Fuseli's Nightmare

Abstract

To the Editor:— I was interested in Dr. Schneck's excellent article on Henry Fuseli (207:725, 1969). "The Nightmare" is, of course, his best known work. Dr. Schneck has argued convincingly that "The Nightmare" represents the well-known clinical syndrome of sleep paralysis. Critics of Fuseli's work, eg, Sacheverell Sitwell, have also commented on the quality of "static horror" that they project. Did Fuseli himself suffer from sleep paralysis, which as Dr. Schneck points out, can be accompanied by terrifying hypnagogic hallucinations? There is another feature of Fuseli's work which is worthy of comment. This is the frequent juxtaposition of large and small figures. The demoniac figure squatting on the abdomen and chest of the sleeping woman in "The Nightmare" is a dwarf. In Fuseli's drawing "The Fireplace," a woman of normal proportions with a statuesque body is standing in front of a fireplace. She is attended on each side by