Doubles: Studies in Literary History

This fascinating study explores the image of the double as it appears in literature, examining the doppelgänger, the alter ego, the second self, and the modern multiple self in a wide variety of literary settings. Focusing mainly on the Romantic period, the fin-de-siècle, and what could be called the romantic modern world, Miller considers a broad array of subjects, including the equivocal language of Romanticism, the orphan delirium of the Gothic heritage, the themes of isolation, escape, and the after-life, and the phenomena of secrecy and literary anonymity. Over twenty authors are examined in detail, including Poe, Dickens, Dostoyevsky, Henry James, Robert Frost, Sylvia Plath, Norman Mailer, and Saul Bellow.