Psychoanalytic Literary Criticism: The Tradition of Psychoanalysis

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Psychoanalytic Literary Criticism
Introduction
We have various types of art and their critics too. Newspapers, televisions, blogs, magazine refer to literature. Critic’s deals with evaluating and interpreting of art work. Criticism will help one to know whether a certain piece of work is worth to be read or watched. Literary criticism started the days when Plato reigned (Luborsky, 1-270). From since then it has developed and matured to high level, and giving us parameter to study literature. There are various methods to dissect written works.
To understand the significance of literary criticism, everyone needs to comply with fact that he/she has attended any English class in his/her live. Assume, abruptly somebody tells you to analyze the work of a certain writer. To be able to come up with right analyses of any piece of written literature then, knowledge of criticism of literature has to be on our figure tips. One can evaluate literature in many ways; some approaches deals with born place of author and others with think that prior information is irreverent (Luborsky, 1-270). In our case we are going to deal with psychoanalytic literary criticism.
Psychoanalytic literary is technique of literary evaluation and literary theory of which method, concept and form is affected by the tradition psychoanalysis which was started by a person known as Sigmund Freud (Gabbard 1-175). Psychoanalytic reading was practiced since immemorial; this made it be developed to heterogeneous tradition. Céline superman quoted that this type of criticism doesn’t encompass unified field. However variants result nearly to a certain degree, implying that literature has psyche.
Tenets as referenced to topic of study means, a belief, doctrine or principle believed to be true on a theory. Psychoanalytic critic’s theory has various basic tenets. These tenets build the theory. According to Alexander (107-185) hysteria comes as result of traumatic kind of experience, that blocks enough expression and this manifests itself in symptoms which appear physically. According to the theory, a repressed mind or memory of an early sexual abuse to child (molestation) is known to be main cause of hysterical/obsession symptoms. Other tenets include, human attitude, mannerism, and his experience are widely influenced through irrational drives that are rooted in our unconscious. Also, it becomes necessary to bypass resistance due to psychological using defense mechanisms form to bring awareness of drives (Alexander 107-185).
Conflicts between the unconscious and conscious or due to repressed material may materialize in form of mental and emotional disturbances. This can include; depression, anxiety, neurotic traits (Alexander 107-185). Liberating unconscious as an element is achieved by bringing this item to conscious mind through skilled guidance like therapeutic intervention.
The psychoanalytic approach gives the assumption that mind as a psychological apparatus needs will need energy to make it work (think, feeling, remember and planning) this energy is assumed to come from Eros (libido) and Thanatos (The Psychoanalytic Review 63). The thought is that at any time some amount of energy is used, and if for the moment it is used to handle anxieties and repress thinking then it isn’t used fruitfully. Through resolving neuroses, this energy can be used productively. Considering physic determinism whereby everything that happens in humans has a cause. Seeming contradiction of mind and behavior has a way to be resolved.
The unconscious urges are of high importance in getting ones behavior. Freud believed that as humans we are driven by, unconscious, animalistic, aggression and fundamentally, this qualities sometimes conflict with wishes of the society. Another assumption to make is of topography of mind which encompasses of unconscious, pre-conscious and conscious. Unconscious is seen to be the large of mind, hidden from our view. Pre -conscious is noticed by waterline and is a zone of fleeting glimpse of the unconscious, flickering across the screen (The Psychoanalytic Review 63).
The structure of mind to deal with Id, Ego and Superego. Id refers to the emotional and irrational portion of the mind; the ego refers to the rational part of mind and superego is the moral part. On the ways of dealing with conflicts of psyche. One’s character is determined by how you handle unconscious conflicts as it deals with Id, Ego and superego. These skills evolve from the way people deal with their psychological stages at your childhood level (affected by early experiences). Last assumption of psychoanalytic is that will of life being painful and the need to look for defense mechanisms which can shield us from pain. These defenses are of great importance since they give us desire of pleasure.
Free association method is one of the basic methods used in psychoanalytic critic theory .it was used during 1892-1898. It was used in instead of hypnosis in Freud’s therapy.it involves gathering of free associations from patients at time of cure. The association will be used to point inner conflicts and also repressed drives found in the neurotic symptoms. According to Alexander (107-185), the activity of psychic doesn’t be under free choice. What our mind produces always has unconscious root which can be reached only by using method of free associations. How it works to someone new to theory, an example can be a person lying on couch relaxing, this person will speak anything that comes across his mind without thinking of specific item to talk. Thoughts in his /her mind are free and flow without intervention.
Freudian slips and mistakes is the second method, and mostly this method refer to common mistakes like forgery, forgetting names ,book titles .pronunciation errors(saying word we expect you say),wring errors (you write what you had not intended).Freud termed these mistakes as lapses to show that were not harmful but meaningful as related to his theory(Auchincloss 1-300).There are also symptomatic acts related to crazy actions like playing with your wedding ring, a man calling his girlfriend in order to break up with her. Freud analyzed these lapses in his book entitled (the psychology of everyday life).
Dream interpretation method appears to be the fascinating field in psychoanalysis. Messages mostly received the evaluation through dreams and symbols. Dreams convey message as it appears from the bible illusions, they can tell us what to happen or give warning of a scary thing to happen in future. First we have to agree that dream is not context predictive neither is it spiritual. Interpretation of dreams is a tool to help in knowing psychic contents. Ideas before linked to repressed emotions –inside unconscious mind can manifest neurotic symptoms (Auchincloss 1-300).
Before we sum up methods there is interpretation of symbols and their meanings. Symbol is defined to be where item compared disappears. An example in case of symbol is, snake and staff. When object compared is no longer there we are left with the symbol which is the staff. Symbols mostly happen in cases of dreams and in nocturnal fantasies as well. They can also be found in the people way of life that is culture, folklore, myths and religion beliefs.to amazement some symbols, which we believe recognized but, we don’t of them because we don’t know how they acquired their meaning.
From above prose written, it easy to deduce that the theory of psychoanalytic literary theory is based on fact that glimpse of factors that inhibit our emotions and behavior we aren’t aware of. These factors end up causing unhappiness, which can be seen through distinguishable symptoms. Finally treatment of psychoanalytic is individualized and seeks to show unconscious factors relationship and mental health.

Work cited

Alexander, Franz G. Psychoanalytic Therapy: Principles and Application. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1980. Print.pg 107-185.
Auchincloss, Elizabeth L. The Psychoanalytic Model of the Mind. , 2015. Print.1-300.
Gabbard, Glen O. Psychodynamic Psychiatry in Clinical Practice. Washington, D.C: American Psychiatric Pub, 2005. Print.1-175.
Luborsky, Lester. Principles of Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy: A Manual for Supportive- Expressive Treatment. New York: Basic Books, 1984. Print.1-270.
The Psychoanalytic Review. New York, N.Y.: W.A. White & S.E. Jelliffe, 1913. Print.Pg 163.