John Wade In The Lake Of The Woods Analysis

Sigmund Freud introduces some powerful ideas in his book Civilization and Its Discontents. Many of his ideas and theories are evident in the life of John Wade in The Lake of the Woods. In my opinion, one can apply Freud’s theories to accurately analyze John Wade in three main ways: Freud’s structural model of the psyche, his argument of suppression of aggression, and neurosis “as the outcome of a struggle between the interest of self preservation and the demands of the libido, a struggle which the ego had been victorious but at the price of sever sufferings and renunciations.” (Freud 104). All of which lead to unhappiness and discontent. Freud proposes that the primal instinct of humans is to act aggressively towards each other. In civilized society, we have restrained our inclination to aggression through law and authority. Repeatedly, in The Lake of the Woods, John Wade either acted aggressively

I believe from Freud’s arguments of neurosis, that he would diagnose John Wade with this. Neurotic behavior can occur from traumatic events. The traumatic events in John Wade’s life include his emotionally abusive father, his father’s suicide, and the Vietnam War. Because of these events, according to Freud, he probably had many internal impulses that were improperly repressed by the ego, so he found substitutions. Wade became neurotic when his ego failed to deal with its desires through repression or displacement or renunciation of instinct. “...the neurotic creates substitutive satisfactions for himself in his symptoms, and these either cause him suffering in themselves overcome sources of suffering for him by raising difficulties in his relations with his environment and the society he belongs to.” (Freud 89). What was discussed in my point about suppression of aggression also applies here, and what I think in large part led to his development of