Saturday, August 22, 2009

Rhymes With Doppelgänger

Spooky stuff: Byron, Donne, Shelley, Goethe and Owen all experienced the phenomenon of doppelgängers. (Link to Lord Byron's story on Futility Closet; see other poets' experiences at the bottom of the linked post.)

This doppelgänger business is apparently not rare, nor is it restricted to poets. I've myself heard a couple of stories from family members. As with the above poets, the sightings were connected with news of death or childbirth. I wonder why?

Actually, it might be fun to run into one's doppelgänger on the street. Though one may have to employ techniques from this classic scene to separate the real one from the spirt. (BTW, that clip is hands down one of the top 5 funniest sequences in cinema history.)

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Apparently, with poets, doppleganger sightings are only the tip of the iceberg. Colin Wilson's "The Occult" devotes a whole chapter to poets and their mysterious tendencies.

Thanks for the youtube link. Some classic tomfoolery there. What are the other four? :)

km said...

Anon: Thanks. And I used to think musicians and painters were the weirdest people on earth.

I do remember reading that Wilson book back in high school, but not this specific chapter on poets and their "tendencies". I should look it up one of these days.

The other 4 from the Top 5 are hidden in YouTube somewhere. (Or they are *all* in "Duck Soup", a Monty Python sketch, a Buster Keaton movie and a Woody Allen film??) :)

Tabula Rasa said...

i can't click that link right now, but is it the mirror scene from duck soup??!

km said...

TR: ha ha, great guess :)