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MYTHOLOGICAL AND ARCHETYPAL ANALYSIS ON MOLLEEN MOHR’S LIFE JOURNEY IN “THE MARRIAGE
BED” NOVEL
A Thesis
Submitted to Letters and Humanities Faculty in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirement for the Strata One Degree
By:
MAEMUNAH ENDAH SARI
NIM: 204026002757
ENGLISH LETTERS DEPARTMENT
ADAB AND HUMANITIES FACULTY
STATE ISLAMIC UNIVERSITY “SYARIF HIDAYATULLAH”
JAKARTA
2008
APPROVEMENT
MYTHOLOGICAL AND ARCHETYPAL ANALYSIS ON MOLLEEN MOHR’S LIFE JOURNEY IN “THE MARRIAGE
BED” NOVEL
A Thesis
Submitted to Letters and Humanities Faculty in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirement for the Strata One Degree
By:
MAEMUNAH ENDAH SARI NIM: 204026002757
Approved by:
Advisor,
ELVE OKTAFIYANI, S.S, M.Hum NIP: 150317725
ENGLISH LETTERS DEPARTMENT
ADAB AND HUMANITIES FACULTY
STATE ISLAMIC UNIVERSITY “SYARIF HIDAYATULLAH”
JAKARTA
2008
DECLARATION
I hereby declare that this submission is my own work and that, to the best of my
knowledge and belief, it contains no material previously published or written by
another person nor material which to a substantial extent has been accepted for the
award of any other degree or diploma of the university or other institute of higher
learning, except where due acknowledgement has been made in the text.
Jakarta, October 11, 2008
Maemunah Endah Sari
LEGALIZATION
The thesis entitled Mythological and Archetypal Analysis on Molleen
Mohr’s Life Journey in “The Marriage Bed” Novel has been defended before the
Letters and Humanities Faculty’s Examination Committee on October, 22 2008. The
thesis has already been accepted as a partial fulfillment of the requirement for the
Strata one degree.
Jakarta, October 22, 2008
Examination Committee
Chair Person, Secretary,
Dr. M. Farkhan, M. Pd. Drs. A. Saefuddin, M. Pd.
NIP. 150299480 NIP. 150261902
Member
Dr. M. Farkhan, M. Pd. M. Supardi, S.S
NIP. 150299480 NIP.
LEGALIZATION
The thesis entitled “Archetypal Analysis on Molleen Mohr’s Life Journey in
“The Marriage Bed” Novel” has been defended before the Letters and Humanities
Faculty’s Examination Committee on October, 22 2008. The thesis has already been
accepted as a partial fulfillment of the requirement for the Strata one degree.
Jakarta, October 22, 2008
Examination Committee
Chair Person, Secretary,
Dr. M. Farkhan, M. Pd. Drs. A. Saefuddin, M. Pd.
NIP. 150299480 NIP. 150261902
Member
Examiner
M. Supardi, S.S
ABSTRACT
Maemunah Endah Sari: Mythological and Archetypal Analysis on Molleen Mohr’s Life Journey in “The Marriage Bed” Novel. A thesis supervised by Elve Oktafiyani, S.S, M.Hum. Jakarta: English Letters Department, Adab and Humanities Faculty, State Islamic University Syarif Hidayatullah, 2008. The thesis is using Jung’s mythological and archetypal approach in order to find out the motives that underlie Molleen Mohr behavior in Regina McBride’s novel “The Marriage Bed.” The thesis looks at one problem: how is Molleen Mohr’s life journey viewed from Jung’s mythological and archetypal approach. The objective of the research is to know Molleen Mohr’s life journey viewed from Jung’s mythological and archetypal approach. The novel is analyzed carefully and accurately using the theory of Jung about the archetypes and the structures that form the psyche. The method uses in this thesis is qualitative method. The result of the research is written descriptive-analytic. Molleen’s life journey is analyzed with the archetypes that exist in her life and then the archetypes are connected with the myth. These archetypes are the manifestation of Molleen’s deepest psyche. Psyche is human personality in a whole. So in order to reveal her deepest psyche, we must interpret the archetypes. Archetypes are the content of collective unconscious. Collective unconscious is one structure that forms the psyche. The psyche is divided into three parts, which is ego, personal unconscious, and collective unconscious. The collective unconscious is the most powerful and influential psyche system. Molleen faces a problem when her father and her lover died in the sea. She cannot handle her grief very well so she loses her psyche energy. In order to stabilize her psyche, she must distribute the energy to the collective unconscious. Because the distribution is disturbed by her grief that keeps going on, she is doing irrational behavior that is committing suicide. She faces three painful deaths. First, her father, then her lover, and the last is her beloved horse that she assumes as her former lover who comes back for her but in another shape. And this is the peak of her repression. She commits suicide because she loses her hope in finding her happiness.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
ABSTRACT…………………………………………………………………….….....i
APPROVEMENT……………………………………………………………………ii
LEGALIZATION…………………………………………………………………...iii
DECLARATION……………………………………………………………………iv
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS…………………………………………………………v
TABLE OF CONTENTS…………………………………………………………..vii
CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION
A. Background of Study ……………………………………………..1
B. Focus of the Research….. ………………………………………...5
C. Research Question ………………………………………………..5
D. Significance of the Research …………………………………..…5
E. Research Methodology ………………………………………..….6
1. Method of the Research ………………………………….…...6
2. Objective of the Research …………………………………….6
3. Data Analysis ………………..……………………………….6
4. The Unit of Analysis …………………………………………6
5. Instrument of the Research……………………………………7
6. Time and Place of the Research……………………………….7
CHAPTER II THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK ...……………………………...8
A. The Structures that Form the Psyche ………………………….10
B. The Collective Unconscious ………………………………......11
C. Archetypes …………………………………………………….12
1. The Self Archetype ……………………………………...14
2. The Father Archetype …………………………………...15
3. The Initiation Archetype ………………………………...16
D. Complex ………………………………………………….........17
E. Introvert and Extrovert ……………………………………......17
F. Sublimation and Repression ………………………………......18
CHAPTER III RESEARCH FINDING
A. Data Description……………………………………………….19
B. Analysis of the Research………………………………………20
1. Sea as the Father Archetype …………..…………………..20
2. Father Complex …………………………..……………….21
3. Centaur Figurine as One of Molleen’s Collective
Unconscious ………………………………………………23
4. The Separation with the Self Archetype ………………….25
5. The Transformation ……………………………………….29
6. Return: Regression to the Collective Unconscious …….....32
CHAPTER IV CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION ………………………….34
BIBLIOGRAPHY .....................................................................................................38
APPENDIX …………………………………………………………………………40
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
A. Background of the Study
Literature has become a way to express someone’s thoughts and
feelings since centuries ago. Even though in the beginning, literature literally
"acquaintance with letters" (from Latin littera letter) as in the first sense given
in the Oxford English Dictionary, or works of art, which in Western culture
are mainly prose, both fiction and non-fiction, drama and poetry. 1
One form of literature is novel. Today, the definition of novel is a long
prose narrative set out in writing (from, Italian novella, Spanish novela,
French nouvelle for "new", "news", or "short story of something new").2
Novel and the other form of literature has always been interesting, not only to
read but also interesting in exploring the meaning and the message behind it.
In this thesis the writer is motivated to research one novel entitled The
Marriage Bed by Regina McBride, an Irish American author. The novel was
published in 2005 by Piatkus London. She is also the author of The Nature of
Water and Air and The Land of Women and is the recipient of fellowships
from the National Endowment for the Arts and the New York Foundation for
1 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/literature 2 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/novel
the Arts. Her poems have been widely published in literary journals and
magazines, and her book of poetry, Yarrow Field, won an American Book
Series Award.
Regina McBride always frames myth in her books. In the first book,
The Nature of Water and Air (2001), there is a myth of the elemental mother
who, once she finds her seal skin, leaves her human child and goes back to the
sea, choosing a darker place and more original call over a human life with her
child, and it was called the selkie myth.
What she found in writing The Land of Women and The Marriage Bed
is not so much that a particular myth “framed” those stories, but that mythic
episodes organically broke out here and there as she worked. There is a “land
of women” in Celtic lore. Her version of it is nothing like the place described
in St. Brendan’s journey which is the Celtic version of The Odyssey. And of
course there is a ghost that lives off the dresses in that book and they have a
strong mythic energy. In The Marriage Bed there is a kind of primitive,
magical energy that occurred in the early story on The Great Blasket Island.
Regina McBride absorbs folklore and mythology. She also read many
books by Jung and his followers in which myths and fairy tales are interpreted
to show patterns of “individuation” (or the evaluation of an individual human
psyche). This is one reason why she wrote The Marriage Bed.
The Marriage Bed is a profound work: an inquiry into the extremes of
erotic love and a testament to the power of longing and the hold of unresolved
grief. It is an exquisitely lush and lyrical story about marriage and
motherhood, attachment and let go, set in early twentieth century Dublin.
In this novel, there are some main characters such as Deirdre, Manus,
Mrs. O’Breen, Bairbre, and Deirdre’s mother, Molleen Mohr. Deirdre is the
main character and also the narrator of this novel but the writer chooses
Molleen Mohr as an object of research because of the simplicity of her life
story but ended in a mysterious way. It is interesting but in the same time it
makes us wondering why she ended her life in a pathetic way by jumping to
the sea like her beloved horse died.
Her life story begun when she was still a child but she had to lose her
father in the sea. Then she had to suffer of losing a person she loved again
when she was a teenager. His name was Macdarragh, and he also died in the
sea. When she had a husband, she forbad him to go to the sea because she was
afraid that he was going to die like them. Then when she had a horse that had
a name after Macdarragh that also died in the sea, she committed suicide in
the way like it did.
If we have a look for a glimpse, the story is about a girl who has a sad
life like every other has. And it is normal to have a life like that. But there is
something interesting that why she had to end her life by jumping to the sea
after her horse named Macdarragh died in the same place. It is a bit strange
and irrational. When she was left by her father and her boyfriend, she
extremely felt sad but she kept going on with her life but why when she was
left by her horse, she committed suicide. This makes the writer chooses The
Marriage Bed as the object of her research.
Literally the story is about a life journey of a person, but it can also be
defined as a symbolic journey. In his essay “Psychology and Literature”, Jung
said that in literary work which he called visionary, there are strange parts that
make us surprised and hard to be understood if we only see from our daily
life. Jung theories make the writer more interested in doing further analysis on
The Marriage Bed strangeness.
After reading the story for several times, the writer found similarity
between the story of The Marriage Bed with rites, myths, and folklores. Since
the background of the writing was framed by myth, it also contained symbols
or archetypes.
In his essay, Jung also said that visionary work reflected motifs that
usually exist in myths. By considering Jung’s explanation, the writer uses
archetypal approach to analyze the novel The Marriage Bed, because it
underlines the relationship between the literary works with the human myth.
There is an obviously close connection between mythological criticism
and the psychological approach, both are concerned with the motives that
underlie human behavior. Between the two approaches are differences of
degree and of affinities. Psychology tends to be experimental and diagnostic;
it is closely related to biological science. Mythology tends to be speculative
and philosophic; its affinities are with religion, anthropology, and cultural
history. Beside that, the study of myths reveals about the mind and character
of a person, so myths are the symbolic projections of a person’s hope, value,
fear, and aspirations.3
B. Focus of the Research
The writer would like to focus the research on Molleen Mohr’s life
journey using Jung’s mythological and archetypal approach in The Marriage
Bed by Regina McBride.
C. Research Questions
Based on the background of the study above, the writer would like to
make research question as follow:
How is Molleen Mohr’s life journey viewed from Jung’s mythological and
archetypal approach?
D. Significance of the Research
The writer hopes this research will help the readers to understand the
novel especially Jung’s mythological and archetypal approach on Molleen
Mohr’s life journey in the novel of The Marriage Bed by Regina McBride.
3 Wilfred L. Guerin, et al., A Handbook of Critical Approaches to Literature, (New York: Harper & Row, 1979) p. 148
E. Research Methodology
1. Method of the Research
This research uses qualitative method. Therefore, it is necessary to
know explicitly the main point of the novel “The Marriage Bed” and
Jung’s mythological and archetypal approach on Molleen Mohr’s life
journey in “The Marriage Bed”.
2. Objective of the Research
The objective of this research is to know Molleen Mohr’s life
journey viewed from Jung’s mythological and archetypal approach.
3. Data Analysis
The collected data are analyzed using Jung’s mythological and
archetypal theory. Therefore, the study begins by analyzing the main point
of the novel “The Marriage Bed”, and then focuses on the symbols on
Molleen Mohr’s life journey.
4. The Unit of Analysis
The unit of analysis is using the novel “The Marriage Bed”
written by Regina McBride, published in 2005 by Piatkus Books Ltd,
London.
5. Instrument of the Research
The research uses the researcher herself as the instrument to get the
data by finding the symbols in Molleen Mohr’s life journey using the
archetypes as the tool.
6. Time and Place of the research
This research takes place on September 2007 until July 2008 in
State Islamic University Syarif Hidayatullah, Jakarta.
CHAPTER II
THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
Literature as one of several ways to express someone’s feelings and thoughts
has always been interesting to be learned. It comes not only from the conscious mind,
but it also comes from the unconscious mind of the author. Myths and fairy stories
are one form of literature and in the hypothesis of the unconscious, they draw on the
collective. In Jung’s view, they express a deeper reality than can be perceived by our
rational everyday existence. These stories express something about the whole human
unconscious, put in symbolic form. Both the communication in dreams and that in
myths and fairy tales is symbolic.4
The reason why the writer uses Jung’s archetypal approach in analyzing the
novel entitled The Marriage Bed because Molleen’s life journey contains many
symbols. And to understand more about the problem, the writer also uses other
disciplines such as Anthropology and folklore.
Several writers point at to the idea that symbols can have a transcendental
element. Jung wrote in his Symbols of Transformation, ‘symbols are not allegories
and not signs: they are the images of contents which for the most part transcend
consciousness’. And Mircea Eliade has argued in Images and Symbols that ‘the 4 Jean Hardy, A Psychology with a Soul: Psychosynthesis in Evolutionary Context, (New York: Arkana, 1990) p. 69
symbol reveals certain aspects of reality, the deepest aspects, which defy any other
means of knowledge’. A symbol of course can be any object, which still stays as an
object in its own right; a rose, or a lion, seen as representing an aspect of reality for
someone still exists in its own right. So a symbol is both itself and a personal or
collective representation of some other meaning on a different plane of reality. Some
symbols are so universal that Jung referred to them as archetypes – the Mother, the
Cross. These carry enormous universal symbolic meanings. But they, or indeed any
other object, may carry personal meaning.5
Often in working with the unconscious, myths and fairy-stories appear in the
material, as these are a cultural shock to which we all have access. They are a
particularly available form of symbolism. Both myths and fairy-stories represent
eternal truths in a way that is easy to understand.
The connection between myth and understanding psyche is at Jung’s concept
about archetype that the writer has mentioned earlier. These symbols are a form of
psyche which is unconscious and we need these symbols to reveal the unconscious
mind in a person. Myths and fairy-stories draw on unconscious material rather than
rationality to make sense out of living in the world. Some of the basic experience of
mankind has been passed through the tales.
Myths also deal with human life phase. So, myths are symbolically draw man
effort in knowing Self which is its original growing.
5 Ibid p. 70
One thing that is important in using mythological/archetypal approach is that
it cannot be separated from Carl Jung theories. So the writer needs to explain the
theories in a short and practical way.
A. The Structures that Form the Psyche
According to Jung, human personality in a whole is called psyche. Psyche
contains all thoughts, feelings, and behaviors, whether it is conscious or not, inside
the person. Psyche also manages and adapts someone with the social surrounding and
with his physic.
Different with Sigmund Freud who generally divides psyche into two parts
(conscious and unconscious; both personal), Jung’s theory divides the psyche into
three parts. The first is the ego, which Jung identifies with the conscious mind. It
contains perceptions, memories, thoughts, and feelings. Closely related is the
personal unconscious, which includes anything which is not presently conscious, but
can be. The personal unconscious is like most people’s understanding of the
unconscious in that it includes both memories that are easily brought to mind and
those that have been suppressed for some reason. But it does not include the instincts
that Freud would have it include.
But then Jung adds the part of the psyche that makes his theory stand out from
all others: the collective unconscious. You could call it your “psychic inheritance.”
And the writer focuses the discussion on the collective unconscious because this
concept link with the problem in this research.
B. The Collective Unconscious
Concept of the collective unconscious or transpersonal is one of Jung’s
personality theories that is the most original and controversial. It is the most powerful
and influential psyche system, and in pathologies cases, it defeats ego and personal
unconscious (Jung, 1936, 1943, 1945).
The collective unconscious is a warehouse of latent memories that inherited
from someone’s ancestor in the past, the past that not only contains the history of
human race as a species but also his prehuman ancestor or his animal ancestor. So, it
is the reservoir of our experiences as a species, a kind of knowledge we all born with.
And yet we can never be directly conscious of it. It influences all of our experiences
and behaviors, most especially the emotional ones, but we only know about it
indirectly, by looking at those influences.
There are some experiences that show the effects of the collective
unconscious more clearly than others: the experiences of love at first sight, of déjà vu
(the feeling that you’ve been here before), and the immediate recognition of certain
symbols and the meanings of certain myths, could all be understood as the sudden
conjunction of our outer reality and the inner reality of the collective unconscious.
Grander examples are the creative experiences shared by artists and musicians all
over the world and in all times, or the spiritual experiences of mystics of all religions,
or the parallels in dreams, fantasies, mythologies, fairy tales, and literature.
A nice example that has been greatly discussed recently is the near-death
experience. It seems that many people, of many different cultural backgrounds, find
that they have very similar recollections when they are brought back from a close
encounter with death. They speak of leaving their bodies, seeing their bodies and the
events surrounding them clearly, of being pulled through a long tunnel towards the
light, of seeing deceased relatives or religious figures waiting for them, and of their
disappointment at having to leave this happy scene to return to their bodies. Perhaps
we are “built” to experience death in this fashion.
C. Archetypes
The contents of the collective unconscious are called archetypes. Jung also
called them dominants, imagos, mythological or primordial images, and a few other
names, but archetypes seem to have won out over these names. An archetype is an
unlearned tendency to experience things in a certain way.
The archetypes has no form of its own, but it acts as an “organizing
principles” on the things we see or do. The most profound influence of archetypal
functioning on the experience of the individual is the manner which archetypes are
held to control the human life cycle.
The archetype is essentially an unconscious content that is altered by
becoming conscious and by being perceived, and it takes its color from the individual
consciousness in which it happens to appear.6
Dreams and myths are constellations of archetypal images. They are not free
compositions by an artist who plans them for artistic or informational effects. Dreams 6 C.G. Jung, Four Archetypes, (London and New York: Routledge, 2001) p. 4
and myths happen to human beings. The archetype speaks through us. It is a presence
and a possibility of “significance”. The ancients called them “gods” and “goddesses”.
The archetypal units making up the collective unconscious posses the
dynamic property of seeking their actualization in the reality of life – that is to say, in
the behavior and personality of the individual as the life cycle unfolds within the
context of the environment. In his essay ‘Mind and Earth’ (1927) Jung wrote:
‘Archetypes are systems of readiness for action, and at the same time images and
emotions. They are inherited with the brain-structure – indeed, they are its psychic
aspect’ (1927/1931b: par. 53)7 , for example, mankind generally afraid of snake or in
the dark. They do not have to realize these fears through the real experience.
Mankinds are inherited with these fears because our ancestors experienced it through
generations. In other word, the experience sank in human brain and it is universal.
Even though the collective unconscious is part of psyche with great proportion, this
structure of psyche can not be seen directly because it express through archetypes.
Psyche changes experiences become psychic energy (libido) and then it put
the experiences in unconsciousness. The writer needs to explain that the term ‘libido’
in Jung Psychology has wider meaning compared to what Sigmund Freud has. Freud
definition of libido is as sexual impulses. When someone faces a crisis situation in his
life, the energy brought back to the conscious with the help of symbols that is called
the archetypes.
7 Anthony Stevens, The Archetypes, in Renos K. Papadopoulos (ed), The Handbook of Jungian Psychology, (New York: Routledge, 2001) p. 85
Archetypes have many forms as much as situations that we can see in life, but
in this paper the writer only mention archetypes that the writer consider relevant with
the problem analysis.
1. The Self Archetype
The most important archetype of all is the self. The self is the ultimate unity
of the personality. The goal of life is to realize the self. The self is an archetype
that represents the transcendence of all opposites, so that every aspect of your
personality is expressed equally. It acts as a principle of personality balancer and
it creates harmony among other archetypes and their form in the conscious. You
are then neither and both male and female, neither and both ego and shadow,
neither and both good and bad, neither and both conscious and unconscious,
neither and both an individual and the whole of creation. And yet, with no
oppositions, there is no energy, and you cease to act. Of course, you no longer
need to act.
To keep it from getting too mystical, think of it as a new center, a more
balanced position, for your psyche. When you are young, you focus on the ego
and worry about the trivialities of the persona. When you are older (assuming you
have been developing as you should), you focus a little deeper, on the self, and
become closer to all people, all life, even the universe itself. The self-realized
person is actually less selfish. The personifications that best represent self are
Christ and Buddha, two people who many believe achieved perfection. But Jung
felt that perfection of personality is only truly achieved in death.
In his essay, M. L. von Franz said that Self archetype often symbolized with
animal, as a creature that has human instinctive behavior and its connectivity with
the nature around us.8 In literature, animals that often mention are lion, fish, horse
and dog.
2. The Father Archetype
Another archetype that links with psyche development is the image of Father
(The Father Archetype). The Father archetype represents the traditional forces of
law and order, often signifying physical, mental, and spiritual superiority in myth
and legend. It corresponds to consciousness as opposed to maternal
unconsciousness. Based on the elements of heaven, light, thunderbolts, and
weapons. This archetype is often symbolized by a guide or an authority figure,
because in real life a father is a figure who always gives affection and protection
but in the same time he gives us regulation in life. He could be gentle in one side
but in the other side he could be rough too.
One form of the Father archetype is sea. The sea, as opposed to the ocean, has
known boundaries, and thus can be interpreted as being symbolic of the “known
quantities of life”. Inasmuch as the sea can symbolize life, a journey across the
sea can be seen as a symbolic journey across the “sea of life”. 8 Carl Jung, et al. Man and His Symbols, (New York: Dell Publishing, 1968) p. 220
The nature of the sea, it brings peaceful and comfortable feeling to the person
who looks at it or on it. But it could be dangerous when the waves are high and
stormy, and it has the power to take someone’s life.
In myth, Zeus is one figure of Father Archetype, because Zeus is the king of
God in Greek Mythology and he has the power to rule the heaven.
3. The Initiation Archetype
The initiation is where the individual undergoes a series of excruciating
ordeals in passing from ignorance and immaturity to social and spiritual
adulthood, that is, in achieving maturity and becoming a full-fledged member of
his or her social group. The initiation most commonly consists of three distinct
phases and it also usually appears in heroic journey:
a. Separation. It is the separation between a hero with the society and
starts his adventure. In psychology, the separation is between the
individual with his psyche element.
b. Transformation. It is where the hero experiences his adventure. This is
where the battle and the suffering take place. According to Jung’s
theories, the transformation is where the death and rebirth take place.
Death and rebirth here are indirect or in other word it is not physically
but psychologically.
c. Return. This is where the hero returns to his society and brings the
victory or the failure.
D. Complex
Complex is a pattern of suppressed thoughts and feelings that cluster –
constellate – around a theme provided by some archetypes. An individual who is
obsessed by one of the archetypes will act or think to become or to fulfill the need of
the archetype. For example, father complex. Most of his memory is coming from the
race experience about father and from his memory towards his father. If someone has
father complex, his thoughts, his feelings and his actions is dominated by his father,
so everything that his father say or do will be meaningful to his, and his image of
father will control his mind.
E. Introvert and Extrovert
Jung developed a personality typology that has become so popular that some
people do not realize he did anything else. It begins with the distinction between
introvert and extrovert. Introverts are people who prefer their internal world of
thoughts, feelings, fantasies, dreams, and so on, while extroverts prefer the external
world of things and people and activities.
The words have become confused with ideas like shyness and sociability,
partially because introverts tend to be shy and extroverts tend to be sociable. But Jung
intended for them to refer more to whether you (“ego”) more often faced toward the
persona and outer reality, or toward the collective unconscious and its archetypes. In
that sense, the introvert is somewhat more mature than the extrovert. Our culture, of
course, values the extrovert much more. And Jung warned that we all tend to value
our own type most.
F. Sublimation and Repression
Sublimation is a replacement of energy from process that is more primitive,
instinctive, and less differentiation to a higher cultural and spiritual process. Foe
example, if energy could be drawn from sexual impulse to spiritual values, so the
energy has been sublimated. But if the release of energy disturbed, so the energy will
be repressed. The energy that repressed will not disappear just like that, but it will go
to another place and eventually toward unconscious. By transporting the energy to
that place, the unconscious will be much stronger than the conscious ego. Finally the
person will behave irrationally and impulsively. So sublimation is progressive and the
repression is regressive.
CHAPTER III
RESEARCH FINDING
The writer has mentioned in the previous chapter that literary works often
show similarity with myth. Literary works and myth are projection of archetypes on
human psyche. In other words, literary works have elements that if we analyze it, it
will reveal the archetypes.
Archetypes in The Marriage Bed (next will be shortened become TMB) novel
are signed by symbols. The symbols that occurred in TMB represent the journey of
Molleen Mohr in her life to find what was missing from her and to achieve her
happiness. By analyzing the archetypes, the writer tries to describe Molleen Mohr’s
life journey.
A. Data Description
No Symbol Archetype
1 Father Self
2 Sea Father
3 Life journey Initiation
B. Analysis of the Research
1. Sea as the Father Archetype
There is one common thing in every death that Molleen had to face was that
her father, a boy named Macdarragh and her beloved horse that also named
Macdarragh, they were dead in the sea, and in the end of the story, Molleen in fact
died in the same place as them.
Sea is one form of collective unconscious. If we go back to the definition of
collective unconscious, it points at inherited memory. Every person knows that we
live on earth that consists of land and water. Therefore sea is something that we need
the most beside land. According to Jung, a person who lost his father figure always
spends his time in the sea or doing something that connected with the sea. But in
Molleen’s case, the sea became something frightened her because the sea had taken
her three beloved persons and she had to put her fear in her unconscious by repressed
it in her deepest psyche. She is even rather to live poor than to have her husband die
in the sea. I’d rather eat poorer than the rest than have the sea swallow you and keep
you from me. I’ll eat the rocks and the kelp. (McBride 2005, 230)
Sea became her enemy in this story but in the end, it became her choice in
ending her life by jumping to the sea because it was one way to meet her Self
archetype (about this Self archetype, the writer will discuss it later in point number 4
of this chapter). From the end of the story we can conclude that Sea also acted as
Father Archetype, because father figure was something that she searched for and
when she could not find it in life, she rather gave her life and committed suicide
because it has been said in previous chapter that father based on several elements, and
one of them is heaven. So she thought that she could meet with her father in heaven.
She was willing to give her life in order to get her happiness like in sacrificial myth
where the hero gives his life to meet his lover in heaven. Molleen could not get it
while she was alive so she chose to end her life by getting back to her collective
unconscious that was the sea and it also the place where her three beloved persons
died. Jung also has mentioned in his book that Self archetype can only be achieved
when we die.
2. Father Complex
The writer has mentioned in chapter II that complex was caused by some
archetypes. In this story, Molleen was obsessed to find her father figure since she was
left by her father. So Molleen was suffering father complex because she was affected
by Father Archetype. The memory of her father and her father substitution, a boy
named Macdarragh, had affected her whole aspects of life, even her marriage. Her
husband, Liam, was always jealous toward Molleen’s father and a boy named
Macdarragh, two people who always Molleen talked about. My mother (Molleen)
used to taunt my father by talking about a boy named Macdarragh who she’d once
been in love with. A boy who died. (McBride 2005, 140)
It always made them fought each other how the memory she had kept inside
her heart and mind. Her husband even felt like living unhappy marriage. You’re
leading me the life of the damned. (McBride 2005, 141)
Molleen’s behavior made her husband felt that he had to compete with the
memory of them in Molleen’s heart. How can I ever compete with the two of them,
Macdarragh and your own father fused together in your heart? (McBride 2005, 229-
230) From the sentence we know that Molleen was obsessed with her father and
Macdarragh memory. She could not forget about them and that became a barrier in
her relationship with her husband. Her husband hated everything that connect
Molleen with them, such as the little centaur figurine. He hated the little brass
centaur. How many times as a child had I heard him ask her to throw it in the sea?
(McBride 2005, 230) Molleen always kept that figurine even to her marriage and she
could not let it go. She never threw the figurine even her husband had already asked
her to do it. She preferred to keep it than to obey her husband request. She could not
let the memory of her father and her lover Macdarragh leave her mind.
Molleen’s husband hatred toward her father and Macdarragh memory was
getting bigger when Molleen started to give her affection and attention to a horse
named Macdarragh. And the hatred toward the horse had leaded him to kill that
horse. Twas I, Deirdre, who drove the horse off the cliff. (McBride 2005, 244) The
horse was the analogy of Molleen’s father and her lover Macdarragh.
From the description above, we can conclude that Molleen was suffering
father complex. She was always affected by her father memory and searched for her
father substitution. The horse that also had the same name with her lover,
Macdarragh, supposed to be her last hope to achieve her happiness, however it must
die in the sea. She thought she could not get her happiness, so she preferred to end
her life.
3. Centaur Figurine as One of Molleen’s Collective Unconscious
At the death of a boy named Macdarragh, there was something that connected
Molleen with him as her lover. It was a little brass centaur figurine. The figurine
became part of symbolic journey of Molleen’s life that could explain why she did the
suicide. The figurine could explain the mythologically reason based on the inherited
latent memory from the ancestor, not psychologically.
If we look at the myth, centaur was part of Greek mythology that is a race of
creatures composed of part human and part horse. Many writers treated them as
liminal beings, caught between the two natures, embodied in contrasted myths, and as
the embodiment of untamed nature, as in their battle with the Lapiths, or conversely
as teachers, like Chiron. The centaur is a symbol of conflict between civilization and
barbarism or battle between power and mildness.
For a boy named Macdarragh, this creature represented him because in one
side, although he is a man but he could not act like a man physically because he was
too weak because of his illness. But in the other side, he got the power to enchant
every woman who looked at him. That gift made all man in the island felt jealous
toward him.
The men said he was too soft, that he thought himself a woman. But they were wrong about him. He possessed a manly grace not to be denied, a strong sexual undercurrent. Even one of the older island women, Kate Beg, in her fifties, pragmatic and careworn, took to wandering after him. And so the men hated him more because the women had gone dreamy since he’d come, pining for some unlived desire in themselves. (McBride 2005, 27) While for Molleen, this creature represented the power to find the substitution
of her Self archetype but the sorrow detained her for getting it. The substitution could
stabilize Molleen’s psyche so she could find herself again as a complete person and
by having it, it would make her to get her happiness in life, but the suffering she had,
made her believe that she could not get her happiness, even though she already had a
husband but that made her even worst.
In Greek mythology, there are also female centaurs called Kentaurides. There
is a centauress named Hylonome who committed suicide by casting herself upon his
spear when her lover Cyllarus was killed in the war with the Lapiths. 9This myth also
projected Molleen’s life in the future because she committed suicide by jumping to
the sea where her horse named Macdarragh died in the same place.
The myth was inherited in Molleen’s latent memory and became her content
of collective unconscious. The figurine had affected her life even in her marriage,
because she thought it was part of her memory and in the same time, it became part of
her psyche that could not be separated from her unconsciousness. This figurine also
brought her to unhappy marriage as the writer had mentioned earlier. Finally it led her
to commit suicide just like the end of the myth.
9 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/centaur
Mythologically this is one reason why she did that. But psychologically, the
writer will explain it later in the last part of this chapter.
4. The Separation with the Self Archetype
It has been said that there are three phases in the process of initiation in
human life journey; they are separation, transformation and return. From Psychology
aspect and also following mythological plot, the first phase from symbolic journey of
Molleen’s life was the separation with her father. Her father was dead in the sea
during harvesting mackerel. Molleen was not ready with her father death, so she felt
shock.
Her separation with her father was not only physically, but it also her
separation with her Self archetype, the center of her psyche, and this separation that
brought her psyche to unstable state. Father was acted as her psyche balancer. It can
be seen when she had to lose her father, she became hopeless like stopped speaking
and started to daydreaming. So father had become her Self archetype. Because of this
separation, her ego, that was her grief, appeared to the surface and controlled her
conscious. This ego took over her social life and acted as the center of her
personality, just like the story said:
Molleen Mohr had adored her own father. After he drowned during the run for mackerel when she was six, she stopped speaking and gave herself over to daydreaming, laying on the pallet on the floor all day, staring up at the ceiling, captivated by what she was moving across her field of vision. (McBride 2005, 27)
Based on the entropy principle, the energy must be distributed in order to
make the psyche stable. Molleen’s grief toward her father death made her psyche
energy decrease, it can be seen when she stopped speaking and started to
daydreaming after her father’s death, or in another words, all her physical systems
was run down, and so the energy must be distributed. In order to stabilize her psyche,
based on the entropy principle, Molleen must replace or distribute the energy to the
conscious. Because the replacement or the distribution of the energy was disturbed so
it will be repressed and went to the unconscious. By transporting the energy to that
place, the unconscious will be much stronger than the conscious ego.
Molleen was an introvert who preferred her internal world of thoughts,
feelings, fantasies, and dreams, so her ego was dominant toward the collective
unconscious and the archetypes. Molleen voluntary muteness at six was the
replacement/distribution of the energy to the inside of her psyche that is toward her
unconscious, or in another words, the energy was repressed in her unconscious. This
condition is what they called symbolic death. The definition of death here is not
physically, but it is symbolically. It is not the human separation with his spirit. Death
here means someone who loses his energy and has no willingness to act or to react.
Just like Molleen’s condition after her father’s death where she would not speak and
started daydreaming.
Molleen’s meeting with Macdarragh who was mute brought her ego back to
conscious. Macdarragh was a substitution for Molleen’s father position in her life,
which was as the Self archetype. Macdarragh was the person who could make
Molleen’s psyche stable again. Molleen started to speak again and socialized with her
environment. She acted as Macdarragh mouthpiece and in the same time as his
guardian.
According to Jung, father is a symbol of stern, powerful, and controlling, and
that was missing from her life, so when Molleen saw Macdarragh had an illness, she
acted as Macdarragh guardian. After that day my mother (Molleen) and Macdarragh
were always together. (McBride 2005, 28) Her companion toward Macdarragh was
one of her manifestation of father figure. She thought that she was powerful enough
to protect Macdarragh.
The meeting between Molleen and Macdarragh was one form of collective
unconscious. They could recognize each other like old friends who had not been
meeting for a long time, and they just fitted in each other. Just like the story said:
From the first moment Molleen Mohr met Macdarragh face-to-face near the Way of the Dead, a pure recognition was evident between them. And if the constrains of society and propriety had not held, they might have conveyed themselves into each other’s arms like long-lost friends. So strong was the sympathy between the two that some even said that Molleen’s voluntary muteness at six anticipated Macdarragh’s coming. (McBride 2005, 27) In the creation of humankind myth, Adam and Eve were the first couple that
God created. They lived in heaven at first and they were one soul. But Adam made
mistake by eating the forbidden fruit, so God sent Adam and Eve to the Earth. God
sent them to different places. They were separated. In order to be reunited, they must
search each other. They must find their soul mate. And their reunion created the
humankind.
Adam and Eve were our ancestors, and that memory settled in every
humankind‘s mind. Just like what happened to Molleen, Macdarragh was her soul
mate in the past. Macdarragh was a new comer in that island. So they were reunited
after they met each other for the first time and Molleen’s voluntary muteness is what
anticipated Macdarragh’s coming.
Molleen experienced symbolic rebirth when she saw Macdarragh who was
seized by a fit and fell. Molleen felt come back to life when she saw that Macdarragh
was struggling against his illness and felt like a hero who comes from battle. Molleen,
more alive than ever since her da’s passing, descended the hills supporting him in
her arms. (McBride 2005, 28) From this sentence, we can conclude that she had
experienced symbolic death and rebirth. The symbolic death was when she was left
by her father and the symbolic rebirth was when she saw Macdarragh struggling from
his illness.
This boy, Macdarragh who was a substitution for the father figure in
Molleen’s psyche, was also dead in the sea. This incident was almost like the
separation with her father. She had to lose her Self archetype once more and she lost
her energy again. For almost three years, Molleen did not walk to the hill where she
had taken her lover Macdarragh to that place.
After that she got marriage. The marriage with Liam did not bring happiness
to her life. Her husband could not fill the emptiness in her heart.
They loved each other, but they wanted so much from each other. Neither believed enough in the other’s love. They flailed and fought…….it could be terrible between them, the way they hurt one another. (McBride 2005, 141)
The writer has mentioned earlier that sea is Molleen’s enemy in this story.
The sea and Molleen had in conflict and that was the reason why her husband could
not substitute her father position because her husband confronted her about the sea by
kept going to the sea for fishing. There was anxiety that her husband would leave her
just like her father and Macdarragh.
From the description above, we can see that the first phase of Molleen’s life
journey was the phase of entering the collective unconscious that was projected by
her separation with the Self archetype and sea that became her fear. Her union with
her unconscious contents also reveals the ego-conscious fused and become part of her
unconscious.
5. The Transformation
The transformation phase is a phase where there is a complication and in this
phase also the climax occurs. The transformation of Molleen’s psyche was marked by
her meeting with the horse that finally named Macdarragh, a person who she really
loved.
After experienced so many suffering, she did not believe in happiness. Even
after she had a husband, she still could not trust the happiness, she even got more
afraid of it. Just like her mother said:
I tried to tell her he was hers, what more was she wanting when she had him so in her bed as her husband. The love she had with him, rousing a kind of devil in her. She mistrusted happiness. …….Afraid of happiness, she was.
Blind as a herring leaping in the bay, inviting sorrow into her life, so. (McBride 2005, 31)
Her fear toward happiness was the manifestation of her unconscious that exist
to the conscious. This negative consciousness controlled her life, so she could not
believe in anything or anyone any more.
But when she met the horse, she felt the same recognition when she met with
her lover, Macdarragh. She became more familiar when the horse showed it affection
to her. They were getting closer and closer all the time. They even acted like two
lovers who were in love. The horse had resembled with her former lover who had the
same name with it.
A horse is a symbol of power and strength and it has the same function like
her father. So horse is also an analogy of her father. Based on the meaning of
symbols, a horse is acting as the mediator between heaven and earth. So Molleen
thought that the horse is the mediator between her and her father in heaven. It can be
seen when she met with this horse, she started to get back to her conscious and
socialized with her surrounding. Beside that, a horse is also a symbol of never giving
up. So when the horse died, Molleen felt she lost her hope to achieve her happiness in
life and finally she ended her life by committing suicide.
In heroic myth, the hero must through so many suffering in order to get his
goal. Like in this story, Molleen must suffer first to get her goal. The horse was her
analogy of her final goal, because it represented her father position in her life. She
treated it as a human and as substitute of her lover and it also because they had the
same name-Macdarragh-. She felt it was him. She really treated it as a human. When
we got to the cottage, Macdarragh stood at the door waiting and my mother brought
him against the dark, covered him and boosted the fire, then kept to him all night.
(McBride 2005, 237).More than that, she treated it as her lover.
The horse was standing knee high in the water, the sound of the tide riding in and away in minimal wind. My mother was naked, washing Macdarragh. She poured a bucket of water over his back, rinsing away the line of foaming soap. She dropped the bucket in the water and embraced the horse, kissing its nose, both woman and horse oblivious that they were being watched. (McBride 2005, 238)
She believed it was Macdarragh, her former lover who came back for her but
in another shape. She convinced herself by saying: you’re like the mute one himself,
with the sounds from the depths of you. (McBride 2005, 234) the island women even
said that made her believed even more it was her lover Macdarragh. He said he’d
back to you, Molleen Mohr, and if this isn’t himself before us, then I’ve not lived a
day. The shape-shifter! (McBride 2005, 234)
The basic reason why she was not happy with her husband was that her
husband could not be the substitution to her father position in her life, which is as Self
archetype. Her husband love could not stabilize her psyche, but made it even worst.
He confronted her by keep going on to the sea which was Molleen’s biggest fear
because she was afraid that her husband will die in the sea like them who were
already dead.
The horse coming had activated her Self archetype in the collective
unconscious. It brought back her consciousness to the surface. She experienced
symbolic rebirth once again. She started to act like every normal women. She started
to gather with another islander woman and played some game and laughed.
We played a game with him, taking turns, standing in front of him with our backs to him, and he would push us between our shoulder blades with his great head, propelling us forward. A kind of thrill in the jolt of it that made us laugh and feel both dreamy and giddy. (McBride 2005, 236)
But every thing happened in the other way around when the horse fell of the
cliff and died in the sea. This is the climax of the story where Molleen once again had
to lose her central archetype.
6. Return: Regression to the Collective Unconscious
The final phase of Molleen’s journey was her decision to end her life. She
could not bear to live unhappy life. The meeting with the horse was the union with
her Self archetype. She had fulfilled her need in life. Jung said that horse is also
symbol of never giving up, so when it died, she preferred to commit suicide because
she thought that there was no hope for her again.
When she met with the horse, her unconsciousness emerged to the
consciousness. This consciousness defeated her collective unconscious. That is why
she started to behave normally and enjoyed her life. When the horse died, the
conscious back to the collective unconscious. Molleen could not joint with her Self
archetype in the world – ego conscious- so she took the step to go back to her father
archetype that is the sea, as one manifestation of her collective unconscious.
If we go back to the entropy principle, the negative energy of her grief toward
the horse death was not distributed perfectly, so the distribution of the energy this
time is like the same distribution when she lost her father. This was the peak of her
desperate moment because she had too many repressions in her life. The last
repression of her unconscious made her energy much stronger than before. This was
the strongest energy that brought the negative impulse or in other words it was the
regression to her psyche that made her behaved irrationally by jumping to the sea, and
psychologically, this is the reason Molleen committed suicide.
CHAPTER IV
CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION
1. Conclusion
Through mythological and archetypal analysis on Molleen Mohr’s life
journey, the writer drew a conclusion that Molleen experienced an archetypal
symbolic journey in her life until her death. Molleen’s journey contains
archetypes, specifically in getting her goal that is to find her father figure or her
father substitution, even though her life ended by committing suicide.
The most affecting archetype in Molleen’s life is Self archetype. This
archetype is signed by her father. Since Molleen was a child, her father died in the
sea and that incident had affected her whole life because she stopped speaking
and started to daydream. Molleen’s state proves that her father was acted as
Molleen’s psyche balancer or in another words father acted as Self archetype, and
since that she searched for her father substitute.
Another archetype is Father Archetype and the sign is the sea. In this
story, at first the sea became Molleen’s enemy but in the end it was the place
where she chose to end her life in order to meet with her father in heaven.
Molleen considered the sea as her enemy because it had taken her father, her lover
Macdarragh, and her beloved horse that is believed as another shape of her lover.
In her journey, Molleen was suffering father complex. Since she was left
by her father until her death, she was affected by her father memory. It happened
even to her marriage. The way she kept her father and her father substitute
memory in her heart, made her husband living unhappy marriage. Even to the end
of her life, she gave her life by jumping to the sea in order to meet with her father
in heaven because a horse named Macdarragh who was supposed to be her last
hope and also acted as the analogy of her father figure, must die in the sea.
In this novel, there is something that also affected Molleen’s life and her
marriage. It is a little brass centaur figurine. It was given by her lover Macdarragh
before he died. This figurine also became one of her collective unconscious. In
Greek mythology, a centaur is a creature part human and part horse and there is a
women centaur called Kentaurides named Hylonome who commit suicide after
her lover died in the war. This myth settled in Molleen’s latent memory and this
was also what happened to Molleen and this is the mythological reason why
Molleen committed suicide.
If we go back to the journey itself, Molleen had a similarity with the phase
in hero mythological journey, which is separation – transformation – return.
In the first phase, Molleen had to separate with her father who acted as her
Self archetype. Her ego, that is her grief, emerged to the surface and controlled
her conscious. Because Molleen was an introvert who preferred her internal
thoughts, so she distribute the energy to the unconscious and that what made her
stopped speaking and started daydreaming. This state is called symbolic death.
Molleen experienced symbolic rebirth when she met with Macdarragh,
a boy who is mute. Macdarragh was a boy who had illness and when Molleen saw
him had a fit and fell, she felt like more alive since she was left by her father. So
she started to speak again even became his mouthpiece and socialized with people
around her.
In the second phase, the transformation was marked by Molleen’s meeting
with her horse. This meeting also became her meeting with her Self archetype.
Molleen treated her as human and as her lover. The people believed that it was
Molleen’s lover who came back for her but in another shape. Molleen’s affection
toward this horse made her husband jealous and this jealousy led to drive the
horse off the cliff.
In the last phase, Molleen ended her life by jumping to the sea. When she
was alive, she could not achieve her goal, so she chose to get back to her
collective unconscious. The horse was the analogy of her father and her lover and
it was her last hope to achieve her happiness, so when it was dead she had no
hope anymore. This was the peak of her desperate moment because she had too
many repressions and this repression made her energy much stronger than before
and that what made her behaved irrationally by jumping to the sea, and this is the
psychological reason why she committed suicide.
So, the result of the analysis on Molleen’s life journey using the
mythological and archetypal approach reveals that Molleen did not succeed in
achieving her goal in her life journey and preferred to achieve it in heaven.
2. Suggestion
From the conclusion above, the writer attempts to show the reader that the
journey of Molleen’s life contains some symbols that are signed by archetypes or
mythology. This research is just one way to interpret a literature. There are many
ways that can be used to analyze and appreciate this literature. The writer
suggests the readers to analyze another aspect or use another approach to analyze
the novel The Marriage Bed by Regina McBride. The writer realizes that this
analysis is imperfect. It is needed deep research to relate a journey of life with
mythology.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Farkhan, Muhammad. 2007. Penulisan Karya Ilmiah. Jakarta: Cella. Goleman, et al. 1982. Introductory Psychology. New York: Random House. Guerin, Wilfred L., et al. 1979. A Handbook of Critical Approaches to Literature.
New York: Harper & Row. Hall, Calvin S. and Gardner Lindzey. 1993. Teori-Teori Psikodinamik (Klinis).
Translator Yustinus. Ed. A. Supratiknya. Yogyakarta: Kanisius. Hardy, Jean. 1990. A Psychology with a Soul: Psychosynthesis in Evolutionary
Context. New York: Arkana. Jung, Carl G. 2003. Four Archetypes. London: Routledge. Jung, Carl G., et al. 1968. Man and His Symbols. New York: Dell Publishing. Jung, Carl G. and Carl Kerenyi. 2002. The Science of Mythology. London: Routledge. Knapp, Bettina L. 1998. Women, Myths and the Feminine Principle. New York:
SUNY Press. Lundin, Robert W. 1972. Theories and Systems of Psychology. Massachusets: D.C.
Heath and Company. McBride, Regina. 2005. The Marriage Bed. London: Piatkus Books Ltd. Rose, H.J. 2000. A Handbook of Greek Mythology. London: Routledge. Stevens, Anthony. 2001. “The Archetypes,” The Handbook of Jungian Psychology.
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APPENDIX
SYNOPSIS
Molleen Mohr had adored her own father. After he drowned during the run for mackerel when she was six, she stopped speaking and gave herself over to daydreaming. When she was fifteen, Macdarragh, a boy who was mute, came to that island and became her lover. Some people said that Molleen’s voluntary muteness anticipated Macdarragh’s coming. He was a weak man because of his illness but he had the manly grace that could enchanted every women who looked at him. But she had to suffer again because she had to lose her lover. Her lover was drowned in the sea when he was taken to a ventry doctor. But before his death, he gave a centaur figurine to Molleen that became part of her life.
Three years would pass before Molleen would happen out of the house for a rare walk up the hill and come upon the man who would be her husband, Liam O’Coigligh. At first, they had a wonderful time as husband and wife. But everything change when her husband went to the sea for fishing. Molleen had anxiety that her husband would leave her as her father and her lover. She was afraid that the sea would take her husband’s life. And it happened when one day her husband did not come home after gone fishing. She believed that her husband had died. But miraculously her husband came back alive and that made Molleen confuse how a dead man came back to life. Since that time, she believed nothing. She did not believe in happiness. So they started to live as strangers.
When a horse came to that island, it reminded Molleen and every woman in that island to Macdarragh. It had the same manner with him. So they called it Macdarragh. Molleen believed it was her former lover who came back for her but in another shape. So she treated him like her lover and gave him affection.
Her husband felt jealous toward the horse so he drove him off the cliff and the horse died. Knowing her beloved horse died in the sea, Molleen committed suicide by jumping to sea.