PsychoanalyticCriticism

Definition&Description When looking through a psychoanalytical lens, a critic is going to focus on the human psyche, which has been defined in several ways by different critics. The basic idea is that the mind has three controlling factors: � the Freudian ego, superego, and id � the Jungian conscious, preconscious, and unconscious 1.CharacterAnalysis � Psychoanalytic critics can look at a character with either of those two concepts in mind, delving into the how’s and why’s of the human development that is taking place within a character. � They may look for a particular pattern in the development of a character and how that character has been defined through that pattern. � An analysis of a character is specifically “psychological,” however, when it attempts to describe and understand a character’s behavior, motivations, and mental and emotional traits in the same way it would if that character were a real human being.

2.AuthorAnalysis � Critics can look at a text as if it were the unconscious desires of an author and do a psychobiography on the author. � Critics may examine how a work was produced and how it reflects its author’s psyche. 3.AudienceAnalysis � Critics examine a work’s effect on its audience or, in what is called “reader-response” criticism, how audiences experience a text mentally, emotionally, etc. Whatever a critic decides to focus on, he/she will often focus on symbolism—images brought up and suggested—possibly archetypes, and development of the human psyche.

Keepscrolling...

FreudianApproach

(1856-1939,Austrianneurologist) Freud’sMajorPremises � Freud was a determinist – he believed that everything is caused. � Most of the individual’s mental processes are unconscious. � There are unconscious motives, and people don’t always know why they do what they

do. Example: 1. Kid doesn’t want to go on Scout hike. 2. “Accidentally” slips on stairs at school, spraining his ankle. 3. Can’t go, yet heals almost miraculously.

� Most human behavior is motivated ultimately by anger or sexuality.

� Individuals are conflicted by the need to conform to societal expectations; these are

simultaneously desirable, unmet, and repressed. � Because of the powerful social taboos attached to certain impulses, many of our desires

and memories are repressed.

� Repression is the key concept behind unconscious motivation—repression occurs without conscious will.

� When an idea is painful to the conscious ego, it is repressed—shoved out of the center of consciousness.

� FYI: repression = unaware, unconscious; suppression = aware, conscious

Benefits/Offerings � The goal of psychoanalysis is to reveal these “splits” in the self and teach subjects to

accept their fragmentation. � Psychoanalysis examines the articulation of our most private anxieties and meanings

and gives us a perspective on them as cultural formations. � Psychoanalytic thought is part of 20th-century thought, correcting the Cartesian

mind/body split, to see humans as complete beings.

� Psychoanalysis offers one approach to the questions of good and evil, and especially suffering, which plague humanity.

ForLiteratureSpecifically � Critics taking a Freudian approach attempt to psychoanalyze authors or characters,

usually finding the standard anxieties and complexes. � A Freudian discussion of a work’s effect will often emphasize the role of wish-

fulfillment in the experience of reading.

� Freudian critics often find in literature the kinds of symbols Freud analyzed in his

patients’ dreams, and they often attribute to these symbols a sexual significance. � Psychoanalysis doesn’t provide a standard by which to judge the aesthetic greatness of

a literary work. � Readers uses texts to deal with their own psychological issues and to help them find

successful solutions within textual themes. � Readers’ egos won’t allow “in” parts of a literary work that don’t fit into their own

understanding of themselves. � Psychoanalysis is a “talking cure”; therefore, language and narrative are fundamental to

it; in a sense, psychoanalytic therapy is the retelling/reconstruction of a person’s life. � As psychoanalysis deals with language and interpretation, it necessarily fosters a

mindset of suspicion, that there are motives and meanings disguised by, and working through, other meanings; hence, the term “subtext.”

� Psychoanalysis also deals with motives, especially hidden or disguised motives; as such it helps clarify literature on two levels: the level of the writing itself, and the level of character action within the text.

� Psychoanalysis deals with many basic elements we might think of as poetic or literary, including metaphor and metonymy (substitution); Freud deals with this particularly in his work on the interpretation of dreams, and Lacan sees metaphor and metonymy as fundamental to the workings of the psyche.

______________________________________________________________________________________ Conscious: Perceives and records external reality and is the reasoning part of the mind. The conscious senses, orders, and directly interacts with the external world. Unconscious: Controls a large part of our actions; receives and stores our hidden desires, ambitions, fears, passions, and irrational thoughts. The unconscious consists of repressed instincts, ideas, and images.

______________________________________________________________________________________ Dynamic Model: The dichotomy/conflict consisting of the conscious (the rational) and the unconscious (the irrational). Battle between external reality (represented in the conscious) and the instinctual drives of the individual (represented in the unconscious).

Economic Model: Similar to the dynamic model in that the unconscious and conscious battle for control of a person’s actions but also deals with the pleasure and reality principles. Describes the pleasure principle (individual bodily drives for pleasure), which must be constrained by the reality principle (the practical concerns of the society) for society to run smoothly. ______________________________________________________________________________________ Pleasure Principle: Craves only pleasures and instantaneous satisfaction of instinctual drives ignoring moral and sexual boundaries established by society. Reality Principle: The part of the psyche that recognizes the need for societal standards and regulations on pleasure. ______________________________________________________________________________________ Id: The term “id” is Latin for the word “it.” May be defined as the part of the psyche or personality responsible for basic life urges, the storehouse of life instincts. It’s also the irrational, unknown, and unconscious part of the psyche, as well as the repository of the libido. It operates without concern for consequences, without regard for the needs of others. It’s totally selfish, demanding swift satisfaction and fulfillment of desires, the reduction of tension. The id is the primary source of all psychic energy. It functions to fulfill the primordial life principle, which Freud considers the pleasure principle. Freud describes this region as “a chaos, a cauldron of seething excitement with no organization and no unified will, only an impulsion to obtain satisfaction for the instinctual needs, in accordance with the pleasure principle.”

Ego: This is the rational governing agent of the psyche. Operates according to reality and acts as a regulating influence for the id, supervising and resisting the id’s drives. Though the ego lacks the strong vitality of the id, it’s needed to filter and control the instinctual drives of the id so that these energies may be released in nondestructive behavioral patterns. The ego functions by the reality principle; consequently, it serves as the intermediary between the world within and the world without. Rationalization is an ego defense mechanism. All defense mechanisms involve some degree of repression—shoving the unpleasant truth out of the consciousness. As long as the ego defense mechanisms operate, a person can maintain sanity and contact/connect with the real world. Superego: The part of the psyche that acts as a filtering agent for the id by following rules—set by society and parents—that forces unacceptable desires back into the unconscious. The superego’s primary function is to protect society. It is the moral censoring agency, the repository of conscience and pride. Acting either directly or through the ego, the superego serves to repress or inhibit the drives of the id, to block off and thrust back into the unconscious those impulses toward pleasure that society regards as unacceptable. Feelings such as shame and guilt provide additional restraints on primitive id impulses. The superego is dominated by the morality principle. Freud saw neuroses as arising basically out of a conflict between the id and the superego.

� A newborn baby’s personality is almost pure id. The neonate has no concept of reality or morality. These concepts are acquired by learning. � Gradually, out of these encounters with the external environment, the ego is formed. The ego is in contact with the external world and is guided by the reality principle. � The last part of the personality to emerge is the superego. It forms out of the ego as the child encounters the values of his parents. The superego represents standards and morals—or self-control.

______________________________________________________________________________________ Oedipus Complex: Manifestations of boy having rivalry with father for the love of his mother.

Electra Complex: Female grows attachment to father but comes to identify with mother because she realizes she is already castrated, and she seeks to have a man like her mother has.

______________________________________________________________________________________ Libido: The source of our psychosexual desires and all our psychic energy; housed in the id. In modern medical terms, this is one’s sexual drive. Phallic symbol: A masculine symbol. It is recognizable because its length exceeds its diameter. Yonic Symbol: A feminine symbol. It is recognizable because it is concave. ______________________________________________________________________________________ Condensations: A process to veil a direct meaning of a symbol in a dream. Displacement: Using another image to gear an emotion towards a real person, like hating Brother Brugger and dreaming about burning hamburgers; symbols that take the place of original desire. Latent Content: The dream’s underlying meaning; what the images mean—hidden by displacement and condensation.

Freudian-BasedLiteraryAnalysisQuestions —How do the operations of repression structure or inform the work? —What unconscious motives are operating in the main character(s); what core issues are

thereby illustrated; and how do these core issues structure or inform the piece? —Are there any Oedipal dynamics – or any other family dynamics – at work in the

text? —How do these patterns of behavior and family dynamics operate and what do

they reveal?

—How can characters’ behavior, narrative events, and/or images be explained in

terms of psychoanalytic concepts of any kind? For example, regression, crisis, projections, fear of or fascination with death, sexuality – which includes love and romance as well as sexual behaviors – as primary indicator of psychological identity or the operations of ego-id-superego.

—In what ways can we view a literary work as analogous to a dream? That is, how might recurrent or striking dream symbols reveal the ways in which the narrator or speaker is projecting his or her unconscious desires, fears, wounds, or unresolved conflicts onto other characters, onto the setting or onto the events portrayed?