Interpretation Of Beyond The Horizon From The Perspective Of Freudian Personality Structure

Eugene O‘Neill（1888-1953）is internationally recognized as―Father of ModernAmerican Drama‖and Founder of the serious American Drama. He was awarded theNobel Prize for Literature in1936, the only American playwright who received thishonor, and also the one who was awarded the Pulitzer Prize four times. He wrotealmost fifty plays all his life, but almost all of them involve some degree of tragedy.He is the one who insists on exploring the fate and the inner world of ordinary people.Beyond the Horizon is one of such plays.As his early masterpiece, Beyond the Horizon was created in1918, premiered in1920, earned him the first of the four Pulitzer Prizes, marked the new period of hiscreation life, and also established his position in American drama and literaturehistory. It has been received extensive attentions from numerous scholars at home andabroad since it was staged. However, the current researches only focus on suchlimited angles as the conflict between dream and reality, tragedy theory, archetypalapproach and feminist studies. Therefore, this thesis is intended to re-interpret thisrenowned play from the perspective of Freudian Personality Structure, to probe intothe causes of the tragedy from the layer of the protagonists‘inner world.The theory of Freudian Personality Structure is widely applied in literarycriticism. According to Freud, an individual‘s personality is composed of Id, Ego andSuperego. The id is driven by pleasure principle, the ego operates based on the realityprinciple, and the superego obeys moral principle. The key to a healthy personality isa balance among the three. The imbalance will lead to an individual‘s abnormalpersonality, further resulting in a tragic life. This thesis aims to analyze the threeprotagonists Ruth, Andrew and Robert from the perspective of id, ego and superego,respectively to explore the inner causes of their tragedy.The whole thesis consists of six parts: the introduction, four chapters and theconclusion.The Introduction mainly gives a brief introduction to Eugene O‘Neill, his majorworks, literature review on Beyond the Horizon at home and abroad, and the theory ofFreudian Personality Structure.Chapter One focuses on the behaviors and psychology of Ruth, and illustratesthat she is a fantasy woman with no sense of self-reliance, unwilling to change the bad situation on her own efforts, and shoulder the responsibility for her family. She is onefollowing the―pleasure principle‖and driven by Id.Chapter Two analyzes the canny and sophisticated speculator Andrew. On theone hand, subjugated by Ego, he is capable of adjusting himself and catchingopportunities in bad situations; on the other hand, he is an egotist as well. He is lost inhis Ego and money pursuit.Chapter Three studies the protagonist of this play, Robert, the most tragic one ofall the characters. He frequently displays the spirit of Superego, and renders himselfan incarnation of morality. He has always been sacrificing his dreams for Ruth and thefamily members. He is a man with strong self-esteem, refuses the help from his elderbrother and holds on alone. Although he always sacrifices to others, but does not winthe favor from fate, he dies eventually with his unfulfilled dream of going beyond thehorizon.Chapter Four, based on the above analysis, examines the root causes of thetragedies. Ruth is manipulated by Id, Andrew is lost in Ego, and Robert rendershimself a slave to Superego. In general, their personality is problematic, thus causingtragedies to themselves and the whole family.The Conclusion points out the signification of this play to the modern people.The present society is the one of highly material civilization; human beings are easilytempted by the unrealistic illusions, which will lead them astray, depriving them ofthe sense of belonging, and consequently leading to tragedy. In order to avoid suchtragedy, the healthy personality is of great importance for all the human beings.