Virginia Woolf's Life And Works: A Psychoanalytic Perspective

Virginia Woolf is an outstanding English novelist and critic. She occupies an important place in the world literature, she is known as one of the greatest novelists in the 20th century and the pioneer of the modern literary. She had innovated English language, tried stream of consciousness in her novel writing, trying to depict people's subconscious. Her achievements in literature still have enormous influence, so she has always been the concern of scholars at home and abroad. Most of critic groups home and abroad have studies her works in terms of writing technique—stream of consciousness. With the development of feminism in the west since 1960, the study on Woolf's works reached a climax. The study has been focused mainly on her feminist thought, especially her androgynous vision.Writing is catharsis of a writer. Therefore to know his life will help us understand the author and his writing thoroughly. Woolf resisted the founding principles of psychoanalysis. At first Woolf expressed her resistance openly and strongly, she was alone in her resistance. Woolf's life is contemporary with the development of psychoanalysis. And in 1920s the spread of psychoanalysis was mainly through the Bloomsbury group, with which Woolf is closely associated. Leonard, her husband, wrote Freud's first non-medical review in Britain, their Hogarth Press took massive risks but delivered the professor's ideas into the London literary world. Her family friends the Strachey's translated and converted to psychoanalysis, in writing, science, thought. Woolf was influenced by psychoanalysts' working hypotheses about many aspects of personality, and her extraordinarily sensitive personality made her contact psychoanalysis ideas around her. Therefore it's significant and necessary to study and explore Woolf and her works from psychoanalysis perspective. Although the forerunning critics and learners have made achievements in studying Woolf from psychoanalysis perspective, there is still research gap. They ignored the relationship between Woolf herself and psychoanalysis and there is no thorough analysis of Woolf's works from this dimension.This thesis the author attempts to conduct a study on Woolf and her writings from psychoanalysis perspective. Whatever the degree of her ignorance of or hostility to Freud himself, her own writing about the Oedipus Complex, female desire , personality structure and death is closely related to Freud and psychoanalysis. Woolf consciously re-writes some Freudian notions. Woolf invented new writing technique, especially stream of consciousness, and put forward androgynous vision, which are both closely related to Freudian psychoanalysis.Chapter One focuses on Woolf's madness and her relation with psychoanalysis. Freud holds that we may have certain unconscious desire which will not be denied, but which dare not find practical outlet either; in this situation, the desire itself forces its way in from the unconscious, the ego blocks it off defensively, and the result of this internal conflict is what we call neurosis. Woolf's madness has genetic and social background. During her childhood she lost several family members including mother, sister and brother. As Freud said she found a way to let the repression out. The way she resorted to is writing, which she referred to as auto-analysis.Chapter Two elaborates Woolf's sexual orientation from homosexuality the relation between Woolf and psychoanalysis. Sexual pleasure is most important part of Freudian principles. In the phallic stage, children begin to sense sexual difference, and they will experience the Oedipus Complex and Electra Complex, which is full of conflict. The process for the girl is demanding, if it does not develop in a normal way the girl will find expression in homosexuality. Woolf suffered a lot in her childhood, losing mother and her brother's sexual intrusion, which is nightmare of life. She hated sex and didn't trust marriage, showing affection to females. James in To the Lighthouse spent ten years identifying with his father. The heroes of To the Lighthouse and Mrs. Dalloway had same sexual orientation with Woolf and all of them were scared of marriage, which reflected Woolf's struggle in terms of sexual orientation and marriage.Chapter Three analyses Woolf and the relation with psychoanalysis from the dimension of personality structure. According to Freud personality of a person consists of three major systems—the first is id, the most primitive and least accessible part in personality. The second is superego, composed of ethical and moral principles. The "ego" is a pitiable, precarious entity, battered by the external world, scourged by the cruel upbraiding of the superego, and plagued by the greedy, insatiable demands of the id. Woolf is very sensitive and has split personality. She holds that we have a great variety of selves to call upon, far more than we have been able to find room for, maybe six or seven selves, or a person may well have as many thousand. It is in accordance with Freudian personality structure. Orlando is embodied, and she is a combination of three selves.Chapter Four focuses on death. From this perspective, Woolf's suicide and relation with psychoanalysis is dealt with. According to Freud, Thanatos represents the organic need to return to lifelessness and stasis such as assault, masochism and destruction. Freud thinks the final goal of life is death. Freud views psychic life as interplay of life and death. Woolf holds extremely positive attitude towards death. In her eyes death is not the ending, is not darkness. It is a communication and will leave significant trace in the survivors' life. Death is also a repeated topic in Woolf's writing. Bernard gave out exclamation to fight death.The last part is a conclusion of the thesis. Although all the recorded paper materials show that Woolf is hostile to psychoanalysis and hates the psychoanalyst, a safe conclusion can be drawn that Woolf's relation with psychoanalysis is manifold. No matter Woolf identifies with psychoanalysis or not, Freudian psychoanalysis has had a profound impact on her. The environment and experience of the childhood will play a profound role in the character of an adult. Woolf's sexual orientation and psychological conflicts can be traced back to the traumatic experience and suppression in her childhood. In turn, her experience and character is reflected in her novels. Woolf had consciously re-written Freudian notions about the conscious, dreams, madness, the Oedipus Complex, homosexuality, personality structure and death. Furthermore, Woolf's famous androgynous thought and stream of consciousness are both closely related to Freudian theory.This thesis is an attempt to analyze Woolf and her writings form psychoanalysis perspective and to seek to find a new approach to Woolf and her works.