The Lost Self-an Exploration Of The Collector From The Perspective Of Lacan’s Theory Of The Mirror Stage

John Fowles is a British writer of great reputation. He has created many greatworks which have attracted scholars’ attention all over the world. Since his first novelThe Collector was published, it has aroused the intimate attentions of so many critics.This thesis interprets The Collector within the framework of Lacan’s theory of themirror stage in order to analyze the process of Clegg’s self construction through hisidentification with the mirror images.At first, based on Lacan’s theory of the mirror stage, this thesis analyzes Clegg’ssense of self forming in the primal mirror stage and then the self constructs through themultiple mirror images in society will be presented. Thus, Clegg is confused with hisreal self. Afterwards, the thesis discusses the process of Clegg’s self constructionthrough the mirror image-Miranda as well as the narcissistic self of Clegg. At last, thisthesis interprets the failure of Clegg’s self construction, and its reasons will be revealedas well.To sum up, by exploring the novel, we can discover the process of Clegg’s effort tofulfill the fusion of self and mirror image. The thesis draws the conclusion that thepsychic journey of Clegg’s identification with the mirror image is also the process of hisself-identification. It is doomed because the mirror image is something out of him ratherthan the internal sense of self. Encountering multiple mirror images in society, Clegg isafraid of facing the real self, so he chooses to stick to the original image firmly which isanother reason for his failure. Thus, his attempt to fulfill the harmonious fusion of selfand the image is doomed, and thus the self is inevitable to be lost. In other words, themirror image is changing with the change of “mirror” and the development of thepeople; we should face the changing mirror image bravely so as to construct the selfbetter.