Oedipus Complex: These slides offer a basic overview of the concept.

Oedipus Complex: These slides offer a basic overview of the concept.

1. PSYCHOANALYSIS
Oedipus Complex
Dr. Ilyas Babar Awan
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These slides have been prepared in accordance with NUML’s MPhil English course
outline

2. Oedipus Complex
AccordingtoFreud,theOedipuscomplexreferstoachild’sunconscious
sexualdesirefortheopposite-sexparentandrivalryorjealousytowardthe
same-sexparent.
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3. The origin of the concept
1.Oedipus unknowingly kills his father, King Laius, and marries his
mother, Queen Jocasta.
2.When the truth is revealed, he blinds himself out of guilt.
3.Freud named the “Oedipus complex” after this play because it
dramatizes the unconscious desires and guilt central to his
theory.

4. William Shakespeare Hamlet
(Elizabethan Tragedy)
1.Hamlet’s deep emotional conflict about his mother’s remarriage and his
hesitation to kill Claudius have been interpreted as signs of an Oedipal
tension.
2.His disgust with Gertrude’s sexuality and identification with Claudius
shows the repressed desire for the mother and rivalry with the father
figure.

5. Early Psychoanalytic Literary Criticism (1910s–
1930s)
Early critics began applying Freudian ideas to literature by:
•Studying authors’ works as expressions of their personal neuroses or repressed
desires.
•Treating characters as if they were real people whose unconscious motives could be
analyzed.
Example: Ernest Jones’s analysis of Shakespeare’s Hamlet (1910) interpreted
Hamlet’s delay in avenging his father as rooted in the Oedipus complex.
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6. Expansion Beyond Freud (1930s–1950s)
Other psychoanalysts expanded or modified Freud’s concepts:
•Carl Jungintroduced the idea of the collective unconscious and
archetypes, leading to mythic and symbolic approaches in literary
studies.
•Alfred Adleremphasized feelings of inferiority and compensation,
influencing character analysis in fiction.
•Otto Rankand Erich Frommalso brought cultural and social dimensions
to psychoanalytic reading.

7. The New Directions: Lacanian Psychoanalysis
(1960s–1970s)
Jacques Lacan (1901–1981)reinterpreted Freud through the lens of
structuralism and linguistics.
Key ideas:
•“The unconscious is structured like a language.”
•Literature becomes a space where desire, language, and identityinteract.
•The mirror stageexplains the formation of the self through identification and
misrecognition. Lacan’s theory shifted psychoanalytic criticism from studying
authors’ psychology to exploring language, desire, and subjectivitywithin texts.

8. Feminist and Postmodern Adaptations (1970s–
Present)
Feminist theorists such as Julia Kristeva, Luce Irigaray, and Hélène Cixous
blended psychoanalysis with feminism:
✓They questioned Freud’s male-centered views of sexuality.
✓They explored how language and desireshape women’s identity and
expression.
✓Contemporary critics use psychoanalysis to study:
✓Reader response (the reader’s unconscious desires).
✓Cultural symbols, trauma, repression, and identity.
✓Films, advertisements, and digital media, not just literature.

9. Summary Table
Phase Main Figures Focus
Classical (1900–1930s) Freud, Ernest Jones
Author’s psyche; Oedipus
complex; dream
symbolism
Neo-Freudian (1930s–
1950s)
Jung, Adler, Fromm
Archetypes; cultural
psyche; inferiority
Structuralist
Psychoanalysis (1960s–
1970s)
Lacan
Language, desire, identity
formation
Feminist/Postmodern
(1970s–Present)
Kristeva, Irigaray, Cixous
Gender, language, body,
identity politics

10. Sigmund Freud and His Basic Terminologies
Freud’s Central Idea
Freud’s work is based on the belief that unconscious motives and
repressed desires largely shape human behavior and creativity.
In literature, this means a text often expresses what the author has
suppressed or disguised, revealing the workings of the unconscious
mindthrough characters, symbols, and actions.

11. The Structure (or Models) of the Human Psyche
Freud explained the mind through three interacting systems—id, ego, and superego—each representing
distinct aspects of human personality.
Component Description Governing Principle Example
Id
The primitive, instinctual part of
the mind. It seeks immediate
satisfaction of desires (especially
sexual and aggressive drives).
Pleasure principle –
demands instant
gratification.
A child crying for food
immediately; a character driven by
impulse.
Ego
The rational, realistic part that
mediates between the id and the
external world.
Reality principle –
delays gratification to
act appropriately.
A person planning how to satisfy
desires in a socially acceptable
way.
Superego
The moral conscience,
representing internalized social
rules and parental authority.
Moral principle – judges
and restrains the id.
Feeling guilty after breaking rules
or lying.

12. The Pleasure Principle and the Reality Principle
1.The pleasure principle(id) seeks immediate enjoyment, avoiding
pain.
2.The reality principle(ego) teaches the individual to defer pleasure
until it can be achieved safely or acceptably. Freud saw civilization
itself as a compromise between these two drives.
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13. The Stages of Psychosexual Development
1.Oral stage(birth–18 months): pleasure from sucking/eating.
2.Anal stage(18 months–3 years): pleasure from control and elimination.
3.Phallic stage(3–6 years): discovery of genitals; source of the Oedipus and
Electra complexes.
4.Latency stage(6–puberty): sexual feelings are dormant.
5.Genital stage(puberty onward): mature sexual expression.
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14. Oedipus and Electra Complexes
1.Oedipus complex:A boy’s unconscious desire for his mother and
jealousy of his father (named after Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex).
2.Electra complex:A girl’s unconscious desire for her father and
rivalry with her mother (named after Electra in Greek myth).
These desires are repressed during the phallic stagebut continue
to shape adult relationships and behavior.
Example: Hamlet’s hesitation to kill Claudius is seen by Freudians as
a sign of repressed Oedipal guilt. [email protected]

15. The Castration Complex
During the phallic stage, the child fears punishment (castration)
from the same-sex parent for forbidden desires toward the opposite-
sex parent. This fear causes the child to repress those desires and
identify with the same-sex parent, forming the foundation of gender
identity and moral development.
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16. Neurosis
When desires and fears are repressed but not resolved, they
reappear indirectly through neurotic symptoms, anxiety, obsession,
or symbolic behavior.
In literature, neurosis may appear as a character’s irrational
actions, dreams, or fixations.
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17. Cathexis (plural: Cathexes)
Freud used this term for the emotional energy or
psychic investment attached to a person, object, or idea.
For example, a character may invest emotional energy
(cathexis) in a symbol, like a portrait or ring, which
represents repressed feelings.
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18. Freudian Slips
Also called “parapraxes”, these are unconscious errors in speech,
writing, or action, revealing hidden thoughts or desires.
Example: saying “I’m glad you’re dead—I mean, here!” might show
repressed hostility.
Peter Barry explains that critics look for similar “slips” in texts —
contradictions, symbols, or jokes that reveal repressed meanings.
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19. Literary Application
Psychoanalytic critics often:
✓Treat literary works like dreams, expressing disguised wishes.
✓Interpret symbols, images, and slips in the text as manifestations of the
unconscious.
✓Focus on the author’s or character’s repressed desiresrather than the
surface plot.
✓Barry summarizes this approach as “a reading between the lines, and
beneath the surface, of the text.
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20. Summary Table
Term Meaning Literary Example
Id Instinctual desires Macbeth’s ambition
Ego Rational mediator Hamlet’s hesitation
Superego Moral conscience
Guilt in Crime and
Punishment
Pleasure
Principle
Drive for instant gratification
Dorian Gray’s pursuit of
pleasure
Oedipus Complex
Desire for mother, rivalry with
father
Hamlet–Gertrude–
Claudius relationship