The Psychological Journey of the Narrator in Atwood’s Surfacing Essay

The Psychological Journey of the Narrator in Atwoods Surfacing In Surfacing, a novel by Margaret Atwood, the vote counter undertakes three prefatory journeys a animal(prenominal) quest to search for her lost father, a biographical journey into her past, and most importantly a psychological journey. The psychological journey allows the narrator to reconcile her past and ultimately leads to the conclusion of the physical journey. In this psychological voyage into her innerself, the narrator, while travelling from cognizant rational reasoning to subconscious dissociated macrocosm progresses through three stages. In the first stage, the narrator is in touch with reality she lives and exists in a state of mind chicanen in Freudian psychology as the Ego. The Ego is defined as the element of being that consciously and continuously enables an individual to think, feel and act. (Barnhardt, 667). The ego is based on a reality principle, in which, a person reacts in realistic ways that will bring long term pleasure rather than pain or destruction (Meyers, 414). The narrators inability to cope with disagreeable thoughts such as her fathers possible death is evidenced early in the novel. The narrator states nothing is the same, I dont know the way anymore. I slide my tongue around the ice cream, trying to concentrate on it, they put seaweed in it now, but Im starting to shake, why is the thoroughfare different, he shouldnt have allowed them to do it, I want to turn around and go back to the city and never find out what happened to him. Ill start crying, that would be horrible, none of them would know what to do and neither would I. I bite down into the cone and I cant feel anything for a minute but the knife-hard pain up the side of my face... ...to reality The lake is quiet, the trees surround me, asking and giving nothing (Atwood, 224). Thus, the narrator has completed a psychological journey from snaeness to madness and then again in a fullcircle, travelling t hrough three distinct stages the Ego, the Superego, and the Id. The narrator by completing the psychological journey into the subconscious is able to resolve the biographical and physical journeys. Therefore, with the past and present conflicts resolved, it can be most likely assumed that the narrator will assimilate herself back into reality. She may have a go on to become human again. Works Cited Atwood, Margaret. Surfacing. Simon and Schuster New york, 1972 Barnhardt, Clarence L. Ed. The World Book Dictionary, Field Enterprises Publishing Co Chicago, 1975. Meyers, David. Psychology. Worth PublishingU.S.A., 1992