Interpretation Of The Sense Of An Ending From The Perspective Of Freudian Personality Structure

Julian Barnes, a prolific British novelist, whose works covering various aspects: identity, marriage, love, gender, history, religion, philosophy and politics, has widely attracted the domestic and foreign scholars' attention. As Barnes' s work, The Sense of an Ending expresses his exploration and question on the reliability of memory, as well as his humanistic concern about the contemporary society. The novel describes Tony, the protagonist and his process of psychological change: he collects his memory, faces the truth of his memory and feels guilty for his past wrongdoings. Tony's psychological state and discourse expressions reflect the imbalance of his personality structure. Scholars at home and abroad, mostly focus on the novel's narrative techniques as well as the characteristics of post-modernism and new historicism. Few researches explore the relationship between the protagonist's psychological state and his memory.Tony's psychological changes illustrate the unreliability of memory, and the process of his self-exploration accords well with Freudian personality structure. Based on Freudian personality structure, this thesis is divided into three parts: the introduction, the main body and the conclusion. The thesis attempts to study how Tony's psychological state influences his behaviour and memory.The introduction includes Barnes' s life experience, the plot of the novel, and the introduction of Freudian personality structure. In addition, this part reviews the researches on the novel at home and abroad and stresses the significance of the thesis.The first chapter mainly analyses how Tony looks back at his past decades. According to his memory, we can find that his utterances are filled with vulgar words. In addition, Tony spends most of his time satisfying physical pleasure, and is indifferent to his friends' suicide. Moreover, this chapter aims to uncover his personality defects behind his vulgar words and love affairs. Based on Freudian personality structure, this chapter explores how Tony's id controls his unconsciousness and leads to the emergence of his false and distorted memory. When Tony fabricates his past experience, he follows the pleasure principle, ignores the true memory and lives in an imaginary world.Chapter Two explores how Tony struggles with conflicts between the reality and his desire, and then the ego and the id, when he goes back to the reality. Insistence on Adrian's diary and facing the truth about Adrian's suicide are the process of Tony's ego inhibiting his innate needs. In the process, Tony follows the reality principle. Adjusted by the ego, he has to behave rationally and reasonably. However, restricted by his instinct for self preservation he cannot totally get rid of the temptation of his desire.Chapter Three illustrates Tony's illumination, feeling guilty for his past wrongdoings and doubting the reliability of his memory after realizing the damage he has brought to Adrian's son. From then on, following the morality principle, Tony begins to make introspection and self-examination, especially toward the end of his life, which leads him to admit his faults and gives him a new beginning. Under the guidance of the superego, Tony sympathizes with the suicide of his friends, changes his moral standards and begins to query about the sense of an ending.The last part is the conclusion of the thesis. Combing with Freudian personality structure, The Sense of an Ending will obtain a new interpretation and explanation. The imbalance of Tony's personality structure results in his distorted memory, which consequently creates a false edition of his personal history. With a detailed analysis, the thesis aims to arouse more critics' attention to Julian Barnes and his works.