Suspiria de Profundis · Chapter
The Apparition of the Brocken explained
The narrator describes the Brocken spectre, a mountain phenomenon, and uses it as a metaphor for the Dark Interpreter, a figure in his dreams that reflects his inner nature.
What happens
The narrator describes the Brocken spectre, a mountain phenomenon, and uses it as a metaphor for the Dark Interpreter, a figure in his dreams that reflects his inner nature. He explores themes of suffering, memory, and the subconscious through experiments testing the phantom's response to religious and emotional stimuli.
Themes in this chapter
Suffering and Grief
The chapter explores ineffable childhood affliction and grief, symbolized by the veiled head of the apparition and Judaea weeping under a palm tree.
Dreams and the Subconscious
The Dark Interpreter is introduced as a dream figure that reflects the narrator's inner thoughts, subject to the transformative power of dreams.
Memory and the Past
The narrator recalls a childhood affliction that returns in memory like April showers, linking past grief to present experience.
Characters to notice
- The Narrator
The narrator guides the reader through the apparition of the Brocken and introduces the Dark Interpreter as a reflection of his own mind.
- Thomas De Quincey
Implied as the authorial voice behind the narrator, reflecting on his own dreams and opium experiences.
Key passages
“Immediately you see that the apparition of the Brocken veils his head, after the model of Judaea weeping under her palm-tree, as if he also had a human heart, and that he also, in childhood, having suffered an affliction which was ineffable, wished by these mute symbols to breathe a sigh towards heaven in memory of that affliction”
The Brocken spectre covers its head like the weeping figure of Judaea, suggesting it too has experienced an unspeakable childhood sorrow and silently mourns it.
This passage connects the phantom's gesture to the narrator's own grief, emphasizing the theme of ineffable suffering.
“Such a relation does the Dark Interpreter, whom immediately the reader will learn to know as an intruder into my dreams, bear to my own mind. He is originally a mere reflex of my inner nature.”
The Dark Interpreter, who appears in my dreams, is initially just a reflection of my own mind and thoughts.
This introduces the Dark Interpreter as a dream figure that mirrors the narrator's subconscious.