A Horneyan Psychoanalytical Interpretation Of Clara’s Anxiety In Jerusalem The Golden

As one of the most important British women writers in the late twentieth century,Margaret Drabble dedicated herself to reflecting the true living conditions of females,expressing the true voice in their hearts and showing concern for their fates,and was impressive for her creative writing techniques and deep and insightful thoughts.Published in 1967,Jerusalem the Golden was Drabble’s fourth novel.It skillfully told a story of a girl’s road of questing for an ideal realm of life,and reflected women’s endeavor for self-searching and self-realization in the English society at that time.Clara is an intelligent and ambitious girl who is daring in exploration and yearning for freedom.However,the fact of being born in a provincial and closed small town becomes the obstacle for her to pursue her aspirations,and the conflict between the ideal and reality in her early life involves her in a strong feeling of anxiety,burying some underlying problems for her uneasiness and confusion when she enters society.On basis of Horney’s social-cultural psychoanalysis,especially her neurotic personality theory of which the essential factor is anxiety,this thesis makes an interpretation of Clara’s anxiety in Jerusalem the Golden from the perspectives of the manifestations,causes,defensive strategies and consequences,hoping to provide a clear construction of Clara’s anxiety in her interaction with the culture and society around her,explore into the inner principle of the development of anxiety and the corresponding solution,and enrich the understanding of the character Clara in the novel.This thesis consists of three parts: introduction,main body and conclusion.Firstly,in the introduction part,the foundation and significance of this thesis,as well as the previous research results are illustrated.The main body of this thesis is divided into four chapters.The first chapter analyzes the manifestations of Clara’s anxiety.Firstly,it is the loss of self-identity.Clara’s living environment since childhood makes her suspicious of herself and self-abased,losing a correct cognition of her self-identity.Secondly,it is the lack of sense of security in interpersonal relationships,including the over-dependence on love and appreciation and sense of loneliness and disillusionment.Thirdly,conflict between personal desires and social contexts is also an important manifestation of Clara’s anxiety.In Clara’s process of growth,her aspirations are always frustrated until she loses her courage to express her desires or insist herself in front of others.Chapter two enquires into the causes of Clara’s anxiety from two aspects: Clara’s personal experience and the social cultural background,and analyzes how these causes affect Clara’s psychology and form her anxious personality.The personal causes mainly include the indifferent family relationships and the shadow of her mother’s misfortune.Women’s repressed status,and alienation among modern people constitute the social causes which work out as the oppressive power and lead to Clara’s anxiety.Chapter three is about Clara’s defensive strategies against anxiety,including the constructive resistance and passive evasion,and analyzes Clara’s efforts in face of her anxiety with these strategies.Constructive resistance consists of search for sanctuary in love,pursuit of power and success,and challenge to social norms.Passive evasion consists of escape from anxious environments and compliance to others.Chapter four discusses the consequences of Clara’s defense against anxiety.For one thing,Clara achieves her self-redemption from anxiety through her hard efforts.Firstly,Clara is cured by the intimate relationships with her friend and lover,which alleviates her anxiety in interpersonal relationships.Secondly,Clara realizes self-value in her pursuit of power and success,which alleviates her anxiety about self-identity.Thirdly,Clara reconstructs her self-confidence to express herself bravely to the outside world and gets rid of the fear that her desires would be frustrated.For another,there are some limitations of Clara’s self-redemption,including the unsolved problems in pursuit of self-fulfillment and failure in quest for the ideal realm,which will bring challenges to her in the following life.The third part is conclusion,which makes a summary of the whole thesis and comes to a conclusion on the essence of Clara’s anxiety under the influence of social and cultural background,and provides some suggestions and illumination for people’s comprehension and solution of anxiety.Clara’s anxiety is produced from her lack of love and sense of security in her early life,changes and develops in her interaction with people and environment around her,and is finally alleviated through her acquisition of sincere love and abundant life experience,which verifies that everyone is powerful in the core,and it counts for the individuals to resolve the unfavorable conditions and stimulate the constructive power to realize their self-fulfillment.Through the interpretation of Clara’s anxiety,this thesis hopes to give encouragement and provide ideas for modern people to walk out of anxiety and bloom in their respective positions heartily,and make appeals to form an affectionate and inclusive human world in the modern society.