A Spiritual Journey

Edith Wharton(1862-1937) is one of the most distinguished American women writers in the twentieth century.Her novel,The Age of Innocence(1920),won the Pulitzer Prize in 1921.The novel makes a great contribution to the development of realistic novels with "the vivid descriptions of displaying the inner world of characters" (赵兴国,赵玲1999:3).The novel tells a tragic love story between Newland Archer,a lawyer and Ellen Olenska,a woman with a divorce scandal.When Newland decides to marry May Welland,a lady from the upper class society,May's cousin,Ellen comes to New York to seek support for her divorce from her family.At the beginning,Newland shows sympathy for Ellen,but in the process of their contact with each other,his sympathy turns to his love for her,and Ellen also falls in love with him.Considering her families' honor,Ellen eventually leaves Newland.Newland and May live together until May dies of illness.Thirty years later,Newland and his son come to visit Ellen in Paris,but Newland decides not to see her.The psychoanalytical theory,founded by an Austrian psychologist,Sigmund Freud (1856-1939),have a great research value to the analysis of The Age of Innocence.In Freud's early study of the psychoanalytical theory,he points out that conscious, preconscious and subconscious are the three parts of individual psychology,among which preconscious and subconscious are called unconscious,and that most parts of mental process are unconscious.In his later study,Freud puts forward the basic structure of personalities,which includes three parts:the id,the ego and the super-ego. Based on his psychoanalytical theory,Freud's psychoanalytical criticism is used to analyze the whole process of novel writing.This thesis makes use of Freud's psychoanalytical theory to analyze the characters and the author of The Age of Innocence in order to reveal the significance of playing the super-ego's role in our real lives.Chapter One introduces systematically Freud's psychoanalytical theory.With the help of the basic structure of personalities of Sigmund Freud's psychoanalytical theory, Chapter Two first of all analyzes the conflicts between Ellen's id and the old New York society,such as the conflict between Ellen's id to know the truth and the hypocritical nature of the old New York society,the conflict between Ellen's id to be cared for and the cruel nature of the old New York society and the conflict between Ellen's id to love poetry and art and the little cultural environment of the old New York society. Meanwhile,the conflicts between Ellen's id and the old New York traditions are discussed,such as the conflict between Ellen's id to rebel against the traditional women's role through putting forward a divorce and the old New York society's regarding divorce as a scandal,the conflict between Ellen's id to ignore the class distinction and the clear class distinction of the old New York traditions and the conflict between Ellen's id to take the unscrupulous behaviors,to use the bold words as well as to wear unusual dresses and some social customs of the old New York society.And then it explores the ego and the super-ego of Ellen,the conflict between Newland's id to defend for women and the traditional women's role,the conflict between Newland's id to love Ellen and the old New York traditions and Newland's ego and super-ego by use of the basic structure of personalities of Sigmund Freud's psychoanalytical theory.Through the analysis of the characters,we can see that the super-ego plays its role to care for others.When Ellen and Newland's egos are not powerful enough to control their ids,their super-egos play their roles.According to the basic structure of personalities of Freud's psychoanalytical theory,the super-ego represents all moral restrictions,which comes from parents,but also comes from the natural love of oneself for important others and the wish of protecting important others from one's own cruel harm.Love,either for others or for oneself,is one form of moralities.The super-egos of the protagonists Ellen and Newland use love to control their ids.Because of love and care for others,Ellen refuses Newland's mad love and leaves him;For his family, Newland decides to live with May,taking up his responsibility as a father.Chapter Three makes a study of the life experience,the whole writing process of the author and the author's super-ego with Freud's psychoanalytical criticism and psychoanalytical theory,which not only makes us know the relationship between the life experience and the whole writing process of the author,how the novel is created, but also explores what the super-ego means to the author."Freud believes that the unconscious field of the author is full of various repressed wishes" and "a strong experience in the present awakens in the creative writer a memory of an earlier experience from which there now proceeds a wish which finds its fulfillment in the creative work".We can draw a conclusion that Wharton's unsatisfied wishes are the motive force of the creation of The Age of Innocence,while the creation of The Age of Innocence is the fulfillment of Wharton's unsatisfied wishes.As for the author,the super-ego not only means to take others' interests into her consideration,but also to care for and protect herself.Through the creation of the novel, the author attaches the importance of loving other people through playing her super-ego's role.At the same time,the author also needs to play her super-ego's role, love and protect herself.Because she doesn't take care of herself,a woman intervenes and destroys her sweet love affair,and then the author experiences an unhappy marriage.From the above analysis,playing the super-ego's role to care for others,to take care of and protect ourselves has great significance either for an individual person or the whole society:it makes the super-ego a bridge of love,builds a harmonious life for people and avoids war and poverty.What's more,it will also contribute to constructing a harmonious society.If every one makes his super-ego play its role,not only taking others' benefits into his consideration but also concerning about himself,it will provide a friendly and harmonious environment for the social development.