Lacan once said, in an unpublished seminar, “the Oedipus Complex is a dream of Freud” (Felman,

Oedipus complex stage is a child’s desire of a sexual gratification of the opposite sex of the parental figure. To resolve tis unconscious conflict of fear and erotic desire within one must characterize themselves with whom they want to be and what they desire. Sigmund Freud believed that little girls had penis envy. In later days men had higher rank than women. Girls were thought to first have a sexual attachment to their mother which eventually transferred to the father in hopes to somehow obtain a penis. According to Freud “Classic Theories and Modern

Differently to what is thought nowadays, the Oedipus complex described by Freud goes beyond just the son 's desire to have sex with his mother. The Oedipus complex includes the teenager 's psychosexual idea of feeling jealousy, anger, and above all, competing with his father. Besides, Freud’s theory emphasizes that boys select their mother as their principal object of desire, and subconsciously wish to usurp or even murder their fathers in order to gain exclusive possession of her and become their mothers ' lover.

Oedipus Rex, an ancient Greek tragedy authored by the playwright Sophocles, includes many types of psychological phenomena. Most prominently, the myth is the source of the well-known term Oedipal complex, coined by psychologist Sigmund Freud in the late 1800s. In psychology, “complex” refers to a developmental stage. In this case the stage involves the desire of males, usually ages three to five, to sexually or romantically posses their mother, and the consequential resentment of their fathers. In the play, a prince named Oedipus tries to escape a prophecy that says he will kill his father and marry his mother, and coincidentally saves the Thebes from a monster known as the Sphinx. Having unknowingly killed his true father Laius during his

Repression is a process of continual re-working on the latent dream-thoughts to distort or unrecognizable forms. During the state of repression, the censorship is relaxed and therefore the wish can be presented free. However the relaxed censorship still has control of the material and the material must submit to certain alterations (166) to satisfy the repression level. The obscurity of dreams is due to the censorship between the unconsciousness and consciousness. That is why repression exists “What is rejected by the censorship is in a state of repression (166)” so dreams can be regarded as undisguised wish fulfillments. In Freud’s hypothesis, there are two thought-constructing agencies in our mind, the first is in the unconscious and the second agency has free access to the consciousness. In between the first and the second agency, there is a censorship, which is a conflicting force opposing each other. It acts as a guard preventing certain repressed emotions or thoughts from coming to the surface. During our sleep the censorship is relaxed for some reasons, thus the repressed material can no longer be held back. Even though the censorship is relaxed, it still exists therefore a compromise between two agencies is established.

In order to completely understand Oedipus and his actions, we must first understand the basics of Freud’s theories. One of the most well known aspects of Freudian theory is the Oedipus Complex. We can already see a relationship between the Oedipus

The Oedipus complex refers to the thoughts some men have regarding their mother or maternal figures. Many scenes from the play can prove Hamlet did have these thoughts about his mother, such as acts one and three. If the reader knows what he or she is looking for, then these signs can be easily spotted. The story of Oedipus Rex is an

The Oedipus conflict or complex is a concept developed by Sigmund Freud to explain the origin of certain psychological disorders in childhood. It is defined as a child's unconscious desire for the exclusive love of the parent of the opposite sex. This desire includes jealousy toward the parent of the same sex and the unconscious wish for that parent's death. Horney states that it is not a “biologically given phenomenon” but rather a response to the “provocation’s” of the outside world.(Horney)

“Pride leads to every other vice: it is the complete anti-God state of mind.” says the writer C.S lewis. Indeed this is evident in Sophocles’ Oedipus The King. The rather disturbing events that takes place during the play. The pride of Oedipus, the tragic hero of the play, sets off a chain reaction of events that could have been avoided if Oedipus kept his pride in check. However, he can not and his ego inflates to the point his persona can only be described as a mental disorder. Through analyzing Oedipus’ behaviour and his interactions with the other characters in the play, it can be concluded that he suffers from Narcissistic Personality Disorder.

The Freudian Regression theory states that Psychological repression, “is the psychological attempt made by an individual to repel one's own desires and impulses toward pleasurable instincts by excluding the desire from one's consciousness and holding or subduing it in the unconscious”. Sigmund Freud believed that In order to face problems in life, the ego employs defense mechanisms. These mechanisms function unconsciously to keep away unpleasant feelings. Repression was the first defense mechanism that Freud discovered and is thought to be the most important. Repression is one of the unconscious mechanisms employed by the ego to avoid a disturbing thought from being conscious. Normally the thoughts that are repressed are those of guilt. Freud believed that repression could sometimes have two stages which had to do with the aspects of personality “ego” and “super ego” and the individual’s sense of “good” and “bad”. The first stage of Repression which is called “Primary Repression” is realizing and determining what is good and what is bad The Second stage of repression starts to take place when a person notices that acting on some desires could cause anxiety. Repression is seen in “The Story of an Hour” and in “The Yellow Wallpaper” in different ways. We can see that in “The Yellow Wallpaper” Jane is a depressed woman who can’t handle to be alone

Bronislaw Malinowski, in his book ‘Sex and Repression in Savage Society’ says that it is wrong to assume that Oedipus complex is universal. He argues that this complex only “corresponds to the patrilineal societies” (5) in the world. He says that since “the constitutions of the family” goes under changes related to power, settlement, housing, sources of food, labour etc from time to time, and the “passion and attachments within the family vary” (4). Some critics connect this theory with Freud’s complex family structure. In his book, his father was twenty years elder than his mother and had a grandson when Freud was born (Afroz 9). M. Young, in his book “Whatever happened to Human nature?”, present Freud’s words from his letter to a friend where he says that he remembers falling in love with his mother and being jealous of his father and thus he “regards this complex as universal” (Afroz 9). Thus critics criticize him of regarding his personal experience as a universal one. Michel Juffé, a psychiatric says that “He [Freud] could not accept that parents - including his own parents - could be responsible for the psychic problems undergone by children. In

Psychoanalytic criticism originated in the work of Austrian psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud, who pioneered the technique of psychoanalysis. Freud developed a language that described, a model that explained, and a theory that encompassed human psychology. His theories are directly and indirectly concerned with the nature of the unconscious mind. Through his multiple case studies, Freud managed to find convincing evidence that most of our actions are motivated by psychological forces over which we have very limited control (Guerin 127). One of Freud’s most important contributions to the study of the psyche is his theory of repression: the unconscious mind is a repository of repressed desires,

“You are your own enemy” (Guthrie, Oedipus Rex, 22:43). In the film adaptation of Sophocles’ “Oedipus Rex” (1957), Sir Tyrone Guthrie portrays the characters as truth seekers that are ignorant when trying to find King Laius’ murderer. On the other hand, Sigmund Freud’s hypothesis of Sophocles’ work introduces us to “The Oedipus Complex” (1899) which states that as we’re young we grow infatuated with our opposite sex parent and feel resentment towards our same-sex parent. These two pieces have adapted mirror like meanings of Sophocles’ tragic play. Sir Tyrone Guthrie and Sigmund Freud explore this through the use of ethos, irony, social distance, and the visualization of state of mind in order to show the manifestation Oedipus undergoes

The tale of Oedipus and his prophecy has intrigued not only the citizens of Greece in the ancient times, but also people all over the world for several generations. Most notable about the play was its peculiar structure, causing the audience to think analytically about the outcomes of Oedipus’ actions and how it compares with Aristotle’s beliefs. Another way that the people have examined the drama is by looking at the paradoxes (such as the confrontation of Tiresias and Oedipus), symbols (such as the Sphinx), and morals that has affected their perceptions by the end of the play. Nonetheless, the most important aspect is how relevant the story is and how it has influenced modern ideas like that of Freud and other people of today.

Oedipus complex is a psychoanalytic theory denotes the ideas that deals with a child’s sexual desire for the opposing sex parent. The Metamorphosis has many examples of Oedipus complex, however one example is dominant. In an

The Oedipus complex is when the boy is in love with his mother and fears castration if his father finds out about his fantasies. In the Electra complex the girl is in love with her father and desires to have a penis as a genital organ.