls clearly symbolizes his death. The animals that appear in these tales, obviously, symbolize some kind of animal, a wild part of the personality. The hunt for omnipotence involves violence. This emphasizes the Arabic version of the tale of the gin being released from the bottle. Perrault's tale "Bluebeard", which is the basis of this article, also has a magical element in the background. The long beard of the protagonist of the tale hints at him.
The meaning of hair and, in particular, a beard in magical manipulations and in the symbolism of the other world is so obvious and widespread in all cultures that it is not worth talking about it in more detail. The color of this beard requires more explanation. It turns out that the blue color throughout the Indo-European culture is also associated with the deadly principle and magical powers. For example, in the Icelandic sagas, blue robes are worn by all avengers and assassins.
There is a common European tradition of portraying wizards in blue robes. The Mother of God herself wears blue robes as a symbol of sorrow. Shiva carries the epithet "Sineshey" as a symbol of the terrible poison with which he will poison the world at the end of the kalpa. And his body is colored blue. Almost all Tibetan fearsome deities are colored blue. In many American tribes, blue is known as a symbol of death. In the Maya tribes, the sacrifice before sacrifice was painted blue. Propp cites the example of one researcher who believes that Bluebeard symbolizes death itself.
Carefully reading the article by Z. Freud, "Eerie", one can find confirmation of the idea that both versions of fairy tales are about the same. Listing what can create the impression of the creepy, Freud writes that the creepy can be created because all your desires are fulfilled in an incomprehensible, magical way.
Melanie Klein in her work "On the development of mental activity" says that extremely dangerous objects are split off into the deep layers of the unconscious, are not accepted by the Ego and are constantly expelled, without taking part in the formation of the Super-Ego. Moreover, among them there are those that are perceived as killed and damaged objects. Obviously, these are the objects that are described in the tales of the forbidden room.
As you know, the strengthening of the ego occurs due to integration with some split off or projected parts of the personality. Actually, this is what psychoanalysis does, this is its goal. It can be assumed with a high degree of probability that there are parts of the personality that are so terrible and frightening that they cannot integrate with ordinary psychological methods, and there is no need for this. Since they are associated with very scary fantasies. But these parts, stored in the deep layers of the unconscious, and dormant there, obviously strive to break through into consciousness.
Obviously, this can happen through some kind of magical rituals, during which there is an identification with these images, for example, in the sects of all kinds of Satanists. The same can happen when performing destructive actions. For example, in armed conflicts. Some mental disorders also contribute to this dynamic. But identification is still not the integration of the ego with the object. After the integration of the parts with the ego, as you know, its strengthening occurs. When identifying, obviously, we are not talking about a real strengthening of the ego, but the feeling that such an increase is taking place is obviously present. In this case, we are talking about introjective identification and experiences of omnipotence.
For such sensations and experiences, magic rituals were carried out. Magic is always a search for omnipotence. The dream of strength is the eternal dream of man. Therefore, identification with these eerie images, which promise omnipotence, despite the fact that it can lead to confusion between the self and the object, is an attractive force for a certain group of people. We can find confirmation of this idea in ethnography. Z. Freud in his work "Totem and Taboo", describing unconscious fantasies, tends to think that in a primitive person, thought immediately turns into action. And an act replaces a thought for him. He gracefully ends his article with the phrase: "in the beginning there was a case." Therefore, it is useful to remember that fairy tales also reflect rituals that were literally performed in antiquity.
Many ethnographers write about real secret rooms and their connection with initiation rites. But for obvious reasons, very little is known about what was in these rooms. It is known, for example, that there were images of animals. It is also known that the rites of initiation into sorcerers presuppose the symbolic death of the hero and the “dismemberment” of his body in order to “reassemble it again in a different capacity”. Propp quotes a certain Voas telling about the initiation in the Kwakiutl tribe, which was carried out in a secret room, where no one was admitted except the initiate. In a specially performed song, it is sung: "You are coming close to the secret room, great wizard, you were inside the secret room …"
Anyone who has visited it is filled with magical powers. This is the purpose of the visit. In psychoanalytic terms, entering the secret room is for the realization of omnipotent fantasies.
At this point it is time to return to the fairy tale "Bluebeard" again. Many, if not all, know the tale itself, but obviously few people know that "Bluebeard" is a real person. Only in life did he bear a completely different name. Gilles de Rais, Marshal of France, fearless warrior and commander, on account of which several fortresses taken, hero of the war of liberation, personal squire and close friend and assistant of Jeanne D'Arc.
The only person who with his squad dared to try to free her from captivity, but was late. And at the same time a great killer and a sadist. Condemned to being burned at the stake by both a secular court for murder and a church court for witchcraft. The magical and ritual context of his crimes was inextricably linked with his personal psychopathology. The macabre and the magical are linked in this story, because they belong to the same temporary historical layer, when magical rituals were accompanied by bloody rituals. This is true both for the development of human society, when such actions were carried out literally, but, which is especially important for us, it is also true for individual development. Although in individual development this happens only at the level of fantasy. The time that the child spends at the mother's breast is known to be filled with aggressive instincts of great strength. But this is also the time when the child operates either exclusively or mainly with magical thinking. The period when a person is almost completely helpless is filled with fantasies of omnipotence, and magic is the answer to this need. Which is rooted in omnipotency fantasies. With some psychopathology, these archaic experiences become, as it were, accessible and powerfully assert their rights.
As was the case with Gilles de Rais.
In our individual development we have experienced a phase characteristic of the animism of primitive peoples. The memory of her lives in the corners of our personality, and experiences can sometimes creep out of there suddenly, giving rise to a feeling of revival of what has frozen, pretending to be lifeless.
But what is the key that opens the forbidden door?
Numerous stories about the forbidden room, and similar ones, speak of the great importance of such a factor as curiosity. Obviously, this, most often encouraged quality in society, in reality is not always unambiguously colored in light colors. And it should also be under control. There are some types of curiosity that imperatively demand to know what is inside the object, regardless of the desires of the object itself. It is this that underlies the curiosity of children tearing off the wings of butterflies, and according to the research of psychoanalysts, it may underlie the so-called unmotivated crimes. Which are actually very motivated, except that their motives are hidden in the abyss of the unconscious. In fact, this is not even curiosity, but a narcissistic intrusion into the object. As you know, Leonardo da Vinci, who retained a childish curiosity about the world until old age, had among his inventions a machine for chopping off legs. We do not know anything about the character of Bluebeard, but the information that the story about Gilles de Rais left us confirms that from childhood he was distinguished by a very inquisitive mind. But nevertheless, curiosity is hardly the key, most likely it is the ring on which this key hangs.
Although curiosity is an almost invariably mentioned factor in all these stories, they still enter the room for omnipotence. Even though Eve is curious, the phrase of Satan makes her break the prohibition: “you will be like gods”. The search for omnipotence is the main motive, and obviously the key to the forbidden door. Culture is a door and a lock, which is still opened with a key called desire. Including the desire for omnipotence. Gilles de Rais was an educated and cultured man of his time. And even in his youth, he collected a collection of rare manuscripts in his castles. But at the end of his life, he collected another eerie collection that witnesses at the trial spoke about.
Obviously, his aggressive desires turned out to be stronger than the prohibitions of culture. Z. Freud in his work "Dissatisfaction with culture" writes that the biggest obstacle on the way to culture is the tendency to aggression of a person against each other. And even connects the very question of the fate of the human race from whether culture will be able to curb the human primary urge of aggression and self-destruction. He is far from being optimistic about this. And he ends his work with the phrase: “But who can foresee the outcome of the struggle and predict on whose side the victory will be? “What is true for humanity as a whole is all the more important for the individual.
Tales of Forbidden Rooms tell about aggressive desires, very archaic, and monstrous in order to be realized by modern man. In particular, we are talking about the only archaic desire that is considered defeated by culture - about cannibalism. And also about the desire for omnipotence, which are locked behind the door of culture. But they can easily be discovered, since a person has free will. In some Russian tales about the forbidden closet, the hero finds there a serpent chained to the wall. Who is very emaciated and asks to drink, since he has not drunk for a thousand years.
But whether it is worth the hero to satisfy this desire, you need to think carefully. Therefore, for those who come to the forbidden door and tremble with curiosity, it would be nice to know that this is exactly the trembling of objects ready to come to life, and to recall the warning of F. Nietzsche: him”.
References
Klein M. “On the development of mental activity”.
Propp V. Ya. “The historical roots of the fairy tale”.
Freud Z. Totem and Taboo.
Freud Z. "Dissatisfaction with culture."
Freud Z. "Terrible".
Hinshelwood R. Dictionary of Kleinian Psychoanalysis.
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