170700 VO Dracula, Freud & Sherlock Holmes (2021S)

In the last years of the 19th century, three white, bearded men sit at their desks simultaneously but in different places in Europe, working on masterpieces: Bram Stoker is writing the novel Dracula, a hymn to superstition and pseudoscience. Sigmund Freud is fine-tuning his Interpretation of Dreams, the - according to him - scientific interpretation of the expressions of the unconscious, and Conan Doyle is sending Sherlock Holmes, the embodiment of strict rationality, from success to success.
The heroes of these world successes are semioticians and detectives: as trackers, Dr. Van Helsing, Sigmund Freud and Sherlock Holmes are on the trail of dark secrets. At the same time, they are also shapeshifters. Dracula, the alter-ego of Van Helsing, can take on many forms, Freud sees himself as a master of transforming manifest forms back into latent content, and Sherlock Holmes is such an unrivaled master of disguise that even Dr. Watson keeps falling into his trap. This course will explore similarities and differences, and not least the different "worldviews" embodied in these world-famous characters.