Psychology and Literature

Psychology and Literature

As a psychology major, I consider myself to be quite the critical thinker and analyst about anything and everything that is thrown my way, whether it's just casually analyzing someone's behavior, or thinking critically about a story. I enjoy reading, especially medical journals, and pretty much anything that's informational and gets my mind wondering. For this to be my last semester, I've had good experience writing my opinion and my observation about different situations. I find that writing really lets me express my feelings and philosophies on certain subjects without being instantly criticized as one would be explaining it verbally to someone. Most of my life I've kept some type of journal or diary to record what is going on in my life and in some cases when I feel the best way to express myself to someone without being interrupted or stopped for whatever reason, I will write a letter for them to read. I find that this is the best way to get everything I am feeling out in the open because I would have had time to think about what I wanted to say and affectively explain myself. In high school I did well in my English classes. The most interesting English class I have ever taken was British Literature; it was so refreshing to learn about how the literature we read and write today was affected so much by 15 and 16th century literary scholars. Needless to say, I am extremely excited about continuing my education in literature. I find reading literature gives us a terrific example on how people are thinking and how they are choosing to express themselves.

As far as the psychological interpretation of "The Storm" by Kate Chopin, I found many interesting elements of this story. The sexual dynamic between characters screams for Freudian's psychoanalysis to draw conclusions about the relationships that each of the characters have to one another. In this short story, Chopin conveys complex emotional conflict in very few words. In a story that is but a few pages long Chopin is able to tell the story of a woman torn between two men. Sexually frustrated, she uses the storm as a symbol and it is through her rich use of language in describing the storm that Chopin is able to convey the emotion of her characters in great detail. As we discussed in class, I found that reading the story again, there are many innuendos that subtly point to what exactly is going on between Calixta and Bobinot. When an individual is told about an affair between two lovers, most of us would immediately judge the situation as being impure, repulsive and an abomination to the commitment not only they made to each other, but also to God. But in this story, you couldn't help but be dragged in and feel some sympathy for Calixta and Alcee. Living in a society which does not morally allow sharing this kind of encounter with another, both Alcee and Calixta are expected to