A Study To The Psychoanalical Biography Of Stefan Zweig

During the past century, the Western biography has been influenced by many changes, one of which that is most powerful is the effect on the biographic tradition of psychoanalysis established by Sigmund Freud. Stefan Zweig, who has been noted as one of the three greatest biographic litterateurs in the 20^th century (the other two are Andre Maurois and Henri Troyat from France), was heavily influenced by Freud's psychoanalysis, exerting himself in reproducing personal secrete in a psychological perspective, thereby the readers may understand history and culture upon grasping the personal psychological process. He pull down the wall between the traditional biography and its subject, bringing out the inner feelings of the psychoanalytical giants, thus interpreting biographic subjects and history.This thesis explores the profound influence on Zweig's biographic writing from the psychoanalytical theories on three dimensions: rationale, psychological perspective of explanations in biography, and characteristics. The thesis is composed of an introductory chapter, three chapters of the text, and a concluding chapter. The first chapter summarizes rationale for his work on biographic psychoanalysis from four aspects: being attached to homeland (the Vienna · complex), succession of perpetual values (the spirit of humanitarianism), concerns over racial tribulations (Jewish awareness), and incorporating modern academic thinking (psychology of psychoanalysis).Chapter three examines manifestations of psychoanalytical theories in Zweig's biography, centering on explanations in biography, in combination with his many excellent biographies such as "Childhood", "Sex" and "Literary Psychology".Chapter three explores the characteristics of Zweig's biography works as new biography. Psychoanalysis method expands many new realms of humanity and psychoanalytical perspective, which can help biographer to explore his or her subject in depth. However, Zweig did not heavily rely on psychoanalysis, while featuring use of other approaches.The concluding part of the thesis comments on the role of Zweig's biographic psychoanalysis in the 20^th century history of biography, noting that he is not only a greatnovelist, but also a biographer with profound accomplishments on humanities and history. Enlightening from his works is that biographers will gain much experience left by psychoanalysis, if they can abandon the outdated thinking pattern of dualism between science and humanism. Biographers will do better if they can combine the biography's literary and historical tradition successfully with the modern psychology and neuroscience.