ipl-logo

Existentialism In A Clockwork Orange

1372 Words6 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Sigmund Freud contribution to the field

Sigmund Freud was a popular psychoanalyst who coined the terms id, ego, and superego. These terms can define each human’s basic action as primitive/instinctive (id), socially driven (superego) or the mediation between the two (ego). Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis and Stanley Kubrick’s interpretation of A Clockwork Orange both show the consequences of living a completely id/superego driven life. While The Metamorphosis shows a businessman, Gregor swap from a superego driven life to an id driven existence, A Clockwork Orange shows the life of a highschool student, Alex who turns from id driven to superego driven. By showing the impact id and superego have on one’s life, both Kafka and Kubrick explain the negatives of having a id/superego driven life and lacking existentialism. Both Kafka and Kubrick’s characters are shown to suffer as a result of being driven by their id/superego completely. In A Clockwork Orange, a teenager named Alex is the leader of a cult that beats and kills innocent citizens of their city. These acts are considered “Ultraviolence” and is id driven. Alex lives the rest of his life in id as he skips school more than he goes, …show more content…

Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis and Stanley Kubrick’s interpretation of A Clockwork Orange both show the consequences of living a completely id/superego driven life. While The Metamorphosis shows a businessman, Gregor swap from a superego driven life to an id driven existence, A Clockwork Orange shows the life of a highschool student, Alex who turns from id driven to superego driven. Sigmund Freud was a popular psychoanalyst who coined the terms id, ego, and superego. Consequently, these terms that can define each human’s basic action as primitive/instinctive, socially driven or the mediation between the two all work together to give a balanced

Show More
Related
564 Words | 3 Pages

The concept that the id, ego, and superego control

Read More
703 Words | 3 Pages

People who can kill animals or people, they do not feel blame and fear of punishment. Kuklinski was raised in a family without love and respect that impact on his personality in the childhood. Sigmund Freud claimed that earlier childhood experiences affected personality development. Freud emphasizes three theory of personality, such as id, ego and superego, which established at the earlier childhood. The main point on these is about superego because superego develops as a preschool- age child learns the rules, customs, and expectations of society.

Read More
1599 Words | 7 Pages

Freud’s theory breaks the psyche up into 3 elements: the id, superego, and ego. The id is said to be the most powerful part, and solely unconscious. It controls our basic drives and is demanding and has no regard for morality, rules, or order. The superego is the smallest element of the psyche and deals with ethics and provides standards for the other elements of personality to abide by. Lastly, the ego is the “middle-man” between the id and the superego, as they tend to conflict.

Read More
1173 Words | 5 Pages

The famously know children 's book The Cat in the Hat with simple rhymes and short easy words is used to teach children how to read at an early age. Many may only think of the book as a harmless book that contains the simplest plot. Some may agree due to the story 's simplistic plot and generic theme, with the characters learning lessons from their selfish mistakes. But some may disagree. Some may say that there is a different meaning to the characters personalities because of the different actions and mistakes they make.

Read More
522 Words | 3 Pages

One of Freud’s theories is that the “Id – Ego combination dominates a person’s behavior until social awareness leads to the emergence of the superego, which recognizes that

Read More
1480 Words | 6 Pages

These do not stand for physical areas of the brain, but more of the mental functions. ID translates to instincts, Ego is reality and Superego is morality. These three central functioning's make up “… the personality—instinctual needs, rational thinking, and moral standards.” (Ronald J. Comer). Dwight Schrute has a very poor ego, which in turn off-sets his ID and Ego.

Read More
1245 Words | 5 Pages

A Clockwork Orange, written by Anthony Burgess, deals with the essence of humanity and morality. Being difficult topics to grapple with, many turn to a religious perspective to inform their beliefs on these subjects. Burgess himself is a strongly Catholic individual and this ideology shows through in the ideas presented by A Clockwork Orange. The book contains a number of allusions to the Bible, Jesus and God’s intentions for humanity. These religious references build upon each other to develop Burgess’ notion that God created humans with free will, and how this leaves humankind flawed and prone to evil tendences.

Read More
1943 Words | 8 Pages

Psychoanalysis of Frankenstein and His Creation When doing a literary analysis using the psychoanalytic type A criticism, the reader must solely look to the work itself and exclude externalities. One may interpret, “Dr. Frankenstein and the monster as embodying Sigmund Freud’s theory of id and ego” (Telgen). The theory is based upon the idea that a character’s personality can be divided into three parts. The id which is the basic desire for what each person wants. The superego which is the opposite of id, it houses our sense of guilt.

Read More
1736 Words | 7 Pages

FREUD’S PERSONALITY THEORY IN LORD OF THE FLIES Sigmund Freud had once said, “The poor ego has a still harder time of it; it has to serve three harsh masters, and it has to do its best to reconcile the claims and demands of all three... The three tyrants are the external world, the superego and the id” (Freud, psychology.about.com) The idea in this quote which is recognized again and again in many movies and books, reminds of the Freud’s Personality Theory which can be seen in “Lord of the Flies”, too. Freud’s Personality theory consists of three main concepts: ego, superego and id. William Golding, the author of “Lord of the Flies”, uses those three concepts as a base when he creates the characters and the places in the book. Freud’s Personality Theory is based on the human mind and it

Read More
1840 Words | 8 Pages

Fifteen year old Alex de Large is the narrator and main protagonist of “A clockwork orange”, who, along with his 'droogs ' (comrades), rampages through a dystopian Britain committing random acts of 'ultraviolence ', brutal rapes, robbery and ultimately murder. Alex 's other great source of intense enjoyment is listening to classical music, and above all the music of Beethoven or 'Ludwig van ' , which seems to heighten his pleasure and intensify his savage and psychopathic impulses. He is a classic anti-hero, and this includes him having a quality of innocence, even at his most depraved. Deceived by his 'droogs ' and arrested for murder, he is then conned by his fellow cons, who lay blame on him for the murder of a new prison inmate. After

Read More
1898 Words | 8 Pages

Dystopian literature often uses the id, ego, and superego to display behavioral attributes of these characters. In Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World and George Orwell’s 1984, individuality is suppressed by the means of a lack in personal relationships

Read More
1315 Words | 6 Pages

In “Freudian Theory and Consciousness: A Conceptual Analysis”, Avinash De Sousa emphasizes the relationship between the three: “Psychoanalysis regarded everything mental being in the first place unconscious, and thus for them, consciousness might be present or absent” (Avinash). According to De Sousa, the id is the reason that the ego and superego forms. In Fight Club, as the narrator suffers from the lack of love from his parents, his desires then develops the id then the ego and at the end, superego. The narrator behavior keep bouncing from the three stages as the story approaches its climax when he decides to kill his innermost desire himself, Tyler. The id, ego and superego have an important role which help explain the narrator’s actions and

Read More
2186 Words | 9 Pages

The Id, Ego and Superego make complete sense to any person who might be interests in learning about the Psyche. Freud’s use of the psychoanalytic theory is relevant when explaining my current behaviour in regards to my past experiences that have occurred throughout my lifetime. Freud’s theory does apply to my own life as he made his theory a way to help understand and focus on the behavioural problems of the human being, and to resolve them in a way that forces me to accept my own destructive

Read More
847 Words | 4 Pages

Freud suggested that the superego acts to perfect and civilize our behaviour and it suppress all unacceptable urges of the id while struggles to make the ego act upon idealistic standards, rather that upon realistic principles. The superego is present in the conscious, preconscious and unconscious. As far as toilet training is concerned, Freud had developed a theory of 'Psychosexual Development '. He developed and advanced this theory focussing on the effects of the sexual pleasure drive on a person’s emerging personality.

Read More
789 Words | 4 Pages

The first aspect is the psyche which is structured into three, the id, ego and superego, all develops at different stages in our lives. The id is an important unconscious structure that contains basic instinctual drives when we are born. Freud believed that the id is based on our pleasure principle. For example, a baby needs or wants something such as milk, the baby

Read More

More about Existentialism In A Clockwork Orange

Related Topics

Open Document