Mandras Christopher Mandras Mrs.

Alford a February 19, 2014 A Freudian Approach to Macbeth and The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde The mind is part of the body that humans have yet to master, to fully harness so that the people may use it for beneficial purposes. The brain is a mysterious entity that can control how

the body functions on a daily basis, how people can solve problems and interact with each other, and the ability to process and recall information related by others at any given second. However, many modern neurologists have yet to fully comprehend one part of the mind, that is, the unconscious mind, the part of our intellect that lurks in the shadows and never blatantly reveals any of the memories and desires stored there. Scientists and theorists have spent their whole lives trying to unlock the secrets of the unconscious, one such man being Sigmund Freud. Both Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, the protagonists in Shakespeares play Macbeth, and Dr. Jekyll, the protagonist of Robert Louis Stevensons novella, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, experience intense desires and repressed motives driven by their unconscious and the elements of the human psyche, trying hide their true natures from the society in which they lived in. Sigmund Freud, an Austrian neurologist who theorized the significance of the unconscious mind in everyday life, was born in 1856 in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Freud lived in Vienna, Austria, until he moved to England in 1938, the first year in which the Nazi regime occupied the country of Austria. Freud relocated to England during the Victorian era, named after the Queen of Great Britain at the time, Queen Victoria (Ciccarelli and White 437). His main work involved him performing extensive case studies with patients that had various

Mandras psychological disorders. The thoughts and dreams of the patients, which were analyzed, were used to diagnose problems and gain insight into why people behaved in such a way. He theorized that there was a connection between a persons behavior and their various childhood experiences (Sigmund Freud-Biography 1-2). The patient represses these experiences into the part of the mind that was called the unconscious, a level of the mind where thoughts, feelings, memories, and other pieces of information, are stored and not easily brought back into the persons conscious awareness. Freud, throughout his life, based on the observations and case studies of his patients, hypothesized that the human psyche was divided into three parts, the id, ego, and superego. Freud also speculated about dream theory and proposed five stages for the development of personality over the course of a lifetime. Freud published countless books as

well, his most famous, The Psychopathology of Everyday Life and The Interpretation of Dreams, which can be applied to Macbeth (Ciccarelli and White 437-438). In the play Macbeth, Shakespeare alludes to various historical events of the Renaissance to comment on issues of the time. One prevalent idea of the Renaissance that Shakespeare discusses when writing his play is the divine right of kings, the idea that the king of a country, in this case England, was the supreme ruler of the land and the enforcer of the laws. The goal of the king was to preserve the order of the world, or the Great Chain of Being. This theory is based on the idea that God had originally placed all people in a specific order, in which God and angels were at the top of the pyramid, and kings were below them. After that, were the clergy, the lords, the knights, the peasants, the serfs, animals, plants, trees, and rocks. Only in this order did h the world function naturally, and everything at the bottom of the list, obeyed what or who was above. This idea further strengthened the divine right of kings, in which all people, animals, and plants were obedient to the king (Sommerville, 1-3). Some people who resided in England

Mandras followed The Great Chain of Being so closely that many shuttered and cringed at the thought of anarchy and chaos if order was broken. As seen in Macbeth, the Great Chain of Being was

destroyed after Macbeth has assassinated King Duncan. In the scene after, the sky became dark, and a falcon, towering in her pride of place, /was by a mousing owl hawkd and killd [it] (Shakespeare, 80). The falcon, Macbeth, had killed the wise and gentle owl, Duncan, and had disturbed the natural order of things, the Great Chain of Being. Shakespeare was attempting to address the fact that only God could determine your fate and your position in society. Only now, the rightful king could bring order to the world, Macduff, who must overthrow the imposter Macbeth. The rightful king during the time when Shakespeare wrote Macbeth was King James I. After Queen Elizabeth I died in 1603, King James I became the king of England and Scotland, the first of the Stuart dynasty in England. Originally, he was King James VI of Scotland and son of Mary, Queen of Scots, King James I. One of his major contributions to society was the publication and authorization of the King James Version of the Bible. He worked to bring about close relations between the Spanish empire and England, both politically and economically. King James I was also a great supporter of the arts, for example, he was a patron to the Kings Men, a group of actors, including Shakespeare, who performed various plays for the king in theatres across London. However, King James I was not the most respected king of England. He was an ineffective and weak ruler, disliked by almost every Puritan, a group of Christians who were not fond of how lenient the Church of England was toward religious reform, and Catholics, who wished they were treated better by the king and the followers of other denominations in England, Ultimately, some of the Catholics revolted against the King of England (James I and VI (15661625) 1).

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Due to how futile the efforts to rule England and her people made by King James I were, in 1605, some Catholic men, led by Guy Fawkes, tried to carry out an attempt to assassinate King James I and the Protestant elite and to destroy the whole building of Parliament. During the time, many followers of the Church of England and Protestant people badly mistreated Catholics, to the point where some of them tried to cover up their religion by living a completely secret life. Parliament fined many Catholics for practicing their religion; some got so infuriated and upset at this that many relocated to the Americas to start colonies devoted to religious freedom. Others did not want to address the issue passively, and chose to strike down the rule and the wealthy. Five men, Robert Catesby, Thomas Wintour, Jack Wright, Thomas Percy, and Guy Fawkes, plotted a way to destroy James I and Parliament (Robinson 1-2). They believed that the king-becoming graces/[should possess] verity, temprance, stableness/ bounty, perseverance, [and] mercy (Shakespeare 143). They leased a cellar that was located under the House of Lords in Parliament, where the group of men gathered approximately thirty-six barrels of gunpowder in which, on November 5th, Guy Fawkes was to light the barrels and destroy the building. However, the plan was thwarted, after the Earl of Salisbury ordered the search of the Westminster section of London, where they found Fawkes. Eventually, all of the conspirators were found, charged with high treason and attempted crimes toward the king, found guilty, and executed. This event demonstrated the fearful attitude the people of England held regarding the assassination of the king, and if the king was assassinated, confusion now hath made his masterpiece, (Shakespeare 72) or confusion would result. Drawing from the idea that one should be fearful of your supreme, earthly ruler and the events that happened on November 5th, 1605, Shakespeare, in his play Macbeth, was trying to point out was that if a man or woman has unrestrained ambition to become king or queen, the

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power acquired would corrupt your soul. The ambition that Lady Macbeth held was a factor that led to demise, but their personalities and their divisions of the human psyche, also played a role in the play. The three divisions of the human personality include the id, the ego, and the superego. The id, meaning it in Latin, is the only structure present when a child is born. The id is the part of the personality that only focuses on pleasure seeking, primarily controls basic drives, for example, eating, sleeping, self-preservation, and sex, is unconscious, and is immature and amoral. The id operates on a principle developed by Freud called the pleasure principle, which states that people function only for the immediate gratification of desires without regard for the consequences of performing that action (Ciccarelli and White 438). The second part of the human psyche is the ego, Latin for I. The ego is the decision-making part of personality and is more logical and rational than its counterpart, the id, yet still seeks pleasure, but in moderate ways, trying to avoid pain at all costs. The ego can be described as the arbitrator between the impulsive id and the cautious superego (McLeod 2). The ego thrives on the reality principle, which was theorized by Freud, which states that the demands that the id needs are only satisfied when pain and negativity will not happen as a result. (Ciccarelli and White 439). The last part of personality is the superego, Latin for above I or the self. The superego is supposed to control the desires coming from the id and keep it from performing acts that go against the norms of society, especially aggressive acts, for example, murder (Ciccarelli and White 439). These ideas of the id, the ego, and the superego that were theorized by Freud can be applied to the characters in Macbeth, primarily Macbeth and Lady Macbeth. For Lady Macbeth, the desire to be the queen of Scotland propelled the id to completely dominate her personality, becoming so obsessed with the idea of being queen that she tries to urge on Macbeth, a loyal and courageous man, who was just given the title of the Thane of Cawdor by King Duncan. Because

Mandras Macbeth will not commit the crime at first, Lady Macbeth goes to the extreme of wishing to unsex [herself] here and to take [her] milk for gall, your murthering ministers (Shakespeare

42). At this point of time, Macbeths superego is very strong, as his conscience is greater than the desires that are enticing him, coming from the embodiment of the id, Lady Macbeth. Macbeth knows that killing his king would go against the principles of society and his own. However, Lady Macbeth convinces Macbeth to kill Duncan and to screw your courage to your sticking place (Shakespeare 52). Because of the witches and Lady Macbeth, inciting him to kill King Duncan, Macbeth starts on the long path toward his downfall. Macbeths id gradually takes over his personality, however his ego and superego still try to keep Macbeths inner self in order. Macbeth continually has visions and bursts of confusion and paranoia, which represent Macbeths superego trying to tell Macbeth is has done something gravely serious, and he will pay the price for it. For example, Macbeth, in the scene where the ghost of Banquo appears to him, realizes that [his] bones are marrowless, [and his] blood is cold (Shakespeare 108). Yet, Macbeths id is continually fueled by the witches prophecies, and Macbeth grows worse and worse (Shakespeare 109). As the play continues, Lady Macbeth and Macbeths id grow stronger and controls her personality more, while the ego desperately tries to balance out their psyches. But as the id continues to become more resistant to the superego, self-destruction can only follow. Lady Macbeths guilt and superego have arisen from the depths of her mind towards the end of the play, but those parts of personality cannot topple over the stranglehold the id has on Lady Macbeth. In the somnambulism, or sleepwalking episode, she has, Lady Macbeth cries Out, damned spot! Out I/ say! (Shakespeare 157). She thinks she sees the blood of King Duncan on

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her hands, and now, Lady Macbeth is being penalized by her superego for the actions committed toward King Duncan. The Victorian Age of England, named for Queen Victoria of England, can be characterized by rapid development across all parts of life, from population growth, to advances in the scientific and medical fields. Large-scale expansion of the British Empire occurred during this century, as the empire expanded into parts of Africa, China, the Middle East, and India. Some traits associated with the Victorian Era include a high work ethic, strict religious presence, and the importance of the family. People promoted social esteem, conformity to the Church of England, and morality. The Feminist and Socialist movements also sprung about during this time period (Shepherd 1). Literature from this time period is different from others because many novels and texts focused on a different kind of social advancement, for example, the advancement of ones social status through marriage, which is found in Brontes novel Wuthering Heights. Many novels highlight the English standards of proper manners, where usually authors write satires, commentating on these behaviors, as well as the advancement of ones social class (Kirschen 1). In Victorian England, class played a major role in determining the quality of life that a person had. England only had two classes, being the elite aristocrats and the working peasants. The working class did most of the physical, dirty work, such as the labor of the factories and fields, as well as the domestic servants. Some were paid weekly, however, others were often not being paid at all. All of the working class members lived lives of plight and grief. A great amount of men earned enough to keep themselves barely alive, let alone their families. Many of them could easily lose their jobs, be thrown into poverty at any second, and be plagued with illness, eventually dying, while still nobody ever knew of their existence. However the elite,

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aristocratic class, did not work like laborers, but still made money off the land, which was passed down through the family. Because of this monetary gap between the wealthy and the poor, much tension arose between them, and these tensions between the two social classes grew stronger as the working class was kept out of Parliament and politics and the Industrial Revolution encouraged the social stratification of society, during which businessmen were obsessed with making money, paying their workers practically nothing. Freud theorized that there are three levels to our consciousness in which the divisions of the human personality house themselves. The first level, the conscious level is where all thoughts are processed, where rational thinking occurs, and is where communication and the ability to converse with each other begins. The next level, the preconscious, is the part of our awareness where all memories are placed, so that people may easily process and retrieved the information in a short period of time. The bottom level of our consciousness, otherwise know as the unconscious or subconscious, holds all of the persons wishful thinking. The unconscious holds all of the thoughts and memories that are not as easily retrievable because many of these painful and conflicting memories were repressed at one point (Davidson 1-2). These levels of conscious awareness hold the three levels of the personality, the id, ego, and superego. The id is very impulsive, demanding whatever it wants, at any time, with complete disregard for others. The id has no reasoning and logic and always demands for satisfaction, and if not satisfied the person will experience pain (McLeod 2). The ego can be described as the arbitrator between the impulsive id and the cautious superego. The superego develops the conscience of a person and integrates the rules and standards of society into decision-making (Ciccarelli and White 439). The ideas of the unconscious and the three levels of human personality that Freud popularized can be applied to the characters of Robert Louis Stevensons novella, The Strange

Mandras Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Mr. Hyde can be described a being the id of the novella, always seeking instant gratification, living free from moral standards and society, always aggressive, and running on impulses. He enjoys being violent, for example in the scene when the girl was running as hard as she was able down the cross street (Stevenson 4), Mr. Hyde completely shrugs off the existence of the girl and tramples over the girl. Hyde was able to glide more stealthily through sleeping houses, or move the more swiftly (Stevenson 13), than any other. He embodies the savage nature of the individual, the brute that sleep[s] within [that

person] (Stevenson 82). The ego is embodied in the person of Dr. Jekyll, which controls rational thought and is controlled by the superego, or the Victorian society in which he lives. The superego tries to control the id with the help of the ego, however the id continually grows stronger. The unconscious mind still makes people wonder in awe at the powers it has over our behaviors today. Our unconscious can control us to make the wrong decisions, but can be tamed by our conscious minds. The role of the unconscious in various works of literature, for example, Macbeth and The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, can play a major part in changing the dynamics of the some characters, in turn, creating major conflicts inside the character and inside the story.

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Works Cited Cody, David. "Social Class." Social Class. Victorian Web, 22 July 2002. Web. 18 Feb. 2014. "James I and VI (1566 - 1625)." BBC News. BBC, n.d. Web. 16 Feb. 2014. Kirschen, Robert M. "The Victorian Period." The Victorian Period. University of Nevada, Las Vegas, 06 Feb. 2013. Web. 17 Feb. 2014. McLeod, Saul. "Id, Ego and Superego." Id Ego Superego. Simply Psychology, 2008. Web. 16 Feb. 2014. Robinson, Bruce. "The Gunpowder Plot." BBC News. BBC, 09 Mar. 2011. Web. 19 Feb. 2014. Shakespeare, William. Macbeth: FOLGER Shakespeare Library. New York: Washington Square, 1992. Print. Shepherd, Anne. "Overview of The Victorian Era." The Victorian Era. Institute of Historical Research, Apr. 2001. Web. 18 Feb. 2014. "Sigmund Freud - Biography." Sigmund Freud. European Graduate School, n.d. Web. 16 Feb. 2014. Sommerville, J. P. "The Divine Right of Kings." The Divine Right of Kings. The University of Wisconsin, n.d. Web. 19 Feb. 2014. Stevenson, David B. "Consciousness Levels." Consciousness Levels. Victorian Web, 1998. Web. 19 Feb. 2014. Stevenson, Robert Louis. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. New York: Signet Classic, 2003. Print. White, J. Noland. "Theories of Personality." Psychology AP Edition. By Saundra K. Ciccarelli. M,2nd ed. Upper Saddle River: Pearson Education, 2011. 437-39. Print.

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