프로이드와 라깡의 『리어왕』 해석을 경유한 『리어왕』의 ‘수치감’ 읽기

Abstract

This paper first investigates the psychoanalytic meaning of ‘shame’, then reviews Sigmund Freud’s and Jacques Lacan’s interpretations of King Lear to figure out how is relevant this ‘shame’ to Shakespeare’s King Lear. Is ‘shame’ the same as ‘guilt’? Guilt has to do with the ‘Other’ that represents certain values by which it can determine the subject’s transgression of rules, whereas shame, with the primary ‘Other’ which precedes the judging ‘Other’. Freud, in The Theme of Three Caskets, compares three men’s choosing the caskets, gold, silver, and lead in The Merchant of Venice to Lear’s choosing the ‘right’ one among three daughters, Goneril, Regan, and Cordelia in King Lear. The ‘right’ or ‘real’ woman is third daughter, Cordelia whose response, “Nothing” to Lear’s test of love is characterized by “concealment” and “dumbness” like lead. Cordelia’s answer is contrasted to Goneril and Regan’s ones, like gold and silver, which shine with compliments for their father. Cordelia’s “concealment” and “dumbness” also indicate “death” as “dumbness” in a dream normally symbolizes “death”. Cordelia’s “Nothing” which is ‘death’ is ‘shame’ that causes a ‘lack’ in Lear’s being. Lacan argues in The Ethics of Psychoanalysis we should not neglect the moment between when Oedipus becomes blind and when Oedipus is real dead. What Oedipus shows in this middle time is ‘shame’, not ‘guilt’. Oedipus has never expressed ‘guilt’ over what he did, his murdering his father and sleeping with his mother. He did all these things without any knowledge of them. However, though he is not guilty over his doing, it does not mean that he does not feel any responsibility about his act. This responsibility which is incalculable, indicates ‘shame’. Lacan argues that Lear’s entrance into human sufferings after handing over all his wealth and reign to his descendants resembles Oedipus’s tragic experience though Lear still misrecognizes ‘the thing’, Cordelia held in his arms. This leads Lacan to insist that Lear delineates Othello’s crossing over into the ethical space in a ‘derisory’ form. It means certainly that Lear’s shame is not only implicated with Cordelia, ‘the thing’ as Lacan calls, but also is Lear’s shame restricted in that he is not free from his infantile fantasy for his daughter, Cordelia until the end. He does not fully acknowledge Cordelia as his shame, demanding his infantile need to be satisfied with his daughters. There are some moments, nevertheless, when Lear admits his shame as his own, though temporarily, as seen in his dialogue with Edgar and the Fool in Act 3, scene 4. However, because he does not cease giving up his infantile fantasy, his shame still has limitation. Lear’s shame is compared to Gloucester’s one which is unfolded in a different way from Lear’s shame. Gloucester demonstrates a shame in a profound way like Oedipus did, though his blindness and death are each caused by other people and external condition like physical weakness in contrast to Oedipus’s subjective posture.