Gothic Literature: A Literary Analysis

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Throughout all of high school, I’ve been very intrigued and invested in literature courses, specifically the analysis of literary techniques employed by the author to convey their message. I particularly enjoy analyzing gothic fiction, as the authors tend to leave the story cryptic enough to allow the reader to decipher and determine its validity. For example, in Henry James’ The Turn of the Screw, the reader has to decide whether the protagonist is literally seeing the ghosts or if she’s delusional. Depending on the reader’s opinion, the protagonist could be a liar, a lunatic, a medium, or even a schizophrenic; as long as the reader can provide textual evidence for their speculation, anything could be true about the plot and its characters. In these pieces of literature, there is no correct nor incorrect interpretation, allowing these stories to …show more content…

Everything we do, everything we feel, and everything we think could be traced back to psychological theories and principles. The tendency to conform in social situations (conformity), to be lazier in large groups (social loafing), and to perform better around a crowd (social facilitation) can all be explained through psychology. Furthermore, by using the biopsychosocial approach, psychologists are able to provide a thorough understanding for a person’s thought processes, personality traits, and mental disorders. For example, a child’s extraversion tends to influenced by their genetic predisposition, whereas a child’s religious or political affiliation tends to be influenced by their home environment. Psychology essentially allows people to understand themselves, which enables the student to connect every lesson to their personal

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