Literary Criticism of Matthew Lewis’ Novel, The Monk
Elliot B. Gose's essay "The Monk," from Imagination Indulged: The Irrational in the Nineteenth-Century Novel, is a psychological survey of Matthew Lewis' novel The Monk. Gose uses Freud's and Jung's psychological theories in his analysis of The Monk's author and characters.
To understand Gose's ideas, we must first contextualize his conception of Freud's and Jung's theories. According to Gose: According to Freud we must look behind conscious daydreaming, as well as behind unconscious sleep dreaming, for keys to the unsatisfied primitive desires of the self. According to Jung, when investigating such fantasy, we sometimes find ourselves in the presence of a vision that transcends the
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He sights the separation of Lewis' parents as a traceable indication of an event leading to Lewis' split psyche. Lewis lived with his father only. from the age of six, and followed his father's educational wishes. Then, as a young man, Lewis entered the Civil Service influenced by his mother's love of music and literature. Gose attributes Lewis' personality development to the constant companionship of his mother who was a timid and sensitive woman. Gose alludes to Freud's Oedipal complex in the significance he places on the fact that Lewis' mother's youthful appearance occasionally led to her being taken for his …show more content…
He believes that Lorenzo's descent into the underground burial vaults parallels the descent of the monster into the abyss because the "imagery of light and dark is as pronounced" (219). Additionally, he states that the hiding of Agnes' prison by a statue of St. Clare is symbolic because the saint is known as "Saint Light." Gose believes that St. Clare's "hiding a harsh reality of darkness behind her appearance of benevolence and light is appropriate both to Lewis' conscious anti-Catholicism and to the unconscious ambiguity if his feelings about women" (219). Gose parallels Lorenzo's descent into the burial vaults to Freud's theory of regression, but believes that Jung's idea of "the womb" is a stronger theory contextually because of the female statue above. Jung's theory states that an abyss symbolizes the womb and "the hero goes back to the womb in order that he may be reborn, renewed, made strong again"
Transitioning from childhood to the adult world is a tough time in any adolescent's life. It is a time of discovery of one’s self and the world around them. John Knowles captures this struggle in his novel, A Separate Peace. This story follows Gene Forrester, his friend Phineas, and other boys during their senior year at the Devon School. Throughout the school year, Gene and his classmates notice changes in themselves and the way they perceive the world. There is one boy named Leper, however, seems to play a crucial role in Gene and Phineas’s self discovery of good and evil. In the novel, the author uses Leper’s character as a mirror through which Gene and Phineas’s identity is revealed to them. Through the use of biblical allusions the Genesis, Knowles creates Leper as a serpent like character who reveals the knowledge of the good and evil in Gene and Phineas.
Friar Laurence’s actions throughout the play resulted in the two star crossed lovers’ death. He assisted the two when they wanted to get married, which began the disastrous events in the play. Friar Laurence says to Romeo:In one respect I’ll thy assistant be.
...Chrie, D., (ed.), Nineteenth Century Literature Criticism. Detroit, MI: Gale Research Company, 1986. Vo. 13, pp. 53-111.
...senblatt, Jon Twentieth Century Literature; Spring79, Vol. 25 Issue 1, p21, 16p Academic Search Complete Ebesco. Web. 25 July 2011
Popular Press, 1993. 92-99. Rpt. in Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism. Ed. Linda Pavlovski. Vol. 157. Detroit: Gale, 2005. Literature Resource Center. Web. 11 Mar. 2014.
Reid, Alfred. “Emerson’s Prose Style: An Edge to Goodness.” Style in the American Renaissance: A Symposium. (1970): 37-42. Rpt. in Nineteenth Century Literature Criticism. Ed. Laurie Lanzen Harris. Vol. 1. Detroit: Gale Research Inc., 1981. 306.
McCarthy’s novel clarifies the affects isolation made for the traveler’s in the story. In particular to the son, isolation affected him in a more discrete way than the father. Everything he sees and experiences goes into great affect in what makes
Freud’s understanding of the unconscious is organized into three echelons: the conscious mind, the preconscious mind and the unconscious mind. The conscious mind involves everything we are cognizant of. The preconscious mind signifies regular recollections. The unconscious mind contains emotions, reflections, memoirs and compulsions that are unknown to our conscious perception. Along with the conscious, the preconscious and the unconscious, there are the three additional elements to Freud’s structure of personality: the id, ego and superego. Unlike Freud, Jung had a more optimistic theory of the unconscious.
The mind of the human being is a complex, unique, and unpredictable system. While unveiling the mysteries of the human mind is not an easy task, psychoanalysts attempt to peel back the layers of the human psyche to better understand the human race. Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung are two such psychoanalysts who analyzed human behavior in connection to the mind and also scrutinized the connection between the subconscious and conscious mind. The transformations and complications of the human mind are often displayed in literary characters such as Sydney Carton from Charles’ Dickens A Tale of Two Cities. Due to Sydney Carton’s love for Lucie Manette, Sydney Carton develops into an archetypal, Christ-like hero as he overcomes his id, superego, introverted nature, and low self-worth to unify his subconscious and conscious states.
Forum 19.4 (Winter 1985): 160-162. Rpt. inTwentieth-Century Literary Criticism. Ed. Thomas J. Schoenberg and Lawrence J. Trudeau. Vol. 192. Detroit: Gale, 2008. Literature Resource Center. Web. 30 Nov. 2013.
Abraham H. Maslow developed the Hierarchy of Needs model between 1943-54 in USA, and this theory remains valid even today for understanding human motivation, management training and personal development. (4) A. H. Maslow first introduced his idea of hierarchy of needs in his paper “A Theory of Human Motivation” and his succeeding book Motivation and Personality in 1943. He stated that people are motivated to achieve certain needs and they are intended to fulfil basic needs before moving on to other, more advanced needs and when one need is fulfilled they move on the next one, and so on. Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs includes five motivational needs, often displayed as a hierarchical pyramid with five levels. This five level model can be divided into basic needs or deficiency needs and growth needs. The four lower levels are considered basic needs and the top level is considered growth needs. The five different level of hierarchy of needs are:
Lewis Carroll’s life as a writer and as a person can be described to some people as secretive or peculiar. He was born in Daresbury, Cheshire, England in 1832 under the name Charles Lutwidge Dodgson. All the books that he published was wrote with the pen name of Lewis Carroll. Being a mathematician, photographer, and novelist, he was a much respected man in England. At an early age he excelled in mathematics and went to college at Christ College. Even though he was a prestige mathematician, Lewis Carroll in known for his nonsense style of writing. Critics have tried to guess of reasons why this style was plagued with Lewis’s writing but none are guaranteed true. On the other hand, some
Paris, Bernard J. Imagined Human Beings: A Psychological Approach to Character and Conflict in Literature. New York: New York University Press. 1997.
In William Shakespeare's play, Romeo and Juliet had many issues leading towards Romeo and Juliet to commit suicide towards the end of the play. When blaming someone it means responsibility for something that is wrong or deserving censure. Accordingly, Friar Lawrence is openly accountable for Romeo and Juliet’s death. With this intention, he does not make one, but three faults that direct to their death. In particular, he marries Romeo and Juliet, he depended upon Friar John with a letter of essential information to be delivered to Romeo, and he took off when Juliet was in jeopardy at the tomb. On balance, without these critical misshapes, Romeo and Juliet would still be alive.
Dr. Abraham Maslow, wrote the theory of Hierarchy of Needs. This theory has the five levels to be acquired for every human; the first level talked about physiological point of view. People have to be able to breathe, find a way to feed and drink water, sleep, excretion, and sex. After all this is cover the second level will come into place. The second level is about finding resource for safety and secure life style. Any person needs to cover its own motivation trues a Family environment, proper health, Job security, and employment. Not everyone need to keep moving up but normally most people stay in level three for what Mosley mention. Level Three is to find pace and fell love by other people. Feel important and appreciated is key to succeed this level. In other words, we have to reach a good friendship, get sexual intimacy and be part of a new family. As levels move up on the pyramid there are harder to meet. For level four, every person needs to work on themselves. Look inside their thoughts and find self-esteem, confidence on which they are, Respect other equally, being respect by others. In this level most of the people find their really motivation. But still quite a few people look for more and the last level is present to achieve their true motivation. On level five, is to be aware of expecting the unexpected. A person of this level needs the capacity of solve problem in the act, have the creativity, high moral level, and being out going around people. After understand each of them, it will be easy for each person to see where they stand and what they need to work on to find the highest hierarchy of motivation. Each individual will chooses which level of motivation will fit...