Psycho-analytical criticism

Since 1980's psycho-analytical theory has entered into literary studies. Stevi Jackson and Seu Scott have made original contribution to the development of psycho-analytical criticism. This two eminent critics are of the opinion that the concept of repression has made psycho-analytical criticism an important base to explore and analyse the issues of (a) gender, (b) sexuality, particularly female sexuality and (c) repression ( of womanhood ). Jackson and Scott have emphasized on the linguistic structure and cultural nuances of a work of art to discover the subdue psychological ideas imbibe in them.

Jacques Lacan, the important psycho-analytical theorist, spoke of his indebtedness to both Freud and Saussure in the development of his theories of psycho-analysis. Lacan believes that "the unconscious is structured like a language". It involves an extension of the linguistic paradigm into the realm of psycho analysis. Lacan's study of Edger Allan Poe's short story The Purloind Letter shows how he discovers hidden psycho-analytical issues in the work which no one before him had discovered.
Lacan is able to discover tremendous psychological potent in the works of Poe and demands that Poe should be re-studied from a psychological perspective. Peter Brook's similar book Psycho Analysis and Story Telling (1994) has established him as a new an formidable force in the field of psycho-analytical criticism. Here Brook admits that 'psycho analysis in literary study has over and over again mistaken the object of analysis'. In his essay 'Changes in the Margin: Construction, Transference and Narrative', Brook focuses on parallel between telling stories to an analyst and telling stories to a literary reader. The analyst, according to Brook, reconstructs the narrative discourse where as a literary reader enamours himself/herself by the story.

The above mentioned ideas are three important tenents of psycho-analytical criticism.