Literary genre
Psychological Fiction
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Psychological thriller, psychological horror, psychological drama, psychological science fiction
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In literature,
psychological fiction
(also
psychological realism
) is a narrative genre that emphasizes interior
characterization
and
motivation
to explore the spiritual, emotional, and mental lives of its
characters
. The mode of narration examines the reasons for the behaviours of the character, which propel the
plot
and explain the
story
.
[1]
Psychological realism is achieved with deep explorations and explanations of the mental states of the character's inner person, usually through
narrative modes
such as
stream of consciousness
and
flashbacks
.
[2]
Early examples
[
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]
The Tale of Genji
by
Lady Murasaki
, written in 11th-century Japan, was considered by
Jorge Luis Borges
to be a psychological novel.
[4]
French theorists
Gilles Deleuze
and
Felix Guattari
, in
A Thousand Plateaus
, evaluated the 12th-century
Arthurian
author
Chretien de Troyes
'
Lancelot, the Knight of the Cart
and
Perceval, the Story of the Grail
as early examples of the style of the psychological novel.
[5]
Stendhal
's
The Red and the Black
and
Madame de La Fayette
's
The Princess of Cleves
are considered the first precursors of the psychological novel.
[6]
The modern psychological novel originated, according to
The Encyclopedia of the Novel
, primarily in the works of Nobel laureate
Knut Hamsun
? in particular,
Hunger
(1890),
Mysteries
(1892),
Pan
(1894) and
Victoria
(1898).
[7]
Notable examples
[
edit
]
One of the greatest writers of the genre was
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
. His novels deal strongly with ideas, and characters who embody these ideas, how they play out in real world circumstances, and the value of them, most notably
The Brothers Karamazov
and
Crime and Punishment
.
In the literature of the United States,
Henry James
,
Patrick McGrath
,
Arthur Miller
, and
Edith Wharton
are considered "major contributor[s] to the practice of psychological realism."
[8]
Subgenres
[
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]
Psychological thriller
[
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]
A subgenre of the
thriller
and psychological novel genres, emphasizing the inner mind and mentality of characters in a creative work. Because of its complexity, the genre often overlaps and/or incorporates elements of mystery, drama, action, slasher, and horror ? often psychological horror. It bears similarities to the
Gothic
and
detective fiction
genres.
[9]
Psychological horror
[
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]
A subgenre of the
horror
and psychological novel genres that relies on the psychological, emotional and mental states of characters to generate horror. On occasions, it overlaps with the psychological thriller subgenre to enhance the story suspensefully.
Psychological drama
[
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]
A subgenre of drama films with psychological elements, which focuses upon the emotional, mental, and psychological development of characters in a dramatic work.
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
(1975) and
Requiem for a Dream
(2000), both based on novels, are notable examples of this subgenre.
[10]
Taxi Driver
(1976) and
The Wrestler
(2008) are original psychological drama films.
Psychological science fiction
[
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]
Psychological science fiction refers to works that focus is on the character's inner struggle dealing with political or technological forces.
A Clockwork Orange
(1971) is a notable example of this genre.
[11]
[12]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
The Penguin Dictionary of Literary Terms and Literary Theory Third Edition (1991) J.A. Cuddon, Ed. p. 709.
- ^
A Handbook to Literature Fourth Edition (1980), C. Hugh Holman, Ed., pp. 357?358
- ^
W. J. Leatherbarrow (18 July 2002).
The Cambridge Companion to Dostoevskii
. Cambridge University Press. p. 134.
ISBN
978-0-521-65473-9
.
- ^
Jorge Luis Borges
,
The Total Library
:
[
The Tale of Genji
, as translated by
Arthur Waley
,] is written with an almost miraculous naturalness, and what interests us is not the exoticism — the horrible word — but rather the human passions of the novel. Such interest is just: Murasaki's work is what one would quite precisely call a psychological novel. ... I dare to recommend this book to those who read me. The English translation that has inspired this brief insufficient note is called
The Tale of Genji
.
- ^
Deleuze, Gilles; Guattari, Felix (1987). "Year Zero: Faciality".
A Thousand Plateaus
. Capitalism and Schizophrenia. Translated by Massumi, Brian. University of Minnesota Press. p. 174.
ISBN
978-1-85168-637-7
.
When the novel began, with Chretien de Troyes, for example, the essential character that would accompany it over the entire course of its history was already there: The knight of the novel of courtly love spends his time forgetting his name, what he is doing, what people say to him, he doesn't know where he is going or to whom he is speaking, he is continually drawing a line of absolute deterritorialization, but also losing his way, stopping, and falling into black holes. [...] Open Chretien de Troyes to any page and you will find a catatonic knight seated on his steed, leaning on his lance, waiting, seeing the face of his loved one in the landscape; you have to hit him to make him respond. Lancelot, in the presence of the queen's white face, doesn't notice his horse plunge into the river; or he gets into a passing cart and it turns out to be the cart of disgrace.
- ^
Paul Schellinger, ed. (2014). "Psychological Novel and Roman d'analyse".
Encyclopedia of the Novel
. Routledge. p. 1057.
ISBN
9781135918262
.
- ^
Logan, Peter Melville; George, Olakunle; Hegeman, Susan; et al., eds. (2011).
"Northern Europe"
.
The Encyclopedia of the Novel, A?Li
.
Blackwell Publishing
. p. 583.
ISBN
978-1-4051-6184-8
. Retrieved
6 February
2012
.
The most significant novelist of the Scandinavian countries is Knut Hamsun, who almost singlehandedly created the modern psychological novel through the publication of four works that probe the human subconscious,
Sult
(1890,
Hunger
),
Mysterier
(1892,
Mysteries
),
Pan
(1894), and
Victoria
(1898).
- ^
N. Baym, et al. Eds.
The Norton Anthology of American Literature: Shorter Seventh Edition
, New York: W.W. Norton Co. 2008, p. 1697
- ^
Christopher Pittard, Blackwell Reference,
Psychological Thrillers
Archived
2018-06-14 at the
Wayback Machine
, Accessed November 3, 2013, "...characteristics of the genre as “a dissolving sense of reality; reticence in moral pronouncements; obsessive, pathological characters; the narrative privileging of complex, tortured relationships” ( Munt 1994)..."
- ^
"Subgenre - Psychological Drama"
.
AllMovie
.
Archived
from the original on 2021-08-12
. Retrieved
2021-08-13
.
- ^
Movies, All (24 February 2020).
"Science Fiction ≫ Psychological Sci-Fi"
.
AllMovies
.
Archived
from the original on 2 July 2022
. Retrieved
24 February
2020
.
- ^
"SFE: Psychology"
.
sf-encyclopedia.com
. Retrieved
2024-03-03
.
Further reading
[
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]
- George M. Johnson. Dynamic Psychology in Modernist British Fiction. Palgrave Macmillan, U.K., 2006.