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<p>Throughout the century, [[psychoanalysts ]] have studied [[Shakespeare]]'s works to deepen their [[understanding ]] of [[psychic ]] [[conflict ]] and to hone their interpretive skills. [[Literary ]] scholars have turned to [[psychoanalysis ]] to solve perennial problems in [[interpreting ]] Shakespeare's [[text]].</p><p>In a [[letter ]] to his friend Wilhelm [[Fliess ]] (15 October, 1897), Sigmund [[Freud ]] sketched out his first formulation of what he would come to call the [[Oedipus ]] [[complex]], then promptly went on to show how this [[notion ]] could be used to [[interpret ]] some [[notorious ]] cruxes in <i>[[Hamlet]]</i>. Freud linked, through the [[triangular ]] [[structure ]] of the [[Oedipus complex]], Hamlet's [[hesitation ]] to avenge his [[father]], his pangs of [[conscience]], his hostility to Ophelia, the [[sexual ]] disgust expressed to Gertrude, and his final [[destruction ]] (1900a, 4: 264-266). "There are more things in heaven and earth Horatio, than are dreamt of in your [[philosophy]]" (1910c, 11: 137n.): Freud's favorite quotation from any source, according to [[Jones]], was this tribute to the complexity of [[existence]], from <i>Hamlet</i>.</p><p>The [[nature ]] of Freud's attachment to Shakespeare's [[work ]] is also conveyed in his [[association ]] of a "special cadence" in his own [[dream ]] [[speech]], with a cadence in Brutus's speech of [[self]]-justification in <i>Julius Caesar</i>. "As Caesar loved me, I weep for him; as he was fortunate, I rejoice at it; as he was valiant, I honor him; but, as he was ambitious, I slew him." (1900a, 5: 424) Freud shed light on the [[unconscious ]] conflict over [[gender ]] and [[ambition ]] that fractured Lady Macbeth's [[psyche]], and on Shakespeare's [[technique ]] of [[splitting ]] a [[character ]] in two "she becomes all [[remorse ]] and he all defiance" (1916d, 14: 324).</p>

<p>In Shakespeare criticism, after classic papers by Ludwig Jekels, [[Ernest Jones]], Theodor Reik, Hanns Sachs, Wangh (Faber, M., 1970) and [[others]], there has been a proliferation of essays, applying various aspects of [[psychoanalytic ]] [[theory ]] to Shakespeare's [[texts]]: dream theory, the [[structural ]] [[model]], [[incest ]] [[fantasies]], [[primal ]] [[scene ]] fantasies, and the symbolizing and creative functions of the psyche itself. There are several [[English ]] bibliographies that catalogue these works, including those by Norman Holland (1964), D. Wilbern (1978), and Murray Schwartz and Copelia Kahn (1980). "On the

[[Universal ]] Tendency to Debasement in the Sphere of [[Love]]" (1912d, 11: 179-190) has featured in the [[discussion ]] of obstacles to love regularly encountered in [[comedy]]. "[[Mourning ]] and [[Melancholia]]" (1916-1917g, 14: 239-258), has been used in [[thinking ]] [[about ]] [[ambivalence ]] toward the lost [[object ]] and severe [[depression ]] in [[tragedy ]] or in a comedy like <i>Twelfth Night</i>. Freud's"On [[Narcissism]]" (1914c, 14: 69-91), and the thinking that grew out of it on the structure of the psyche and its roots in [[infantile ]] [[development]], have influenced many [[recent ]] [[interpretations ]] of Shakespeare's plays. "[[Negation]]" (1925h, 19: 235-239) has been useful to Shakespeareans as it explores one way in which the psyche negotiates its own [[internal ]] contradictions.</p><p>Beyond Freud, Jacques [[Lacan]]'s "[[mirror ]] [[stage]]," Donald [[Winnicott]]'s "[[transitional object]]," Margaret Mahler's "[[separation]]/individuation," and Erik Erikson's "basic trust" have generated new psychoanalytic readings of Shakespeare's plays. Of the classic psychoanalytic essays on Shakespeare, Ernst [[Kris]]'s essay, "Prince Hal's Conflict" (Faber, 1970) has remained a model of sophistication. Integrating elements of the play's [[language]], characterization, and plot with corresponding elements of [[psychic structure]], Kris, examining the play's sources and speeches, recognizes Shakespeare's exceptional [[genius ]] for historical and [[psychological ]] observation. More recently, psychoanalysis has influenced the critics who see Shakespeare as a dramatist whose "plays and poems do not merely illustrate his [[identity ]] but are in each [[instance ]] a [[dynamic ]] expression of the [[struggle ]] to re-create and explore its origins" (Schwartz, 1980, xv-xvi). In this spirit, Janet Adelman (1992) has [[analyzed ]] [[masculine ]] identity and "fantasies of [[maternal ]] [[power]]" and of "the maternal [[body]]" in Shakespeare.</p><p>[[Psychoanalytic criticism ]] of Shakespeare has dominated the application of [[psychoanalytic theory ]] to the [[arts ]] and has articulated debates over the nature of applied psychoanalysis. One side insists that Shakespeare's text be treated with respect for its genre, for its [[formal ]] and aesthetic properties, for its artifice, so that we must not invent an unconscious or an infantile [[neurosis ]] for a character, or do wild [[analysis ]] on the [[author]]; we must not go beyond the language of the text. [[Another ]] [[position ]] responds that a text is the product of the [[human ]] psyche, which always uses the unconscious and its desires in [[creativity]]. Perhaps the most fruitful psychoanalytic interpretations of Shakespeare occupy a middle ground wherein the text is evidence and arbiter, but where the characteristically Shakespearean [[illusion ]] that a stage person has interior [[being]], with motives that he himself does not fully [[understand]], is recognized and explored.</p>

<p><i>See also:</i> <a href="http://soc.enotes.com/psychoanalysis-encyclopedia/failure-neurosis">Failure neurosis</a>; <a href="http://soc.enotes.com/psychoanalysis-encyclopedia/hamlet-oedipus"><i>Hamlet and Oedipus</i></a>; <a href="http://soc.enotes.com/psychoanalysis-encyclopedia/literature-psychoanalysis">Literature and psychoanalysis</a>; <a href="http://soc.enotes.com/psychoanalysis-encyclopedia/mythology-psychoanalysis">Mythology and psychoanalysis</a>; <a href="http://soc.enotes.com/psychoanalysis-encyclopedia/negative-capability">Negative capability</a>; <a href="http://soc.enotes.com/psychoanalysis-encyclopedia/parricide">Parricide</a>; <a href="http://soc.enotes.com/psychoanalysis-encyclopedia/primal-fantasies">Primal [[fantasy]]</a>; <a href="http://soc.enotes.com/psychoanalysis-encyclopedia/theme-three-caskets">"Theme of the [[Three ]] Caskets, the."</a></p>

<h2>[[Bibliography]]</h2><ul><li>Adelman, Janet. (1992). <i>Suffocating mothers: Fantasies of maternal origin in Shakespeare's plays. "Hamlet" to "The Tempest."</i> New York: Routledge.</li><li>Faber, M.D. (Ed.). (1970). <i>The [[design ]] within: Psychoanalytic approaches to Shakespeare</i>. New York: [[Science ]] House.</li><li>[[Freud, Sigmund]]. (1900a). The [[interpretation ]] of [[dreams]]. Part I. <i>SE</i>, 4: 1-338; The [[interpretation of dreams]]. Part II. <i>SE</i>, 5: 339-625.</li><li>——. (1910c). [[Leonardo ]] [[da Vinci ]] and a [[memory ]] of his [[childhood]]. <i>SE</i>, 11: 57-137.</li><li>——. (1912d). On the universal tendency to debasement in the sphere of love. <i>SE</i>, 11: 177-190.</li><li>——. (1914c). On narcissism: an introduction. <i>SE</i>, 14: 67-102.</li><li>——. (1916d). Some character-types met with in psychoanalytic work. <i>SE</i>, 14: 309-333.</li><li>——. (1925h). Negation. <i>SE</i>, 19: 233-239.</li><li>——. (1950a). Extracts from the Fliess papers. <i>SE</i>, 1: 173-280.</li><li>Holland, Norman N. (1966). Psychoanalysis and Shakespeare. New York and [[London]]: McGraw-Hill Book Company.</li><li>Kris, Ernst. (1952). <i>Psychoanalytic explorations in art</i>. New York: International Universities Press.</li><li>Schwartz, Murray and Kahn, Copelia. (1980). <i>Representing Shakespeare</i>. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins [[University]].</li>