The Suicide Puzzle

Susan Sontag, a famous American writer and critic, is extolled as“the conscience of American Public”. Her second novel Death Kit is about aterrifying black story written with the fierce unsettling thrust of a Kafkaesquefable. Seemingly, the book depicts the journey after the hero Diddy’s recoveryfrom his suicidal attempt, but it turns out to be his hallucination when heapproaches death, where things appear to proceed in a natural way yet areoccasionally interrupted by several flashes of his past experiences, which, infact, account for the death of Diddy. With the aid of Freud’s psychoanalytictheory, this thesis intends to ferret out the truth of Diddy’s death, which is thenovel’s main concern and essential meaning: Diddy’s death is not thetermination of his life but a symbol of his rebirth.Divided into three parts, this thesis starts with the introduction of SusanSontag, her Death Kit, as well as the critical theory applied to analyze it.Besides, a literature review is also included. The body part consists of threechapters. While Chapter One traces back to Diddy’s childhood experiences inthe family to dig out the determinants of the flaws of his character, such ashesitation, weakness, low self-esteem, and distrust, Chapter Two probes into thesocial impact--the cold-bloodedness of work mechanism and the cruelty ofwars--on Diddy that leads to his disorientation, with the former serving as aninternal factor and the latter an external one, both of which play the role of acatalyst of Diddy’s death instinct, the decisive cause of Diddy’s suicidediscussed in Chapter Three. In this chapter, the analysis is developed aroundthree respects--Diddy’s pursuit of darkness, his fear of intimacy, and hisdestructive behaviors--to prove Diddy’s strong death instincts. Although fear ofintimacy is deemed as a consequence of death instinct, it can also be a productof the family complex, the psychological wounds caused in the childhood by thedearest family members. Besides, wars viewed by Freud as little other than aform of mass suicide not only arouse Diddy’s destructive desire but also reinforce his death instinct. The three chapters, therefore, each explaining aseparate reason for Diddy’s death, though, are closely related as the former twoact as a reinforcement of the last one. With regard to the last part, thecontributors to Diddy’s suicide are summarized, after which, a conclusion isdrawn: Diddy’s death does not propagate the negation of life but to awakenpeople’s contemplation on the meaning of life.