초록 열기/닫기 버튼
This paper tries to elicit and explicate war trauma in Mrs. Dalloway in relation to Freud’s theory on traumatic neurosis. Septimus, one of main characters in the novel, suffers from war trauma after he returns home, having witnessed the bomb-shelled death of his officer and close comrade, Evans, on the frontline during World War I. The typical symptoms of his illness such as hallucinations, nightmares, terror, dissociation, depression, rage, and denial reveal the existence of unassimilated, unintegrated and hurtful experience of the past. Freud argues that traumatic experience attempts to come to the surface through the compulsion to repeat and to be recognized; however it is destined to fail. In the novel, Septimus is victimized by war trauma and commits suicide because nobody gives him understanding and sympathy. Despite being a stranger, only Clarissa shows a moment of communication and sympathizes with his suffering and death at the end of the novel. Through the emotional connection of both characters Woolf suggests that trauma can be accessed and treated by sympathetic engagement among people; and the narrative construction of a work of literature can contribute to the reality of historical truth.
키워드열기/닫기 버튼
war trauma, fixation, compulsion to repeat, Mrs. Dalloway, Septimus, Clarissa, narrative construction
