Thread:Louis1963/@comment-29712793-20160919185000

Freudian Criticism



Unknowingly this criticism –up until now-, has been a form of criticism I have seen practiced in the classroom, especially in the critique of contemporary poetry. I say unknowingly, because it has never had a name until now. The approach has always been to find the deeper meaning in the poem’s symbols and form, using a psychoanalytical jargon. Besides the grammar-police critic and the critic of “I would have done it this way,” the armchair psycho-therapeutic critique tends to be a best guess at best. The critique seems to a factual definition, even in the N.A.T.C. reading it is noted “Psychoanalysis has been controversial from the beginning because, unlike experimental science, it cannot be adequately tested, falsified, or objectified.” Continuing, “It aims higher than-or falls short of-objective verifiability…” (Freud 807). So an uneasy apprehension takes hold, when one of my colleagues begins to critique as if the statement is scientific fact.



The other concern of the Freudian critique is the balance of pleasure is based on sexual pleasure. The unconscious is a complex part of our being human and to say solely our basic measure of pleasure in the unconscious is sex, I find very limiting. A human finding pleasure or displeasure stemming only from sex limits the motivation and creativity of imagination. I can stay with Freud up until that point, pleasure seems to be subjective and what one human finds to be pleasurable may be seen un-pleasurable to another; including sex.



Pleasure Principle’s use in literary criticism is very interesting and the connection to dream interpretation is a whole new way of looking at writing in general. In a Wikia article on the subject speaks to not only analysis of the text, but includes the, “Author and the characters” ( Psychoanalytic Literary Criticism, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychoanalytic_literary_criticism ) <span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">, as well. I find no argument against the use of the criticism in this way, as long as it not used in a manner described in the same overview, “as a ‘one size fits all,” general rule; speaking of the other forms of criticism that should be in use in literary criticisms. The real plus in Freudian criticism –there are many- us the motivation of readers and critics to look for a deeper meaning in the use of structure, character, setting, as symbols. The sum of this may be finding the reason the piece was written.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"">Naming this particular criticism style is the one thing I find most important and knowing its use is a close second. What was taken for granted, in critique as a general term; now has definition. A tool I will use and be able to use it with more accuracy. <ac_metadata title="Freudian Criticism"> </ac_metadata>