『줄리어스 시저』의 프로이드적 읽기: 원시부족과 그룹정치

Abstract

There have been psychoanalytic researches on Julius Caesar since Sigmund Freud remarked on the ambivalent feeling that Brutus bears toward Caesar. Considering the lack of Freudian interpretations compared with numerous papers on Julius Caesar in Korea, this paper attempts to read Julius Caesar with Freud’s Totem and Taboo, and Group Psychology and the Analysis of the Ego. The primal horde that Freud explains in Totem and Taboo has many respects in common with the group formation of Group Psychology. The social constitution of the sons with the laws prohibiting murder and incest after their murder of the primal father in Totem and Taboo, resembles the group ties in which the group members are connected on the one hand to the group leader and on the other hand to the other members in Group Psychology. Group Psychology, however, includes Freud’s critical views about the group more than Totem and Taboo, as noticed in his mentions of religious group’s tendency to show hostility towards others, of the envy hidden in the liberal request for equality, and of the exclusion of woman as love-object. Julius Caesar, exhibiting the group politics or the primal horde where Brutus, Cassius, Antony, and Octavius conspire and compete surrounding the murder and death of Caesar, discloses the negative aspects of the group as pointed out in Group Psychology. Thus, this paper, locating Julius Caesar with Totem and Taboo and Group Psychology, examines the central issues repeated in the criticism of this play. These issues cover first, why Caesar does not disappear though he dies in Act 3, second, how the relationship of the aristocrats, Caesar, Brutus, Cassius, Antony, and Octavius, can be defined, third, how the plebeians’ changing reactions wavering between Brutus’s and Antony’s speech, and their violence on the poet, Cinna, will be considered, and lastly, why the female characters such as Portia and Calphurnia are excluded from the politics. While investigating these questions with Freud’s elaborations on envy, contagious group feelings such as suggestion and libido, and the exclusion of love toward the woman within the group, this paper argues that Shakespeare presents the masculine-centered group consciousness leading to the collective violence in Julius Caesar. It also suggests that this group politics of Julius Caesar is transformed into the feminine side’s love and forgiveness of the later Roman plays such as Antony and Cleopatra, and Coriolanus