Mirror, Mirror on the Wall

On the 22nd of January (I know I’m slightly late, but oh well), I attended one of the Romancing the Gothic seminars. Romancing the Gothic is a series of talks organised by Dr Sam Hirst. Each week, different academics talk about various aspects of Gothic Literature. These talks occur every weekend. This particular talk was titled Mirror, Mirror on the wall: Paintings, Mirrors, and Monstrous Doubles in Irish Gothic Writing and was given by Dr Madeline Potter.

Dr Potter started the talk by giving context to her talk, which included explaining the Gothic double, a trope often used to express an inner struggle of a character. Potter also explained that the trope of the double is not just linked to the Gothic and, according to Dale Townshend, goes back as far as the development of Western thought and imagination and can be traced back to Aristotle and Plato. Medieval works…