LITR
4232: American Renaissance
University
of Houston-Clear Lake, spring 2002
Index to Student Research Projects
Rhonda Peyton
Dr. Craig White
Litr. 4232
Spring 2002
The Psychology of Freud and Jung is Anticipated in Hawthorne and Melville
As 19th century American Romantic writers shifted their perspective from the European mode of Gothic to man’s struggle with his soul, Hawthorne and Melville were two of the first to explore psychological realms of characters and their motives. Aspiring to get down the Truth of the human heart and human fate, they employed symbolic methods to portray some traits in human nature. Although Sigmund Freud and Karl Jung are 20th century psychologists, many of their views are anticipated in the works of 19th century writers Nathaniel Hawthorne and Herman Melville. Modern critics make use of psychological interpretations to enhance our views of literature.
According to Freudian personality theory, the
id (the shadow or sinful self) must be accepted by the ego (the self) in order
for a person to become whole, i.e. a well-adjusted, rational adult. An
individual who cannot successfully integrate the two may become dysfunctional.
Further, Freud maintained that the id is largely unconscious, seeking
continually to express itself. Therefore, the id is in constant warfare with our
mortality, superego and conscious minds.
Unlike Freud who acknowledges only a personal unconsciousness, Karl Jung
claims a collective unconscious. These are mythological associations
(archetypes) showing up in dreams and fantasies (Snider 22).
Using the Jungian association of good and evil,
Melville clearly personifies Billy as the “good” and Claggart as the
“evil” in “Billy Budd, Sailor”. Billy is used as an archetype in several
references by the author. “Billy in many respects was little more that a sort
of upright barbarian, much such perhaps as Adam presumably might have been ere
the urbane Serpent wiggled himself into his company” 2663). Later Captain Vere
describes Billy as “one in the nude might have posed for a statue before the
Fall” (2690). And finally, after Billy has struck the fatal blow, Melville
says that the touch of Claggart’s body is “like handling a dead snake”
(2693).
Clearly, it would seem Melville wants the
reader to see the theme as good versus evil with Billy as a symbol of Adam and
Claggart as a symbol Satan. But Barbara Johnson has an opposite view as to who
is the good and who is the evil one. She points to, “When Claggart’s
unobserved glance happened to light on belted Billy [. . . ] sometimes the
melancholy expression would have in it a touch of soft yearning, as if Claggart
could even have loved Billy but for fate and ban (2685-6). Relying on Freudian
theories of repressed sexual desires, she labels Claggart as a latent
homosexual. According to Johnson’s perspective, “Claggart’s so-called evil
is thus really a repressed form of love” (57-58). And then she goes on to say
that because Billy has not worked through the Oedipal stage, Billy’s goodness
is really a repressed form of hate symbolized by his inability to speak (57-58).
It has been noted that Hawthorne is considered a master symbolist by many
in literary circles. As Baym notes, “there is hardly an object in the book
that does not do double duty as a symbol” (130). The four main characters,
complex as they are, serve as central symbols in the novel. Two represent normal
personalities; Hester and Pearl. The two others represent psychotic or neurotic
personalities; Chillingworth and Dimmesdale.
In Pearl’s story, the child’s development
toward psychological maturity is hindered by her isolation from her father and
the community. Because she does not yet know or acknowledge Dimmesdale as her
father, Peal has not been allowed to move through the Oedipal complex stage. For
girls, this means breaking the intense bonds with their mothers and forming one
with their fathers. Freud warned
that excessive frustration at this point could have some profound effects on the
personality, i.e. temper tantrums, argumentativeness, sarcasm, and obstinateness
(Morris 454). Hawthorne describes these very traits to us through Hester’s
observation of Pearl: “[. . . ]her wild desperate, defiant mood, the
flightiness of her temper” (2282).
Using a Freudian point of view, R.D. Laing
argues that Hester is a schizophrenic. For Laing, this means a psychotic way of
being in the world (185). He bases
this conclusion on Hawthorne’s description of her mental processes during the
first scaffold scene. Laing says we can “recognize the device’ as a schizoid
defense of herself by placing a false reality between her sense of her self and
the oppressive present intruding upon her (60). Hawthorne writes, “[ . . .
]she felt at moments as if she must needs shreik out with the full power of her
lungs, and cast herself from the scaffold down upon the ground, or else go mad
at once” (2265).
And in the following paragraph, “yet there
were intervals when the whole scene in which she was the most conspicuous
object, seemed to vanish from her eyes, or at least glimmered indistinctly
before them like a mass of imperfectly shaped and spectral images. Her mind, and
especially her memory was preternaturally active, and kept bringing up other
scenes than this [. . .]” (2265). And, “possibly, it was an instinctive
device of her spirit, to relieve itself, by her exhibition of these
phantasmagoric forms from the cruel weight and hardness of the reality”
(2266).
But Hester’s conduct and appearance after
emerging from the prison do not lead to Laing’s conclusion. Hawthorne
describes her as beautiful, lady-like and dignified. “Those who had before
known her and had expected to behold her dimmed and obscured by a disastrous
cloud, were astonished, and even startled, to perceive how her beauty shown out
and made a halo of the misfortune and ignominy in which she was enveloped”
(2263). Clearly, she comes across as a whole person, not as one split into
schizophrenic personalities.
During the seven years of outward penitence, Hester is struggling with an inner conflict of the soul. It is this stress, struggling and affliction of the soul that develops her into a strong, self-reliant individual. With a person of weaker character, as in Dimmesdale’s case, the stress would have made him weaker. But clearly Hawthorne tells us this is not the case with Hester. “[ . . . ] she cast away fragments of a broken chain. The world’s law was no law for her mind” (2321). Her sin became the source of her development and understanding.
In archetypal terms, Hester is not an adulteress but the Mother Mary. At the first scaffold scene we read: “Had there been a Papist among the crowd of Puritans, he might have seen in this beautiful woman, so picturesque in her attire and mien, and with the infant at her bosom, an object to remind him of the image of Divine Maternity [. . .]” (2264). Here, Jungian concepts seem to prevail.
In the characterization of Dimmesdale, Hawthorne portrays his mental state as neurotic or psychotic. He has become two people; the private soul-afflicted man and the public “good” minister. Dimmesdale must heal this split between the inner and the outer self in order to develop and become a truly whole person, that is a well-adjusted adult.
In an examination of Dimmesdale’s hypocritical refusal to admit his sin publicly, it seems evident he is caught up in self-delusion and rationalization. In his interview with Chillingworth he says, “… [sinners] shrink from displaying themselves black and filthy in the view of men; because, thenceforward, no good can be achieved by them [. . .]” (2304). Dimmesdale is justifying his cowardice with the good he believed he is doing for his congregation.
In chapter twelve we see more clearly how the outer self is split from the inner in Dimmesdale’s attempted confession on the scaffold. “Why then had he come hither? Was it but the mockery or penitence? A mockery indeed, but which his soul trifled with itself.” (2312). Disembarking the scaffold, Dimmesdale leaves a glove for the church sexton to find later. An action many modern psychologists would term a “Freudian slip.” Evidently, his unconscious inner self wishes to be found out.
At the end of the second scaffold scene, Dimmesdale sees a meteor and interprets it as a sign only for him. The narrator says “[. . . ] it could only be the symptom of a highly disordered mental state, when a man rendered morbidly self-contemplative by long, intense and secret pain had extended his egotism over the whole expanse of nature until the firmament itself should appear no more than a fitting page for his soul’s history and fate” (2316-7). In modern psychology, we would interpret this condition as paranoia, a Freudian preoccupation.
Further, Jung postulates a shell or mask (which he calls a persona) that is worn by an individual to impress or hide his/her real nature. He states that, “If a person identifies too long with his persona, he may be susceptible to psychic crises and disorders” (Snider 22). Freud also theorized that serious bodily disorders without organic causes are always related to traumatic experiences buried in a person’s past (Morris 534). Evidently, by not allowing his mask to be broken through, Dimmesdale tortured himself to death.
In the case of Chillingworth, many would believe that he was once a kind and caring man who turned himself into a fiend only after his discovery of the adultery of Hester. This is simply not so. From the first scaffold scene, we get a dark and foreboding impression about him. What kind of man deserts his wife and goes wandering for years? What kind of man would take advantage of circumstances and press a young girl of half his age into marriage?
In chapter four, Chillingworth says to Hester, “…I seek no vengeance, plot no evil against thee. Between me and thee, the scale hangs fairly balanced” (2274). This is an abnormal repression of feeling of rejection which will cause problems later on. Nothing else crushes the ego, the healthy and essential sense of self, as quickly and as cruelly as rejection. Through the Freudian phenomenon of transference, Roger Chillingworth’s repressed anger at Hester becomes a revengeful obsession with her lover.
As many readers and critics have previously noted, Chillingworth may have been Dimmesdale’s double or alter ego. It appears this may be what Hawthorne dramatizes through Hester’s words to Chillingworth, “[. . . ] no man is so near him as you. You tread behind his every footstep. You are beside him sleeping and waking. You search his thoughts. You burrow and rankle in his heart! Your clutch is on his life [. . .]” (2324).
And finally at the last scaffold scene. Hester comes to realize that she, Pearl and Dimmesdale can not flee from this community and Chillingworth. Chillingworth’s words to Dimmesdale: “Hadst thou sought the whole world over, there was no place so secret, -no high place nor lowly place, where thou couldst have escaped me,- save on this very scaffold” (2366-7).
Because he has become the minister’s tormenting and punishing conscience, Roger Chillingworth cannot survive the minister’s death. “All his strength and energy-all his vital and intellectual force-seemed at once to desert him; insomuch that he positively withered up, shrivelled away and almost vanished [. . . ]” (2369).
Another aspect of Jungian point of view is that of the archetypal situation of initiation. “Young Goodman Brown” is an archetypal story dealing with initiation and loss of innocence. Suffering from a Puritan need for self-scrutiny and self-understanding, Brown takes a deliberate journey into maturity.
Ostensibly, Brown walks from the real world of Salem into the darkening forest. However, as the narrator takes us into a mood of foreboding and terror, we are aware of Brown’s own darkening consciousness as he understands the evil of an evil world. “The whole forest was peopled with frightful sounds; the creaking of trees, the howling of wild beasts, and the yelling of Indians [. . .]” (2191).
Symbolically, the forest is a place where evil lurks but also the mysteries of life. Once inside the mysterious forest, Goodman Brown is confused and fearful at this world so fused with fact and insanity. Here in the wilderness all those he has felt awe and affection for are present for communion with the devil. When he emerges from this journey through the “forest of his consciousness” he is forever a changed man. For here a fundamental truth is revealed to him. All men are potentially sinners even though they may profess themselves saints.
“Had Goodman Brown fallen asleep in the forest, and only dreamed a wild dream of a witch meeting?” (2194) According to Freud, people can express primitive desires that are relatively free of conscious controls and moral considerations in dreams and fantasies. In this regard, he suggested that dreams provide valuable insight into the motives of which people may remain consciously unaware. Because feelings are repressed, they may become transformed into a highly symbolic form and often take on an illogical character (Morris 43). From a Freudian standpoint, Young Goodman Brown’s dream is an outlet for his forbidden desires.
Finally, Hawthorne and Melville have an instinctive awareness of man’s need for self-understanding. They have dared to investigate the dark side of sin, suffering and human evil. Prefiguring Freudian models and Jungian symbols, they have created enduring stories with multiple levels of meanings. And most skillfully, they have portrayed the psychology of individual existence.
Works Cited
Baym, Nina. “Who? The Characters.” Modern Critical Interpretations: Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter. Ed. Harold Bloom. New York: Chelsea House, 1990.
Hawthorne, Nathaniel. The Scarlet Letter. The Heath Anthology of American Literature. Ed.Paul Lauter. Boston, 2002. 2259-2372.
---. “Young Goodman Brown.” The Heath Anthology of American Literature. Ed. Paul Lauter. Boston: Chelsea House, 2002. 2186-2195.
Johnson, Barbara. “Melville’s Fist: The Execution of Billy Budd.” Herman Melville’s Billy Budd, Benito Cereno and Bartleby the Scrivener and Other Tales. Ed. Harold Bloom. New York: Chelsea House, 1987. 47-80.
Laing, R. D. “R. D. Laing and Literature: Readings of Poe, Hawthorne, and Kate Chopin.” Psychological Perspectives on Literature. Ed. Joseph Natoli. Haamden: The Shoe String Press, 1984. 181-197.
Melville, Herman. “Billy Budd, Sailor.” The Heath Anthology of American Literature. Ed. Paul Lauter. Boston: Chelsea House, 2002. 2656-2713.
Morris, Charles G. Psychology: An Introduction. 7th ed. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1990.