“A Gentle Spirit”: A Case Study of ‘Neurotic’ Aspects in the Light of Lacanian Psychoanalysis

Russian writer Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky’s (1821-1881) amazing and insightful short story “A Gentle Spirit” (1876), is a piece comes with the subtitle of “A Fantastic Sorry”, demonstrates the narrator's self-defence and sharing his thoughts in profound manner and showing that he was guiltless in his wife’s sudden committing of suicide. Throughout the course of the story the narrator gives every possible details of the course of their relationship. Like his other writings Dostoevsky here deals with psychology of the characters covertly if not overtly. Jacques Lacan (1901- 1981), a French psychoanalyst provides lucid ideas about human being’s mental condition. According to Lacan a person can be either a neurotic, or a psychotic or a pervert and he gives the symptoms of these three types of problems. The narrotor of the short story shows neurotic tendencies (According to Lacanian psychoanalysis) , though obsessional neurosis to be particular. His wife shows hysterical tendencies which is also a part of ‘neurosis' . The narrator’s constant breakdown, questioning himself, his awareness of his present condition and his repression of desires lead one to diagnose him nothing but an ‘obsessional neurotic'. His wife also shows tendencies of hysteria, though the narrator addresses her repeatedly as a hysteric but a reader can also perceive that through her characteristics. If not then why she suddenly takes the path of suicide which is a typical neurotic tendency.

The neurotic, on the other hand is marked by having undergone the process of primal affirmation, negation and repression

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