The Sandman by E. T. A. Hoffmann

First published: "Der Sandmann," 1816 (English translation, 1844)

Type of plot: Epistolary

Time of work: The early nineteenth century

Locale: Germany

Principal Characters:

• Nathanael, a student at the University of G.
• Clara, a distant cousin and Nathanael's fiancé
• Lothar, her brother
• Coppelius, a lawyer
• Giuseppe Coppola, a trader in barometers, eyeglasses, and optical instruments
• Spalanzani, a professor of physics
• Olimpia, Spalanzani's "daughter," a doll

The Story

In the first of the three letters that open the story, Nathanael writes Lothar, a distant cousin who lives with his sister Clara and Nathanael's mother, of the distress he has felt following the recent visit to his room by an instrument trader named Giuseppe Coppola. Nathanael is convinced that Coppola is the lawyer Coppelius, who was responsible for the death of Nathanael's father years earlier during his childhood. As a child, Nathanael believed Coppelius to be the Sandman, who, according to a nursemaid's fairy tale, threw sand into children's eyes when they did not want to go to bed, causing their eyes to spring bloodily out of their sockets. One evening Nathanael decided to investigate the Sandman's activities in his father's room and hid himself behind a curtain in his father's closet. When the Sandman entered the room and Nathanael discovered that it was Coppelius, an old lawyer who occasionally had dinner with the family and whom the children found ugly and repulsive, Nathanael was transfixed. As the two men worked on a steaming experiment, his father suddenly appeared to him to be Coppelius's satanic double. When Coppelius shouted "Eyes here, eyes here," Nathanael fell out of his hiding place onto the floor, whereupon Coppelius threatened to burn out his eyes, causing Nathanael to faint. A year or so later, during Coppelius's next visit, an explosion in the laboratory killed the father.

Nathanael has addressed the letter by mistake to his fiancé, Lothar's sister, Clara, who tries to reassure Nathanael in the story's second letter that all the horrible things he experienced existed only in his imagination and not in reality. She recommends that he forget all about Coppelius and Coppola and adds that by recognizing them as phantoms of his real self he will be free of their evil influence over him.

A somewhat more sober Nathanael tells Lothar in the third letter of his acquaintance with a new physics professor by the name of Spalanzani, who has known Coppola for years and claims that Coppola has left the city. Nathanael now doubts that Coppola and Coppelius are identical, yet insists that he cannot rid himself of the image of Coppelius's hideous bearing. He also mentions that on the way to Spalanzani's lecture he caught sight of the professor's daughter Olimpia, whom Spalanzani keeps locked in a glass cabinet behind closed curtains. Her eyes seemed to stare at him, though she appeared not to see him.

At this point, the narrator breaks in to say that he has prefaced his own narration with these three letters because he knows of no other beginning that could adequately reflect the ardent intensity of Nathanael's story. The narrator then continues with Nathanael's return home, where the coolly rational Clara again tries to dismiss Nathanael's demoniac visions as imaginary. The ill effect of Coppola's visit on Nathanael, however, is apparent to everyone. In a long, murky poem, he depicts how Coppelius was destroying their love. According to the poem, at their marriage Coppelius touched Clara's eyes, which sprang into Nathanael's chest "like bloody sparks," and then threw Nathanael into a rapidly turning circle of fire. When Clara tells him to destroy the poem, he responds by calling her a lifeless "automat" (automaton). Lothar arrives and in a heated exchange of insults challenges Nathanael to a duel, which ends, however, with apologies and a reconciliation.

Nathanael returns to G. and finds his apartment destroyed by fire. His new room is across from Professor Spalanzani's house, and he can see into the room where Olimpia remains seated motionless for hours; he is not, however, moved by her steadfast gaze toward him. Just as he is writing to Clara, Coppola appears at his door and pulls thousands of eyeglasses out of his pockets. Nathanael is overwhelmed by the flickering lenses, which seem like a thousand eyes staring at him. As Coppola lays more glasses on the table, "flaming glances" leap around and shoot "their blood-red rays into Nathanael's chest." Nathanael, however, calms down enough to persuade Coppola to remove the glasses and settles instead for a small telescope. Involuntarily he looks into Olimpia's room with the telescope. At first her eyes seem fixed and dead, but then they become more and more lively the closer he looks at them. Coppola demands his money and leaves, laughing loudly. In the next few days, Nathanael thinks only of Olimpia and sees her image everywhere except in her room, where the curtains have been closed.

Spalanzani gives a ball and concert in order to introduce his daughter to the public. Olimpia is beautifully dressed and has a wonderful figure, though her movement is a bit measured and stiff. She plays the piano with great skill and sings with a bright, though brittle, voice. Nathanael stands at the back of the room and uses his pocket telescope to see her better. He becomes inflamed with longing and yells out her name, to the consternation of those around him. When her concert ends, he races up to her to invite her to dance. Although her dancing is rather mechanical and his heated advances are met with cold and laconic responses, he falls so deeply in love with her that he is oblivious to the snickering of the young people behind his back or the end of the ball. Spalanzani is delighted with Nathanael's interest in his daughter and invites him back any time.

Nathanael now lives only for Olimpia and reads to her from his writings for hours in her room, while she sits passively staring him in the eye. Her only words are "ah, ah" and an occasional "good night, my beloved." One day Nathanael decides to go over and propose to her, but on the stairs to Spalanzani's study he hears a horrible banging, swearing, and arguing. It is the voices of Spalanzani and the dreaded Coppelius. Nathanael bursts into the room and sees Spalanzani and Coppola fighting over Olimpia's body. Coppola wrests her away, hits the professor with her, and runs off, laughing madly, with her on his shoulder. Nathanael notices that her face has no eyes, only empty sockets. Spalanzani implores Nathanael to run after Coppelius, who is stealing his best automat and ruining twenty years of work. A pair of bloody eyes lie on the floor. Spalanzani picks them up and throws them at Nathanael, who tries to strangle him but is restrained and taken to an insane asylum.

When Nathanael regains consciousness, he is in bed at home, with Clara, Lothar, and his mother standing nearby. Nathanael appears to be fully recovered from his bout of madness and is now quieter. The family is preparing to move to a new house, and Nathanael intends again to marry Clara. In town one day, the lovers decide to climb the tower of the city hall. Nathanael pulls out his telescope and by chance looks at Clara, whose eyes suddenly seem to spew fire. He leaps wildly at her and tries to kill her, but Lothar manages to get her away from Nathanael and back down to safety. Nathanael meanwhile begins racing around the gallery of the tower, screaming, "Turn, circle of fire." A crowd gathers below, and when Nathanael sees Coppelius within it, he leaps to his death. Several years later, people claim to have seen Clara and a new husband playing with their two lively young boys in front of a country house.