1926: The Sun Also Rises, by Ernest Hemingway, is published
1923: Das Ich und das Es (The Ego and the Id), by Sigmund Freud, elaborates on ideas proposed in a 1920 work, Jenseits des Lustprinzips (Beyond the Pleasure Principle), about the original three amigos: the id, ego, and super-ego
In The Sun Also Rises, it doesn't seem like a stretch to say that the people in the story have problems. They give themselves all sorts of nonsense to squabble over. They give themselves a detachment from real feelings with irony. Jake specifically masks feelings of inadequacy over his injury with hyper-masculinity, becoming ill at the very sight of the gay men that Brett enters the dance hall with in Chapter III (p. 28, to be precise). In fact, the problems the characters face seem almost to riff on the ideas put forth by Freud in that time frame about the way the human psyche works.
With his theory of the id, ego, and super-ego, Freud supposes that humans have three forces at work within their mind. The id brings forth instinctual and unconscious desires and tendencies; it seeks to make us do whatever will make us happy, more or less. The super-ego acts in opposition; it internally criticizes and moralizes what we do, like a conscience. The ego stands between, mediating between the two and giving us whatever action it deems best to perform.
In fact, these descriptions sound eerily similar to specific characters. Mike, when he gets drunk, spouts out whatever comes to his head. He rants off at Cohn (in a manner his friends decide was too far, though right-minded) for following Brett around like a lost puppy and for never getting drunk (146-7). He yells for someone to tell Romero that "bulls have no balls" (180). Whenever he gets drunk, he goes too far, does something ridiculous, doesn't keep himself in check properly, behaves badly. In him, the id dominates, at least when there's enough alcohol in the system.
Cohn, on the other hand, does more or less the opposite. He takes everything too seriously. He takes Brett's supposed morality too seriously: "I don't believe she would marry anybody she didn't love" (46). In fact, Jake retorts she's done it twice; it doesn't make sense to talk virtuously about how she doesn't live virtuously. He gets offended when Jake jokingly tells him to "go to hell" (47). The phrase is tossed around casually the entire conversation by Jake, and elsewhere too, but in this one instance Cohn breaks and snaps at Jake over seemingly nothing. Cohn doesn't mesh with the group, because he doesn't riff with them; he doesn't get drunk like they do, he doesn't joke like they do, he keeps himself too far in check. In him, the super-ego dominates.
With these two extremes set, it's very difficult to find someone between them to contrast them both to. Brett seems just a little too eager to get drunk, to party, to sleep around; her super-ego doesn't have quite enough power, though she is clearly not as far gone as Mike. Jake seems better, especially in the Basque country with Bill, where he can properly indulge his id and riff with him. But, introduce Brett to the occasion, and he falls silent. He doesn't really participate in group conversations. In fact, he is too reserved; just like he says he'd "be as big an ass as Cohn" if given the proper chance with Brett, his super-ego overpowers around Brett (185). Bill is better; everybody likes him, a good indication he behaves himself well and interestingly. Of course, he too leans towards his id; he'll have unprovoked outbursts like Mike, and the id is the source of what makes him funny in the first place, but he generally has control over himself (as evidenced by the "bromance" scene fishing with Jake).
What repulses Cohn even more than his super-ego from the gang, though is when his id pokes out. This is what causes him to come after Jake for "pimping" Brett out to Romero, and to punch everybody out. His id isn't like that of Mike or Bill; he doesn't joke around or try to have a good time when his base desires come out. He goes straight for what he wants. In a way, it's almost narcissistic, that he focuses on what will fulfill his needs over helping out everyone else in the process. No matter what he does, he doesn't fit in with the group; they probably weren't meant to be.
Whether or not Hemingway was influenced by Freud's work any, his characters prove to be a very natural case-study for what Freud was proposing. Whether or not Freud's ideas have merit, they produced interesting and compelling characters in The Sun Also Rises. Perhaps some enterprising author should follow suit, and base a story around nihilism, or existentialism.
I'm almost certain that Hemingway was influenced, either directly or indirectly by Freud's work, since Freudian psychology was very popular with literary types in the 20's-- despite how scientific or accurate his claims were. There's also a lot of Freudian gender and sex stuff, and also repression. All the characters are breaking away from repression in some ways, but in other ways, (your example of Jake going silent at the topic of Brett comes to mind) the characters are still very repressed.
ReplyDeleteFreud's influence can be found in pretty much every work of fiction written between 1910 and 1950. Whether the individual authors will admit to the influence or not (mostly they deny it, probably because writers don't like to reveal their sources, or to admit that psychology might have influenced their art), it's clear that Freud's view of consciousness was "in the air" at the time. Kafka, too, you might have noticed, depicts family dynamics in a way that Freud would've had a lot to say about.
ReplyDeleteAnd if Freud's theory of id/ego/superego is "true," then a realistic novel like this would almost inevitably reflect this view of consciousness. Still, I hadn't thought of breaking it down among the different characters as you have here, and it makes a lot of sense. If nothing else, it's a helpful way to illustrate the psychological concepts (when you think of the id, picture Mike spouting off at the mouth . . .).