An Interpretation Of The Protagonists' Road To Freedom In The Painted Veil From The Perspective Of Psychoanalysis

As a typical English novelist and playwright,William Somerset Maugham has completed many excellent literary works.Rich travel experience and professional experience in Europe,Americas,Asia makes Maugham taste the sweet and sour of life and he also makes these feeling into his works.Unlike other works of Maugham,shaping the character images as the feature,The Painted Veil is firstly created by Maugham as the only novel that is characterized by plot development and it is also Maugham's first novel which Maugham takes years to create.Maugham explores humanity and pursues freedom during his life.He integrates his lifelong pursuit of freedom into his work.So far,the researches on The Painted Veil have focused on the love and marriage,ecocriticism,postcolonialism and heroine characterization,whereas researches from the perspective of the psychoanalysis are still relatively less.It is also this feature that provides the possibility of researching The Painted Veil.In this thesis,Freudian psychoanalysis is used to conduct psychological analysis from the “id”,“ego”,“superego” and the “unconscious”of the hero and heroine.This thesis probes into the relationship between personality structure and freedom of the hero and heroine.Through analyzing the mental activity of the hero and heroine,the thesis reflects the theme of pursuing of freedom and explores the theoretical and practical significance of the theme of freedom in The Painted Veil.This thesis includes three parts: introduction,main body and conclusion.The main content of this thesis is as below:The first part of this thesis is introduction.This part gives a general introduction to William Somerset Maugham,his lifetime,writing style and his achievements,introduces the background of The Painted Veil,explains the theoretical basis of this paper-the main content,theoretical and practical significance of Sigmund Freud's psychoanalysis,reviews the researches and criticism of the novel The Painted Veil at home and abroad,integrates comprehensive analysis of this novel,points out the possibility of using Freudian psychoanalysis to analyze The Painted Veil from the perspective of freedom,points out the direction for the modern self-awareness,self-realization and personality balance.Therefore,analysis of freedom theme in The Painted Veil has the theoretical meaning.The second part is the main body of this thesis,it consists of four chapters.The first chapter mainly analyzes the inner unconscious state of the hero and heroine in The Painted Veil.Unconsciousness is a special mental state and psychological process.It includes a variety of primitive instinctive impulses and instinct-related desires.It reflects people's true inner thoughts.Influenced by family environment and social environment,Kitty subconsciously desires love and desire.As a result,that leads her into the cage and loses her freedom.Walter unconsciously desires Kitty's love and eventually falls into the prison of marriage.By analyzing the unconscious minds of male and female protagonists,we get the reasons that shackle the realization of their freedom.The second chapter mainly analyzes the id in the personality structure of the hero and the heroine.The id in Kitty and Walter's personality structure are the main causes of their distressing marriage.The distressing marriage is also a huge cage that restricts their freedom.The third chapter mainly analyzes the ego of the male and female protagonists.This chapter primarily describes the awakening of the hero and heroine in the predicament.This chapter focuses on the theme of the pursuit of freedom,but also the process of the hero and heroine growth.After the hero finds the heroine derails,in order to revenge the heroine,Walter takes her to Mei-tan-fu-a cholera-endemic town in China and makes their life under the brink of death.After experiencing the war and disease and seeing the benevolence and new life in the monastery,Kitty and Walter start the process of introspection.The fourth chapter analyzes the superego of the male and female protagonists and discusses the realization of freedom.However,the road to free realization is not easy.The stubborn id of the male and female protagonists makes the hero and heroine full of twists and turns along the road to freedom.This chapter also explores the relationship between superego and freedom.Superego is the same with freedom as an ideal state and a beautiful pursuit.Kitty,like Walter,longs for freedom and longs for superego.The last part of this thesis is conclusion.Conclusion is the systematic summary of the whole thesis.It points out the theoretical significance of enriching the theory of freedom and the aesthetic meaning of providing totally new angles to appreciate and understand Maugham's works.This chapter points out once again that the pursuit offreedom has practical value for liberating humanity.It is similar to today's“people-oriented” socialist core values.What's more,the last part also includes defects and aspects that need improve in this thesis.In the end,The Painted Veil contains contemporary people's exploration of humanity and the pursuit of freedom,so consistent energy and research should be put on this novel.