40 Practicing Psychological Criticism
Now that you’ve learned about psychological theory, practiced this method of analysis with “A Narrow Fellow in the Grass,” and reviewed some examples, you will complete a theoretical response to a text using reader response as your approach. You will read three different texts below. Choose one text and respond to the questions in a short essay (500-750 words).
I have included questions to guide your reading. You may choose to respond to some or all of these questions; however, your response should be written as a short essay, and you will need to come up with a thesis statement about your chosen text. Post your short essay as a response to the Psychological Criticism Theoretical Response discussion board. I have included the theoretical response assignment instructions at the end of this chapter.
Psychological criticism applies one psychological theory to a text. Here’s a checklist that may help you. You do not need to address every item on this list.
- Choose a Theoretical Approach: Identify the psychological theory or framework you will apply (e.g., Freudian psychoanalysis, Jungian archetypes, cognitive psychology, etc.). Understanding the chosen approach will guide your analysis.
- Character Analysis: Examine the characters in the text, considering their motivations, behaviors, and conflicts. Look for signs of psychological complexity, trauma, or unconscious desires.
- Author’s Background: Research the author’s life and background to gain insights into how personal experiences, relationships, or psychological states might have influenced the creation of the text. You can also consider what the text tells us or reinforces about the author’s state of mind.
- Symbolism and Imagery: Analyze symbols and imagery, exploring how they may represent psychological concepts or emotions. Consider how recurring symbols contribute to the overall psychological impact of the text.
- Archetypal Analysis (if using Jung): If applying Jungian psychology, identify archetypal elements in characters or symbols. Explore universal patterns and symbols that may be present in the narrative.
- Psychoanalytic Concepts (if using Freud): If applying Freudian psychoanalysis, explore concepts such as repression, desire, id, ego, and superego. Analyze how these concepts manifest in characters’ thoughts and actions.
- Themes and Motifs: Identify recurring themes and motifs in the text. Explore how these elements reflect psychological concepts or theories, contributing to the overall psychological dynamics of the narrative.
- Psychological Trajectories: Trace the psychological development of characters throughout the narrative. Identify key moments or events that shape their personalities and behaviors.
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Macbeth Act V Scene 1. Dunsinane. Ante-room in the castle.
Enter a Doctor of Physic and a Waiting-Gentlewoman
Doctor
I have two nights watched with you, but can perceive
no truth in your report. When was it she last walked?
Gentlewoman
Since his majesty went into the field, I have seen
her rise from her bed, throw her night-gown upon
her, unlock her closet, take forth paper, fold it,
write upon’t, read it, afterwards seal it, and again
return to bed; yet all this while in a most fast sleep.
Doctor
A great perturbation in nature, to receive at once
the benefit of sleep, and do the effects of
watching! In this slumbery agitation, besides her
walking and other actual performances, what, at any
time, have you heard her say?
Gentlewoman
That, sir, which I will not report after her.
Doctor
You may to me: and ’tis most meet you should.
Gentlewoman
Neither to you nor any one; having no witness to
confirm my speech.
Enter LADY MACBETH, with a taper
Lo you, here she comes! This is her very guise;
and, upon my life, fast asleep. Observe her; stand close.
Doctor
How came she by that light?
Gentlewoman
Why, it stood by her: she has light by her
continually; ’tis her command.
Doctor
You see, her eyes are open.
Gentlewoman
Ay, but their sense is shut.
Doctor
What is it she does now? Look, how she rubs her hands.
Gentlewoman
It is an accustomed action with her, to seem thus
washing her hands: I have known her continue in
this a quarter of an hour.
LADY MACBETH
Yet here’s a spot.
Doctor
Hark! she speaks: I will set down what comes from
her, to satisfy my remembrance the more strongly.
LADY MACBETH
Out, damned spot! out, I say!–One: two: why,
then, ’tis time to do’t.–Hell is murky!–Fie, my
lord, fie! a soldier, and afeard? What need we
fear who knows it, when none can call our power to
account?–Yet who would have thought the old man
to have had so much blood in him.
Doctor
Do you mark that?
LADY MACBETH
The thane of Fife had a wife: where is she now?–
What, will these hands ne’er be clean?–No more o’
that, my lord, no more o’ that: you mar all with
this starting.
Doctor
Go to, go to; you have known what you should not.
Gentlewoman
She has spoke what she should not, I am sure of
that: heaven knows what she has known.
LADY MACBETH
Here’s the smell of the blood still: all the
perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little
hand. Oh, oh, oh!
Doctor
What a sigh is there! The heart is sorely charged.
Gentlewoman
I would not have such a heart in my bosom for the
dignity of the whole body.
Doctor
Well, well, well,–
Gentlewoman
Pray God it be, sir.
Doctor
This disease is beyond my practise: yet I have known
those which have walked in their sleep who have died
holily in their beds.
LADY MACBETH
Wash your hands, put on your nightgown; look not so
pale.–I tell you yet again, Banquo’s buried; he
cannot come out on’s grave.
Doctor
Even so?
LADY MACBETH
To bed, to bed! there’s knocking at the gate:
come, come, come, come, give me your hand. What’s
done cannot be undone.–To bed, to bed, to bed!
Exit
Doctor
Will she go now to bed?
Gentlewoman
Directly.
Doctor
Foul whisperings are abroad: unnatural deeds
Do breed unnatural troubles: infected minds
To their deaf pillows will discharge their secrets:
More needs she the divine than the physician.
God, God forgive us all! Look after her;
Remove from her the means of all annoyance,
And still keep eyes upon her. So, good night:
My mind she has mated, and amazed my sight.
I think, but dare not speak.
Gentlewoman
Good night, good doctor.
Exeunt
Macbeth by William Shakespeare is in the Public Domain.
Questions
- Repression and Symbolism: Lady Macbeth’s sleepwalking and her obsessive hand-washing are classic signs of guilt and repressed emotions. How do her actions in this scene symbolize the repression of guilt and the psychological consequences of committing heinous acts?
- The Unconscious Mind and Sleepwalking: Freud believed that the unconscious mind expresses itself in dreams and behaviors like sleepwalking. How does Lady Macbeth’s sleepwalking serve as a manifestation of her unconscious mind, and what repressed desires or fears might be surfacing in her somnambulant state?
- Guilt and the Superego: Lady Macbeth’s guilt is evident in her repeated attempts to cleanse her hands. How does this ritualistic behavior reflect the internal conflict between her actions (id) and her moral conscience (superego)? How does the superego contribute to her psychological distress?
- Psychological Impact of Guilt on the Body: In Freudian terms, how does Lady Macbeth’s guilt manifest physically? Consider her exclamation, “Out, damned spot!” and her intense focus on the imagined stain. What does this reveal about the psychological impact of guilt on the body, as Freud would interpret it?
- The Role of Dreams and Nightmares: Freud argued that dreams provide a window into the unconscious. Lady Macbeth’s speech about Banquo’s burial and the inability to undo past deeds occurs in a dreamlike state. How does the scene demonstrate Freud’s concept of dreams as a pathway to repressed thoughts and unresolved conflicts?
2. Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening (1923)
Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.
My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.
He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound’s the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.
The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.
“Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening” by Robert Frost is in the Public Domain.
3. “Caged Bird” (1983)
A free bird leaps
on the back of the wind
and floats downstream
till the current ends
and dips his wing
in the orange sun rays
and dares to claim the sky.
But a bird that stalks
down his narrow cage
can seldom see through
his bars of rage
his wings are clipped and
his feet are tied
so he opens his throat to sing.
The caged bird sings
with a fearful trill
of things unknown
but longed for still
and his tune is heard
on the distant hill
for the caged bird
sings of freedom.
The free bird thinks of another breeze
and the trade winds soft through the sighing trees
and the fat worms waiting on a dawn bright lawn
and he names the sky his own.
But a caged bird stands on the grave of dreams
his shadow shouts on a nightmare scream
his wings are clipped and his feet are tied
so he opens his throat to sing.
The caged bird sings
with a fearful trill
of things unknown
but longed for still
and his tune is heard
on the distant hill
for the caged bird
sings of freedom.
Maya Angelou, “Caged Bird” from Shaker, Why Don’t You Sing? Copyright © 1983 by Maya Angelou. All rights reserved. (Fair Use Exception)
Read the information about Post Traumatic Slave Syndrome below. Then apply this critical theory to “Caged Bird” by Maya Angelou.
In their essay, ““Addressing the Trauma of Racism from a Mental Health Perspective within the African American Community,” Angela Grayson et al. share the following:
Dr. Joy DeGruy, author of
Post Traumatic Slave Syndrome, developed a theory that explains the etiology of many of the adaptive survival behaviors in African American communities throughout the United States.
9 She explains that it is a condition that exists as a consequence of multigenerational oppression of Africans and their descendants resulting from centuries of chattel slavery, a form of slavery which was predicated on the belief that Africans were inherently genetically and biologically inferior to White people. As such, Africans were dehumanized as being without spirit, emotions, soul, desires and rights. However, once chattel slavery was abolished and dismantled, African Americans became the targets of institutionalized racism which continues to perpetuate injury today. DeGruy’s research lead her to the acronym M.A.P. which concludes that 1)
Multigenerational trauma together with continued oppression leads to 2)
Absence of opportunity to heal or access the benefits available in the society which ultimately leads to 3)
Post Traumatic Slave Syndrome or PTSS. She also proposed that the ability to identify a shared cultural experience and have a descriptive term—Post Traumatic Slave Syndrome—allows for individuals to identify the experience, articulate it, and express it without guilt, fear, blame, or anger and is a source of healing and strengthening within the African American Community (Grayson et al.).
Grayson, Angela M et al. “Addressing the Trauma of Racism from a Mental Health Perspective within the African American Community.” Delaware Journal of Public Health vol. 6,5 28-30. 7 Nov. 2020, doi:10.32481/djph.2020.11.008