THE AVATAR IN PANAMA - Theses - Flinders University

1.2 Fantastic Psychoanalysis and the Doppelganger The Avatar in PanamaMaupassant’s portrayal of his victimised hero has him beingconstantly tormented by an impending sense of foreboding and doom:J’ai sans cesse cette sensation affreuse d’undanger menaçant, cette appréhension d’unmalheur qui vient ou de la mort qui approche, cepressentiment qui est sans doute l’atteinte d’unmal encore inconnu, germant dans le sang etdans la chair (62). 65This unrelenting psychic pressure may furnish an explanationfor his impaired vision. The blurring of words, letters, and sounds heexperiences may be provoked by the perennial state of fear in which theprotagonist exists, which he mentions on several occasions: “A mesurequ’approche le soir, une inquiétude incompréhensible m’envahit,comme si la nuit cachait pour moi une menace terrible. Je dîne vite,puis j’essaye de lire mais je ne comprends pas les mots; je distingue àpeine les lettres” (63). 66He begins to believe an alien force is overwhelming anddeliberately deceiving him:qu’il existe près de moi un être invisible, qui senourrit de lait et d’eau; qui peut toucher auxchoses, les prendre et les changer de place,doué par conséquent d’une nature matérielle,bien qu’imperceptible pour nos sens, et quihabite comme moi, sous mon toit (82). 67Here begins the personalisation of the invisible being and itsimplication as the protagonist’s double:On avait donc bu cette eau? Qui? Moi? Moi,sans doute? Ce ne pouvait être que moi? Alors,j’étais somnambule, je vivais, sans le savoir, de65 “All the time I have this terrible feeling of imminent danger, this apprehension ofimpending misfortune or approaching death, this presentiment which is doubtless thefirst sign of some disease, as yet unknown, germinating in my blood and my flesh”(315). All translations are from “The Horla”, Selected Short Stories. Trans. RogerColet, (Middlesex: Penguin, 1971) 313-344.66 “As evening draws on an incomprehensible uneasiness comes over me, as if thedarkness held some dreadful threat for me for me. I dine hurriedly, then try to read; butI cannot understand the words; I can scarcely make out the letters” (315).67 “an invisible creature exists beside me which feeds on milk and water, which cantouch things, pick them up and move them about, which is therefore endowed with amaterial nature, imperceptible though it may be to our senses, and which is living likemyself beneath my roof…” (330).54