Trauma and Hauntology
Before analyzing Dickinson’s deft manipulation of trauma and haunting within her poetry and its significance, it is important to first examine the breadth of literary and psychoanalytic thought surrounding these terms. Many literary theorists draw upon the work of Freud in attempts to formulate definitions of trauma narratives. Freud's central concept with regard to traumatic events was what he described as repression:
Repression is thus one of the central defense mechanisms by which the ego seeks to avoid internal conflict and pain, and to reconcile reality with the demands of both id and super-ego. As such it is completely normal and an integral part of the developmental process through which every child must pass on the way to adulthood. However, the repressed instinctual drive, as an energy-form, is not and cannot be destroyed when it is repressed–it continues to exist intact in the unconscious, from where it exerts a determining force upon the conscious mind, and can give rise to the dysfunctional behavior characteristic of neuroses. This is one reason why dreams and slips of the tongue possess such a strong symbolic significance for Freud, and why their analysis became such a key part of his treatment–they represent instances in which the vigilance of the super-ego is relaxed, and when the repressed drives are accordingly able to present themselves to the conscious mind in a transmuted form (for more: a helpful summary of Freud's theoretical claims).
Freud's understanding of repression greatly influenced his development of psychoanalytic thought, and profoundly impacting the creation and study of trauma literature. The mind's fascinating capability of pushing thoughts, emotions, and even memories under the surface produced a wealth of theories regarding the nature of the human mind and consciousness, both in psychological and literary disciplines. The psyche responds to trauma by pushing away the event itself, and working to forget; and yet the event keeps resurfacing, again and again, because the mind can't help but attempt to work through it to attain some sort of understanding. The nature of this back-and-forth and the network of higher emotional functioning in the brain has yet to be fully analyzed and unearthed - and this exploration serves to provide an overview of existing theories, and potential pathways for further examination.
My analysis of trauma and haunting was heavily influenced by a thought-provoking piece by Greg Forter, in which he provides an apt summary of what he proposes the divergent thought in traumatic theory to be. On one hand, many literary theorists construct a model of trauma as “a punctual blow to the psyche that overwhelms its functioning, disables its defenses, and absents it from direct contact with the brutalizing event itself . . .Traumas of this kind thus become accessible only in the mind’s recursive attempts to master what it has in some sense failed to experience in the first instance” (Forter 259). Grounded in psychoanalysis, this conceptualization of trauma is exemplified by extreme circumstances, such as the Holocaust. The indescribable pain and suffering produces the “blow to the psyche,” rendering the mind incapable of either processing or understanding what has occurred.
Alternatively, Forter argues that there is an alternative way to formulate a model of trauma. He argues that because “trauma is best conveyed ‘directly’—since attempts to thematize and make it comprehensible betray its essence as inassimilable shock—then the best kind of text is one that actually induces trauma in its readers” (Forter 262). Instead of seeking and failing to provide a representation of the traumatic event, these texts aim to stimulate the sensation and perception of the event in the reader. This theory emphasizes the insufficiency of describing that which inherently cannot be described due to its very nature. The deconstructive nature of the trauma renders the mind incapable of piecing it back together; and therefore, Forter postulates that the trauma narrative is structured such that it recreates the trauma itself in order to produce those sensations in the mind of the reader, and allow the shock and chaos to be understood.
These definitions of trauma are furthered by the critical theory regarding the narrative portrayal of ghosts. Consolidating Jacque Derrida’s work on spectrality into a cohesive theoretical, linguistic mode of analysis, Colin Davis describes the literary movement of hauntology, and reveals how it “replace[s] the priority of being and presence with the figure of the ghost as that which is neither present nor absent, neither dead nor alive” (373). The emergent voice of the ghost within literary narratives creates an inherent tension between life and death, between presence and absence. The specter disrupts temporality, as it is an echo of the past occupying the present. Just as traumatic events can blows to the psyche, the ghost intrudes into one’s consciousness, disrupting our traditional understanding of the linear nature of time, and the cycle of life and death.
Arguably, Dickinson playfully interrogates this complex relationship between trauma and hauntology. As we will see, her ghosts of the present recall voices of the past, evoking and reworking the nature of the trauma, and ultimately "induce" the experience of trauma in the reader through the language, content, and structuring of her poetry.
Before analyzing Dickinson’s deft manipulation of trauma and haunting within her poetry and its significance, it is important to first examine the breadth of literary and psychoanalytic thought surrounding these terms. Many literary theorists draw upon the work of Freud in attempts to formulate definitions of trauma narratives. Freud's central concept with regard to traumatic events was what he described as repression:
Repression is thus one of the central defense mechanisms by which the ego seeks to avoid internal conflict and pain, and to reconcile reality with the demands of both id and super-ego. As such it is completely normal and an integral part of the developmental process through which every child must pass on the way to adulthood. However, the repressed instinctual drive, as an energy-form, is not and cannot be destroyed when it is repressed–it continues to exist intact in the unconscious, from where it exerts a determining force upon the conscious mind, and can give rise to the dysfunctional behavior characteristic of neuroses. This is one reason why dreams and slips of the tongue possess such a strong symbolic significance for Freud, and why their analysis became such a key part of his treatment–they represent instances in which the vigilance of the super-ego is relaxed, and when the repressed drives are accordingly able to present themselves to the conscious mind in a transmuted form (for more: a helpful summary of Freud's theoretical claims).
Freud's understanding of repression greatly influenced his development of psychoanalytic thought, and profoundly impacting the creation and study of trauma literature. The mind's fascinating capability of pushing thoughts, emotions, and even memories under the surface produced a wealth of theories regarding the nature of the human mind and consciousness, both in psychological and literary disciplines. The psyche responds to trauma by pushing away the event itself, and working to forget; and yet the event keeps resurfacing, again and again, because the mind can't help but attempt to work through it to attain some sort of understanding. The nature of this back-and-forth and the network of higher emotional functioning in the brain has yet to be fully analyzed and unearthed - and this exploration serves to provide an overview of existing theories, and potential pathways for further examination.
My analysis of trauma and haunting was heavily influenced by a thought-provoking piece by Greg Forter, in which he provides an apt summary of what he proposes the divergent thought in traumatic theory to be. On one hand, many literary theorists construct a model of trauma as “a punctual blow to the psyche that overwhelms its functioning, disables its defenses, and absents it from direct contact with the brutalizing event itself . . .Traumas of this kind thus become accessible only in the mind’s recursive attempts to master what it has in some sense failed to experience in the first instance” (Forter 259). Grounded in psychoanalysis, this conceptualization of trauma is exemplified by extreme circumstances, such as the Holocaust. The indescribable pain and suffering produces the “blow to the psyche,” rendering the mind incapable of either processing or understanding what has occurred.
Alternatively, Forter argues that there is an alternative way to formulate a model of trauma. He argues that because “trauma is best conveyed ‘directly’—since attempts to thematize and make it comprehensible betray its essence as inassimilable shock—then the best kind of text is one that actually induces trauma in its readers” (Forter 262). Instead of seeking and failing to provide a representation of the traumatic event, these texts aim to stimulate the sensation and perception of the event in the reader. This theory emphasizes the insufficiency of describing that which inherently cannot be described due to its very nature. The deconstructive nature of the trauma renders the mind incapable of piecing it back together; and therefore, Forter postulates that the trauma narrative is structured such that it recreates the trauma itself in order to produce those sensations in the mind of the reader, and allow the shock and chaos to be understood.
These definitions of trauma are furthered by the critical theory regarding the narrative portrayal of ghosts. Consolidating Jacque Derrida’s work on spectrality into a cohesive theoretical, linguistic mode of analysis, Colin Davis describes the literary movement of hauntology, and reveals how it “replace[s] the priority of being and presence with the figure of the ghost as that which is neither present nor absent, neither dead nor alive” (373). The emergent voice of the ghost within literary narratives creates an inherent tension between life and death, between presence and absence. The specter disrupts temporality, as it is an echo of the past occupying the present. Just as traumatic events can blows to the psyche, the ghost intrudes into one’s consciousness, disrupting our traditional understanding of the linear nature of time, and the cycle of life and death.
Arguably, Dickinson playfully interrogates this complex relationship between trauma and hauntology. As we will see, her ghosts of the present recall voices of the past, evoking and reworking the nature of the trauma, and ultimately "induce" the experience of trauma in the reader through the language, content, and structuring of her poetry.