An Interpretation Of Paul Harding’s Tinkers From The Perspective Of Psychoanalysis

Paul Harding is one of the influential American writers. In 2010, his debut novel,Tinkers, is awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize.The novel describes George’s reflection on the experiences of fathers of three generations in his family eight days before his death, which depicts three main characters’ different personalities.This thesis analyzes Tinkers with Karen Horney’s psychoanalytical theory. Based on the factors of society and culture, Horney demonstrates the influence of social and cultural forces. Besides, she divides defensive strategies into three categories according to people’s irrational neurotic needs, including moving against people,moving towards people and moving away from people. Furthermore, on the basis of man’s understanding of himself, Horney divides self-image into three parts, including actual self, real self and idealized self.This thesis analyzes the reason why three main characters, George, Howard and old Howard form basic anxiety and what their defensive strategies are. The thesis consists of five chapters. Chapter One gives an introduction and literature review of Paul Harding and Tinkers and Karen Horney’s key notions adopted in the thesis.Chapter Two analyzes the reason why Howard forms basic anxiety and the defensive strategies of moving away from people and despised self he employs. Chapter Three analyzes how George develops basic anxiety and the defensive strategies of moving against people and idealized self he applies. Chapter Four analyzes basic anxiety old Howard forms, the defensive strategy of moving towards people and idealized self he used and his neurotic need for love. Chapter Five concludes that by analyzing the main characters of the novel, this thesis reflects their neurotic need and provides new ways to interpret the novel. Hopefully, concentration on modern people’s psychology is expected.