Shadow In The Light: A Neo-Psychoanalysis Of The Book Of Lights

The Book of Lights traces the spiritual quest of two rabbis, Gershon Loran and Arthur Leiden, through their seminary studies and separate paths in the secular world. Potok juxtaposes the creative power of Jewish mysticism with the role of Jewish physicists in the development of atomic weapons through Loran's mystical interest in Kabbalah.The Book of Lights is an obscure novel, the author focuses on the Psychological descriptions of the antagonist, Gershon Loran, who suffers from neurosis resulted from basic anxiety. In order to free himself from basic anxiety, Loran has tried three strategies, that is, compliance, withdrawal and agression, as for Loran's psychological puzzle, there's no direct answer through the whole book, but it is indicated in the end that Loran's decision to devote himself to the study of the Kabbalah makes him free from neurosis.In this thesis, a neo-psychoanalysis approach of Karen Horney is used to research the issues in the book. Many consider that Horney's theory is one of the best theories of neurosis we have. For she offered a different way of viewing neurosis. In her clinical experience, she discerned ten particular patterns of neurotic needs on the basis of things that we all need, According to Karen Horney, the ten neurotic needs can be clustered into three broad coping strategies: Compliance, Withdrawal and Aggression.Under the appoach of Karen Horney's theory, the issues of the antagonist, Gershon Loran are analyzed from different aspects. The thesis is organized in four chapters, they are as follows:Chapter 1: Issues in the Book of Lights, aim of the research and existing researches on the issues. This chapter not only states the research problem and defines the methodology and goals of the study, but also surveys the fundamental exiting researches on the Book of Lights.Chapter 2: Analysis of Loran's neurotic structure, which is a review of the theory of Neo-psychoanalysis represented by Karen Horney. Horney moved away from instinct theory and toward an emphasis on family dynamic and culture. Instead of universalizing neurotic problems, she increasingly focused on the specific conditions.Chapter 3: Neurosis as cultural codes in the Book of Lights and its projection, which begins with a study of the major problems Loran faced and his psychological reaction toward them.Chapter 4: Conclusion, in the view of the study of Loran's neurosis and its projection on Potok from his own experience, the expected findings come into being.Loran is found on a forked road where there are too many dangerous choices to make. He has to determine whether to be Jewish or pagan. And he has to think about the guilt of human beings. All these are presented to a young man by culture which throws Loran into the swamp of neurosis and also makes Loran help himself out of it. Karen Horney recognized the importance of culture in the formation of neurotic defenses and conflicts. According to Horney, a neurosis is just a psychic disturbance brought about by anxieties and defenses against these anxieties and by attempts to find compromising solutions for conflicting tendencies. Anxiety is the dynamic center of neurosis. There are three broad coping strategies: compliance, aggression and withdrawal.His world is one beset by unrelenting fears and recurrent attacks of guilt. He is alienated from his roots; rejected by the pagan society, the prospect of retribution for human being's guilt (both real and imagined), and the chaos of his physical world. Helplessness, guilt and fear become a habitual way of his life, which is Loran's basic anxiety. To find reassurance and security he develops three defense strategies, namely, withdrawal, compliance and aggression, He has tried all the three strategies in order to free himself from Basic Anxiety. But in the end of the book, it seems to be the strategy of withdrawal that helps him to find his own aim of life time.In addition, it should be pointed out that Potok brings such a story into full play though it is difficult to understand. What he gives to the world is so original and special that he is to be remembered and celebrated as one of the greatest writers in Jewish and American world. The Book of Lights will keep alive in obscurity as a great Jewish and American novel.