ABSTRACT
Madness has featured as a potentially rational explanation for the supernatural. Madness, along with dreams and drugs, is labelled a 'real-imaginary' explanation. In such situations, the potential for a supernatural explanation of events is ruled out because, in reality, no event has actually taken place. It is nothing more than the product of a deranged mind. The most notable of the changes effected to Le Horla between its 1886 and 1887 publications is the shift from a framed story in which an initial heterodiegetic voice introduces an embedded homodiegetic voice to a narrative presented in diary format. The comparison of the impact of madness in Le Horla and The Double undertaken in this chapter reveals a striking irony. Contrary to expectations, it is, in fact, Dostoevskii's ostensibly heterodiegetic text which provides the more extreme illustration of the consequences of a single, restricted voice.
