Sigmund Freud, as a 19th century neurologist, complexly studied the workings of the human mind, leading him to develop a controversial theory called psychoanalysis. He differentiated between what we consciously do and think and what we unconsciously repress, constructing a model of the distinct divisions of the human psyche and its processes. In this essay, I will explain Freud's theory and highlight its implications for literary criticism, as the unconscious thoughts of the characters and the writer come into play. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why violent video games should not be banned”?Get the original essayAccording to Freud's process of psychoanalysis, the mind does not exist as a single unit, but rather is separated into three divisions distinct: the conscious mind, the preconscious mind and the unconscious mind. Freud uses an iceberg analogy to better explain his ideas about the levels of the mind. Here the conscious mind is presented as comparable to the tip of an iceberg, the only part clearly exposed above sea level. This level encompasses the thoughts and feelings of which we are aware as well as our thought processes daily rationales. The preconscious exists just below "sea level" and can be accessed when necessary, but it is not constantly conscious, much like human memory. These are stored just outside of our awareness, but we can retrieve them in response to a trigger such as an old photo or a friend recalling a memory out loud. The larger part of the iceberg that lies deep underwater, out of sight, is analogous to Freud's idea of ​​the unconscious. It is a vast reservoir of thoughts of desires, fears and anxieties that are mostly socially unacceptable. One of his key ideas about this part of the mind is the idea that it operates outside of our awareness, while affecting our behavior and personality without us knowing it. The majority of this level is made up of what Freud called the “id,” the basic instincts and desires of the human mind. The id is composed of the life instinct (or eros), which determines sexual desire and sustenance, and the death instinct (or theros) which is responsible for aggression and self-destruction. Freud argued that the “ego” develops during early childhood as a means of integrating the primitive desires of the id into the reality of society in a safe and acceptable way. The “superego” is, according to Freud, the part of the brain that acts in accordance with moral expectations. Unlike the ego, the superego makes us feel guilty when we allow ourselves to act uncompromisingly on our primary desires. Freud described how this guilt or conscience prevents our unconscious desires from manifesting in a socially unacceptable way by stating that "conscience is the internal perception of the rejection of a particular wish operating within us"[1]. Critically, Freud's theory has implications for the nature of the characters and their unconscious motivations, leading the characters to adopt a new relational position in the story, perhaps even changing from a protagonist to an antagonist or vice versa. An example of this can be seen in Henry James' gothic novel The Turn of the Screw.[2] Throughout James' novel, we are presented with the story of a woman who, taken literally, is confronted with ghostly apparitions that haunt the house in which she becomes employed. However, read in the light of Freudian theory, these ghosts are more psychological than supernatural. Leonard Orrsupports this alternative view and asserts its alignment with Freud's theory since he argues that “seeing ghosts as hysterical projections of the narrator's disturbed mind… children are therefore victims; [it’s putting] emphasis on the governess’s unconscious and the tools of psychoanalysis”[3]. Indeed, from a Freudian point of view, the close and intimate relationship that the governess develops with Flora and Miles can be considered more perverse than maternal. Gary Gillard supports this notion by suggesting that the governess's repressed sexual desires "take the form of perverse projections of desire, directed toward the children, but not obviously emanating from the governess herself, but only latently revealed, after a process of psychoanalysis”[4]. Certainly, much of the governess's interaction with the children can be interpreted as having sexual overtones, such as when she describes how she "held [Miles] to [her] breast, where [she] could feel the fever suddenly from her little body. the formidable pulse of his little heart”[5]. If this view is to be accepted, perhaps the ghosts are not mere projections of his desire, but rather a product of his superego experiencing guilt. If she realizes that her actions are wrong, the apparitions can be a form of wish fulfillment, allowing her to alleviate her guilt by seeing herself as a protector of the children rather than an antagonist. Here, the governess has undergone a fundamental transition from hero to anti-hero when the text is approached from a Freudian perspective. Another key aspect of Freud's theory that has implications for literature is the Oedipus complex. Taking its name from the famous Greek tragedy Oedipus Rex about the man who unwittingly murders his father and marries his mother,[6] the theory is that all children must develop through an unconscious attraction to their mother. In the case of boys, this leads to an equally unconscious desire to get rid of their father, whom they see as the main competitor for the mother's affection. Indeed, Freud himself affirmed that “sexual desires towards the mother become more intense and the father is perceived as an obstacle; this gives rise to the Oedipus complex”[7]. Added to this is what Freud called “castration anxiety”. Meanwhile, the boys fear that their father will take away their penis, which classifies them as men, due to this perceived rivalry for the mother's love. To avoid this, boys resolve their fears by imitating their father's masculine traits and behaviors, hoping to one day have a sexual relationship with an equally maternal woman. According to Freud, girls are prone to the phenomenon of penis envy, in which they come to blame their mothers for their lack of male genitals, and then shift their unconscious sexual desire from their mother to their father. Instead of an Oedipus complex, daughters develop a similar complex, later called the Electra complex by Carl Jung, in which they experience rivalry with their mother for the father's attention. Unlike the male, the female need for domination by a parent manifests itself as anger rather than anxiety. This anger causes the girl to fear the loss of her mother's love as she begins to imitate her mother in the same way the boy imitates his father. With respect to literary criticism, Freud's theories of Electra and Oedipus complexes can have significant implications when applied to literary texts that feature a central parent-child relationship. What may appear to be a simple conflict over trivial mattersmay actually be a sign of an unconscious and unresolved Oedipus or Electra complex. A key example of this can be seen in the poem Medusa by Sylvia Plath.[8] From a Freudian point of view, the anonymous person to whom the speaker addresses the poem can be interpreted as the speaker's mother. The tone of the poem seems caught between resentment towards the mother and desire for the mother. She is clearly bitter towards her as she claims that "there is nothing between [them]" and perhaps, as Freud might suggest, this is the result of lasting anger towards her mother because of her unresolved desire for the penis and its tension linked to the desire of the father. This is further suggested when the speaker explains how his supposed mother continues to "cripple fighting lovers", implying that in his eyes not only has his mother stolen his father's love from him, but she is destroying it. also her relationship with her lover who replaces her father. In light of Freud's theory of the Electra complex, the meaning of the poem becomes one of maternal rivalry and an unresolved desire for possession of the father. In addition to a Freudian psychoanalysis of fictional literary characters, his theory can also be applied to writers themselves. . According to Freud, literary texts are akin to dreams in that they exist as manifestations of the subconscious desires and anxieties of the dreamer or writer. Indeed, he suggested that literary texts should receive treatment similar to that of dreams with regard to the process of interpreting and understanding their content. This is described in detail in Freud's text The Interpretation of Dreams[9] in which he proposes that dreams are a form of fulfillment of the mind's repressed unconscious desires that seep into consciousness during sleep. According to the work of Freud, “The interpretation of dreams is the royal road to knowledge of the unconscious activities of the mind”[10]. He argued that a dream is a combination of recent events that occurred in reality, together with repressed contents from the unconscious, which undergo the process of condensation to form an image or dream. From a Freudian perspective, literature and other works of art are similar in nature to dreams. This theory has several implications for writers, as Freudian critics may attempt to analyze their own unconscious thoughts through the psychoanalysis of their work. Hank de Berg emphasizes this when he states that "a psychoanalytic interpretation of literary texts and reactions to these texts can tell us a lot about people's unconscious desires, about how they were or were not able to realize these desires, about their education and on their interaction with their social environment”[11]. However, it is important to note that from a Freudian point of view, the projection of the author's psyche onto his literary text is completely involuntary. In other words, the writer is not only unaware that his subconscious desires and anxieties can manifest in this way, but that they even exist. Again, this is very similar to the Freudian view of dreams, which contain both manifest and latent content. Latent content is the manifestation of the unconscious in the dream, while manifest content is whatever one remembers upon waking. In conclusion, Freud's theory as a school of literary criticism serves to uncover the hidden meanings of the stories to delve into the unconscious of both. the characters and the writer. Literary works may appear at first glance to be the product of rational thought and creativity. However, when studied from a Freudian perspective, they are seen as the product of the writer's subconscious desires and anxieties. What, 2004), 11.