Psychoanalysis Of The Tragic Theme Of The Hairy Ape

In the literary history,the ultimate question of human identity has been frequently presented which captivates many writers.Eugene O'Neill is one of those who make great efforts to figure it out.In his play The Hairy Ape,he creates Yank as a major character who keeps inquiring into his identity and the meaning of existence in struggling with so many misunderstandings from both the haves and the have-nots throughout his young short life.However,he ends up dead with no answers and still groans that “Christ,where do I get off at? Where do I fit in?”As an expressionist work,The Hairy Ape depicts a miniature of the whole society with limited numbers of figures,presenting the issue of absence identity and mental problems it causes.This thesis aims to analyze the character of the figures with Sigmund Freud's personality structure and defense mechanisms and further interpret the tragedies happening in nature,society and the mental world of human.Representing the working class,Yank's personal tragedy is an embodiment of the issues brought by ruthless exploitation of the natural world,deviations of values and alienation in society and the wasteland in human spirit.The thesis consists of three parts,the introduction,the main body and the conclusion.The detailed structure is as follows.The first part offers an introduction to the play and its author and the theory applied(i.e.,Psychoanalysis).In addition,literature review,along with the research purpose and practical significance of the thesis are also included in this part.The second part,namely the main body,falls into four chapters.Chapter one probes into the id,ego,and super-ego of the main characters with the theory of personal structure and defensive mechanisms by Freud.The id stands for human desire driven by instinctive while super-ego,the constraints from morality and conscience.The ego functions to regulate the conflict between the former two.Though the figures come from different social background,the id of them all takes the upper hand over the super-ego.They are generally suffering the anxiety to varying degrees in the environment filled with materialism,which suggests the state of mind of men generally lose the balance.The ego fails to solve the conflict among the id,super-ego andthe reality.Thus,human state of mind is not healthy.Chapter two discusses the manifestation of the illness in human mind in the relationship with nature.Since the Second Industrial Revolution,human gain great confidence in conquering nature,which gives way to anthropocentrism.It entitled human to exploit nature relentlessly and finally cause tragic consequences.Large-scale factories are built to mine more resources and businesses are even stretched to killing animals,which endangers their existence.Chapter three investigates the reflection of mental illness in society.Industrialization dramatically pushes forward economy,also brings forth many side-effects.Certainly,with mass production enriching the market,materialism and consumerism are replacing the traditional value orientation,and human desire is swelling too,which speeds up the stratification of society and social disparity.Meanwhile,capitalism makes machine a replacement of manual labor,but also alienates human.All this issues are closed linked with human depression and other mental disease.The last chapter deals with the spiritual crisis reflected by the mental illness.The state of mind of human maintains a worrying problem throughout the industrialization drive.They make every effort to seek comfort in mind but in vain.They are lacking belonging.At the same time,construction of ideology has been greatly neglected.Still worse,human's thinking ability also undergoes degeneration and human dignity is trampled by machines.The final part is the conclusion which draws up a summary out of the four chapters.It deems that in The Hairy Ape,the id takes up a dominant place and the super-ego a weaker place,while the ego fails to solve the conflict among the two and the reality,which implies that the human spirit is in disharmony.It is demonstrated in the human's connection with nature,society and ideology.Through the interpretation of The Hairy Ape with psychoanalysis,the state of mind can reflect the relationships with nature,society and mentality.Only when the relationships are appropriately regulated can human achieve harmony with both nature and society,and can human mind stay in health.