Pit And The Pendulum By Edgar Allan Poe

As one of the most compelling writers of the eighteenth century, Edgar Allan Poe’s wildly imaginative work is conducive to literary criticism, especially that of psychological. While closely examining Poe’s life from birth to adulthood, Freudian theory assists in identifying the motives behind his gruesome thrillers, and ultimately strips Poe’s complicated persona down to the most basic of operations at work in every human mind. Psychoanalytical criticism can be applied to Edgar Allan Poe’s, “The Pit and the Pendulum”, due to the overall dark nature of his work.

Psychoanalytic criticism builds upon the basic concepts of Freudian theory, examining the motives of the author and characters in order to unearth a deeper meaning in a piece of writing. Sigmund Freud attributed all unconscious acts to what he believed are the three fundamental areas of the mind, id, ego, and superego, which house the most primitive to the most complex components of a personality. Contained in the human psyche are learned behaviors and inherent instincts that shape mental development from birth to death.

At this delicate developmental stage, fears and desires begin to take form, and as a result, repression comes into use. However, selective memory fails to eliminate the emotions associated with a traumatic experience, and defense mechanisms develop as a means of coping. Brizee writes, “Freud argued that we develop defenses: selective perception, denial, displacement, projection, regression, fear of intimacy, and fear of death among others” (Brizee 1). The emotions brought on by trauma remain intact throughout a person’s life. Humans unknowingly behave in a way that allows for expression of conflicted feelings, and overall, all actions are dictated by this unconscious. In order to apply psychoanalytic criticism to Poe himself, certain aspects of his personal life should be taken into consideration (Brizee