In Search of, or Escape from, Freedom? A Psychoanalytic Analysis of Sherzad Hassan’s My Father's Fence and Dogs

Abstract

My Father's Fence and Dogs is the title of the first novel by Shirzad Hassan, the celebrated writer, and is considered by critics as a turning point in Kurdish novel. At first glance, the main theme of the work seems to be patriarchy, but carefully in its depth, the narrative focuses on the power and selfishness of freedom of the fence by the father as a dictator. The narrator's delusional souls, irregular narration, eerie and scary atmosphere, existence of all kinds of failures, conflicts, entanglements, anger and repressed desires, and finally the destructive reaction (physical elimination of the father), all provide the present study with a psychoanalytical treatment. Using psychological concepts such as sadistic personality, masochistic personality, machine color, destructive reaction and so on, the author addresses the details of the text in a psychoanalytic way and analyzes the overt content in order to reach the hidden content. The research also focuses on the motivations as the main reasons for the reactions of the narrator and the people of the fence during the life of the father and after his killing.

Keywords

• my father's fence and dogs
• sherzad hassan
• psychoanalytic analysis
• liberation mechanisms
• eric fromm