International Journal of English Language and Translation Studies (Dec 2017)
Lacanian Dream and Desire in A Streetcar Named Desire
Abstract
The decentralization process from Copernicus to Freud proved that no human knowledge could be relied on with definite certainty. The modern world is the world of facts, not truths. Literature is one fact among the many and it could have, in turn, many facts in itself. Besides, literature, and especially dramatic production are supposedly the mirror of real life. The distance we have with this life, to use a Brechtian notion, helps us get a gestalt view of it. Adler (1990) and Thomieres (2012) have worked on the structural aspects of Tennessee Williams's A Streetcar Named Desire to reach at a psychological understanding of the relations in the play. More specific psychoanalytic analysis of the work has been conducted by Timpane (1995), Silvio (2002) and Lidya (2011). This research aims at shedding light on the multiple layers of the play using the Lacanian psychoanalytic concepts of Dream and Desire. The research gives us a new interpretation and understanding of life, people, and society based on the structure and content of A Streetcar Named Desire. Among all the researches that have been conducted on the works of Williams so far, not much has been done on this aspect.
