Literatura a psychologia głębi. Ostatnie historie Olgi Tokarczuk czyli droga do indywiduacji C.G. Junga

Abstract

Modern literary-scientific reflection, noticing the relation between literature and the depth psychology, takes advantage of its tools in literary research. The prose of Olga Tokarczuk, who not only explicitly admits her fascination with Jung’s ideas, but also creates worlds filled with psychology-related meanings, can provide inspiration for considering the bonds between literature and psychology. Also in “Ostatnie historie” one can notice echoes of Jung’s concepts, especially of his individuation theory, as the development of an individual, as the basic existential experience, is actualized in the images of the presented world of the novel. Communication between the two disciplines is realized in the substance of Tokarczuk’s novel primarily by means of such categories as myth, archetype and symbol. The crucial events of “Ostatnie historie”, that is the characters’ encounter with death, are a pretext to undertake a literary reflection on spiritual rebirth, which Jung calls individuation. The archetypes visible in the novel, of the Great Mother, the Wise Old Man, or Anima and Animus are personifications of the ancient models of behaviou, the basis of which is the search for the whole of one’s personality. In psychoanalytic therapy, the superior role is played by narration, thus, in order to discover a private myth, one has to start telling it, and telling a story opens the door to the literary world. The above analysis, investigating the motive of wandering, which has functioned in literature for ages, that is the motive of journey, of a trip, this time directed at one’s interior, inside the psyche, is situated within the boundaries of archetypical criticism, which deals with archetypical images lasting in literature.