Assignment:

Theory of Psychoanalysis of Sigmund

Freud on Death of a Salesman

Introduction:
Psychoanalysis was founded by
Sigmund Freud (1856-1939). Freud believed that people
could be cured by making conscious their unconscious
thoughts and motivations, thus gaining insight. The aim of
psychoanalysis therapy is to release repressed emotions
and experiences, i.e., make the unconscious conscious.

Sigmund Freud:
Sigmund Freud was the founding
father of psychoanalysis, a method of treating illness and
also a theory which explains human behaviour. According
to Freud, the unconscious mind could be accessed through
dream analysis, by examinations of the first words that
came to people’s minds.Psychoanalytic theory focuses on
the role of a person’s unconscious, as well as early
childhood experiences, and this particular perspective
dominated clinical psychology for several decades. Words
he introduced through his theories are now used by
everyday people, such as anal (personality), libido, denial,
repression, cathartic, Freudian slip, and neurotic.

The Psyche
Id, Ego and Superego:
Freud’s structural model of
personality divides the personality into three parts—the id,
the ego, and the superego.
• The id is the unconscious part that is the cauldron of raw
drives, such as for sex or aggression. Freud assumed the id
operated at an unconscious level according to the pleasure
principal meaning it looks for pleasure and avoids pain.
Eros and Thanatos
Eros, or life instincts, based on the libido, sublimated
impulses, and self-preservation. It directs life-sustaining
activities such as respiration, eting and sex.
Thanatos, is the Greek word for death, is viewed as a set of
destructive forces present in all human beings.The death
drive controls aggression, risky behaviors, jealousy, hate
and death.
• The ego develops from the Id during infancy.The ego,
which has conscious and unconscious elements, is the
rational and reasonable part of personality. Its role is to
maintain contact with the outside world to keep the
individual in touch with society, and to do this it mediates
between the conflicting tendencies of the id and the
superego. Furthermore, it functions within the “reality
principle”
• The superego is a person’s conscience, which develops
early in life and is learned from parents, teachers, and
others. Like the ego, the superego has conscious and
unconscious elements.

Application of the Theory on Death

of a Salesman
We can apply the theory of
psychoanalysis on Death of a Salesman. Some of the
psycho-analytical themes shown in the play include low
self-esteem, fear of abandonment, ubsecure or unstable
sense of self and oedipal complex, fear of betrayal and
regression.
The examples of Fraudian theory of
psychoanalysis seems to be on every page on Death of a
Salesman. Louis Tyson explains that family is important to
psychoanalytic theory. It is family pressure that dictates
the action in the story.
Freud calls the problem of repression
"pleasure principle" which means that people seek
pleasure and avoid pain. Willy is also repressing his
thoughts that could've made his family happier.
Regression is the temporary return to a
former psychological state, which is not imagined but
relived. Regression can also be the retur to painful and
traumatic events or to pleasant experience. Willy showed
several flashbacks of his childhood which showed us the
pain he suffered from his father and brother abandoning
him at the young age. He also had memories from the
affair.
Willy suffers from an insecure or unstable
sense of self. He talks to himself alot. His wife tells his sons
how he is mentally unstable and has tried to commit
suicide by inhaling gas and wrecking his car. As Willy has
been fired from the job, it disturbs him mentally. Charley,
Willy's friend, offers him a job but Willy rejects it because
by accepting his offer, he has to reject the philosophy of
being well-liked. And thus, in his ego, he doesn't accept the
job offer.
When he is left alone, his fragile mind shines,
his mind starts talking out loud. Sometimes these
“conversations” are flashbacks from Willy's memories of
"real" events and sometimes Willy's conversations are
pure products of his imagination. Most of his flashbacks
concern Biff, with whom he has placed all his dreams and
hopes. As Willy plays back his role as a father, it becomes
evident that he has failed Biff throughout his life, simply by
avoiding taking in reality. For example, when various
people point out that Biff has some problems, e.g. stealing,
possibly flunking math and that he is too rough with the
girls, Willy responds with:

“There’s nothing the matter with him! …He’s got

spirit, personality”
Explanation:
In this quote, it has been shown that Willy
has distracted his son from reality and he wants Biff to live
a life as he wants to. When Biff stole a ball, Willy
appreciates him. Later on, when Willy came to know that
Biff has flunked math, he says that it's the mistake of his
teacher,
WILLY: That [teacher] son-of-bitch!
Willy says that Biff is well-liked and he has got an attractive
personality.
 Willy believes that if a person is well-
liked and attractive, he will succeed in business. He also
believes in the fulfillment of American Dream and so his
children Biff and Happy are the products of this
environment and they also have dreams of gaining west.
Willy wants his son Biff to be a successful businessman like
himself. But Biff was unable to fulfill his father's dream and
because of his instability in life, he realizes that Willy has
all the wrong dreams.
Low self-esteem is the feeling that we are less
worthy than other people. Willy feels that although, he did
not fulfilled his life goals of living the American Dream his
son can. One of the reasons he committed suicide is
because he felt that he was a failure as a businessman.
After he did not get hired at the company in New York. He
could not handle the guilt of not being able to provide for
his family.s
As the play proceeds, many events e.g. he gets fired, he
relives the moment when Biff finds him with the mistress
may contribute to how Willy's mental health quickly
deteriorates. When all these circumstances are brought
together, they seem to enlarge what he believes to have
been his failures, economically and personally as well as
strengthen Willy’s conviction in his version of the American
Dream.
At the end of the play, she has realized that he has been a
failure in his life, he commits suicide so that his sons
collect the insurance money because he still wanted to be
happy and successful.

"A diamond is hard and rough to the touch."

Explanation:
In this quote, Willy's suicide, according to
Ben, is hard and rough to the touch. The diamond stands
as a reminder of the material success that Willy's salesman
job could not offer him. And Willy thinks that after his
death, life insurance of 20,000$ would help Biff to get what
he wants in his life to be successful.
It is also of importance that this occurs in Willy’s superego
as, according to Freud, the superego:
“…often enough succeeds in driving the ego into death”.