Id versus Superego
...atan to be Brown’s own projection of an alter ego and his wife Faith as a different part of that alter ego. He attributes Satan’s staff as a standard Freudian symbol for the phallus (infantile sexuality in the male). Brown meets many people he knows in the forest, which are attributed to his moral tutors or people that helped form his superego. Near the end he becomes maddened and surrenders to his wild and dark side of his mind. Guerin then goes on to say that Hawthorne thinks that everyone goes through this, having to face their “Satan”, but not everyone is bound to the same fate as Brown. Then Guerin compares Hawthorne’s thoughts to those of Freud’s. That it is unhealthy to suppress one’s libido (sexual desires) as the consequences is an overbearing superego. Hawthorne uses the head versus heart imbalance instead of the Freudian id versus superego imbalance. Guerin then goes on to define what “nature” is. He says that Puritan’s made “nature” almost synonymous with “sin”. Hawthorne is a Puritan descendent and a member of the New England society. Both of which have an obsessed focus on nature equals sin. To violate these ideas were thought to cause great psychological damage, such is the case of Goodman Brown. After Brown’s night in the forest he becomes doubtful and guilty because he does not know how to cope with both the real world and the one in his mind. Since the “forbidden fruit” has been glamorized by prohibition it becomes almost an uncontrollable desire to seek it out. Finally Guerin points out that contents of Brown’s dream “substantiates F...