Theodore Dreiser and Psychology :: essays research papers

  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  At the time of Theodore Dreiser’s writings world culture was looking to find the psychological reasons for society’s miscreants. Psychology was the new science fad due to the popularity of Freud and other psychologists. People were beginning to delve into the world of the subconscious as the source of their troubles. No longer were all mental illnesses considered maladies of the brain. Some were being able to be treated through the treatment of the psyche, a Freudian term. Hypnotism was a popular method of therapy. By investigating the dreams and hidden memories psychotherapist believed they could find the root of the afflictions of their patients. The lounging couch now so greatly associated with the psychotherapeutic method of free association was just coming into popular use.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  This time period reflects the ideas that surrounded Dreiser. Growing up poor in Indiana as the ninth of ten children in a devout Catholic German immigrant family, Dreiser received little formal education as his family moved from town to town. While able to secure a college education at the University of Indiana he only managed to stay enrolled for one year. However, he was voracious reader. One of his favorites was Dr. Sigmund Freud, the preeminent psychologist during Dreiser’s life. This fascination with psychological theories as well as his ability to understand them would become a major trademark of his later work such as Sister Carrie, in which he details the rise and fall of a working girl. It is also predominant in his most successful work An American Tragedy, in which he spins the tale of a psychopathic, overly ambitious young man who will stop at nothing including murder to attain wealth and great status.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Sister Carrie is preoccupied with Dreiser’s statement that society is two concerned with the societal demands for material success. This is the sociological declaration made in this novel. The author makes the reader see this. Take the following passage: â€Å"A woman should some day write the complete philosophy of clothes. No matter how young, it is one of the things who wholly comprehends. There is an indescribably faint line in the matter of man’s apparel which somehow divides for her those who are worth glancing at and those who are not. Once an individual has passed this faint line on the way downward he will get no glance from her. There is another line at which the dress of a man will cause her to study her own.