Trauma and Identity in McEwan’s Stories

Jacques Lacan had identified the individual position based development of identity within the structure of the ‘symbolic order’. This primarily highlighted the concept through which any individual could become, at least at the perceptual measure, constricted through the language, conventions, motives and desires of others. This development of identity involves the ‘circuit of discourse’, as has been indicated by Lacan, through which the individual actions and assertions of identity could be constructed and influenced by the measures of integration within the existing environment. In this context, Bran Nicol has emphasised that such a presumptive order could separate the individual from the ‘real’ which could indicate the notion that ‘everyday life is essentially virtual’ on the basis of the codes of this symbolic order which engenders familiarisation and understanding. This observation could outline the manner through which this symbolic order could be utilised, as part of the postmodern theoretical constructs, as a ‘necessary fiction’, to establish by design of it, the components of human experiences which could not be ‘symbolised’. Such experiential components are trauma and death. The construction and presentation of identity have been based on the conflicting inner desires of characters which have emerged as direct responses to the external influences generated by their environments. First Love, Last Rites of An McEwan drawns on such theory and Kiernan Ryan has illustrated on this that variegations of presentations of male rites within this literary composition emphasises upon the fragile nature of masculine identity. In this context, further argument on such observation of fragility of masculine identity could be undertaken in the measure of exploration of inability of such characters to survive in a condition which could be excluded from their ‘symbolic order’. McEwan has explored the psychological impacts of death and trauma in Conversation with a Cupboard Man and Disguises through presenting the characters with personalities and thoughts which are both passive and conflicting in nature. McEwan had provided the critical reflection that ‘culturally, we are neither puritanical nor liberate, just profoundly confused’ after the publication of First Love, Last Rites .

The stories in both of the collections formulate an image of the world which is relatively coherent in nature. In terms of narration, both of these sources have a lot of commonalities as in both the collections, the first person based narrative techniques generally dominate. Within the First Love, Last Rites, “Homemade,” “Solid Geometry”, “Last Day of Summer.” “Butterflies,” “Conversation with a Cupboard Man”, and “First Love, Last Rites” the protagonists generally recount the crucial experiences of theirs within their lives in the first person narrations. Further references could be drawn from In between the Sheets and from the Reflections of a Kept Ape as well as from the Two Fragments, Dead As They Come, To and Fro and Psychopolis. Furthermore, the narration techniques, though in third person, still, with an exception of one case, is primarily oriented towards exposition of the personal points of views of the involved characters in multiplicity of other references as well. These include Disguises (First Love, Last Rites), the first halves of the Two Fragments, Dead As They Come and In Between the Two Sheets as well as the Pornography (as far as the aimlessness and unfeelingness of O’Byrne could be considered to have any point of view. The final story could be considered to be a complicated one regarding the third person based narration techniques utilised for the pace encompassing not greater than two pages, to shift the point of view of Stephen to a particular direction which could not be based on characters regarding the setting of the bedroom of Miranda (In Between the Sheets) so as to show the aspects which Stephen can never observe. However, this shift is primarily a limited one within the entire story and the eyes and thoughts of the protagonist is utilised consistently through out to demonstrate such shifts in perception. The speaker in the Conversation with a Cupboard Man has been identified as Kiernan Ryan as ‘a reclusive freak curled up in his womb-like wardrobe’.The ‘symbolic order’ has been associated with the significance of the womb. The narrator has recounted his experiences of living within the overbearing obsessive and overbearing mother who had raised him till the age of seventeen as if he had been a child. A combination of nostalgia and contempt has been utilised by the narrator ‘I could hardly move without her, and she loved it, the bitch… I wasn’t unhappy, you know. She was all right really’.

However, the narrator had attempted to adapt to the implications of becoming an adult psychologically out of necessity when his mother had abandoned him through exiling him to a home. He portrays himself in ‘strange shapes in yellow and white’ (p.113) emphasising on the confusion of determination of his identity through the abstractness of his drawings. However, while painting his mother, he utilises ‘large red mouths […]-her lipstick- and in the mouths [he] painted it black’ (p.113) to fill his page. The psychological depiction of his perceptual representation of his mother through such abstractions could become evident. Nevertheless, he struggles to persistently hate his mother ‘that was because I hated her. Though I didn’t really’ (p.113). Her mother represents, in his mind, the overbearing nature of hers which have been depicted as the crowding of the page through red mouths. His migration to London for professional purposes intensifies his confusion. The experience of suffering inside the heated oven leads him to realise that no sense of safety could exist while he was away from his original symbolic order which suggests the cocooned environment of safety which his mother provided. Ironically, the metropolitan lifestyle became suffocating for him, , ‘London was becoming too much for me. I found it hard to get out of bed in the mornings’ (p.118). His solace could be found in the covers which could be equated to the womb ‘it was better under the bedclothes, I was safer there … I wished I was back there. The old cotton- wool life when everything was done for me, warm and safe’ (p.118). The symbolic order of the narrator has been a ‘necessary fiction’ as per the observations of Nicol. He has further stated that ‘he cannot continue living this new life and environment, therefore, he hides behind memories, bedcovers and eventually the cupboard. He admits that he never learnt to become an adult, he has to ‘pretend’ (p.108). .. but when he finally returns home, he however, after returning to his home, the prevalent perceptions are as ‘cheated’ since he discovers that his mother has moved away as well. The significance of such changing occurring within his haven of peace and security, leads to further rupturing of his already fractured identity, ‘I felt really sad that it was changed, I felt cheated’ (p.119).

The above illustrated confession has outlined the struggle of his to distinguish between the conscious thoughts and unconscious desires. The experience of imprisonment within a heated oven is of greater familiarity and desirability for him in comparison to the anger he experienced through his endurance of trauma. Notwithstanding such effects, his experiences directed him to acknowledge that it is impossible for him to continue the pretence of his existence of an average adult which he was ‘secretly wanting’ and ‘hoping it without knowing it’. The experienced frustration of imprisonment within the locked conditions without any salvation has been the only measure through which he has identified himself with the environment through which he could recognise himself within the element of safety: ‘I wanted to be where I couldn’t get out’. However, certain measure of interest exists within the word choices of McEwan regarding the emphasis on his convoluted and complicated sense of identity. In a similar measure with the paradoxical feelings of his towards his mother, the enjoyment of the narrator in the frustrating detention within an oven, is palpable. The fragility of masculine identity could be perceived to be greater apparent in Disguises. In a similar measure to the Conversation with a Cupboard Man, the sudden alteration in the symbolic order of young Henry after his mother passes away contributes to the confusion regarding his childhood identity. To the orphaned Henry, his aunt Mina, having intense propensity to cross dress with an extensive proclivity of costumes on the basis of her persistent changes in moods had attempted to be a ‘real mother’(p.147). The outcome is further confusion for Henry in terms of his living environment. This formulates a vignette criticism of the conditions in which Henry finds himself as his personality gets constricted in terms of self-expression.

Henry exhibits attempts to conceal his actual feelings of uncertainty involving his life and narcissistic tendencies of his aunt. His symbolic order in the form of his life with his mother had become ‘elusive like a faint star’. His enforced dressing as a girl by Mina signifies his dilemma: ‘for the first time he missed his mother, solid and always the same’ (p.155). Ten year old Henry experiences difficulty in expressing his opinions within the perceived place of safety since he struggles to please the only adult in his life pertaining to consistent changes in personality gender and appearances of Mina. Henry experiences self-conflict as he is presented by Mina dressed as a little girl to the drunken officer. It is difficult for him to configure if Mina was ‘very wicked or very mad’ (p.157). His confusion and thoughts are suppressed as he is unwilling to contradict Mina in spite of the fact that feelings of Henry towards Mina are conflicted in a similar measure to that of the narrator in Conversation with a Cupboard Man. In spite of his failure to understand the darkness within Mina, Henry also ‘for the most part liked her, she was his friend’ (p.157). Her abuse has been overshadowed when ‘she make[s] him laugh with all her funny voices’ (p.158). However, his personality changes at school as he is demonstrated to have become outspoken: ‘he played chasing games and loud football against the wall… the teachers considered him mildly precocious’ (p.160). When Henry reflects on his life at house with Mina and at school, the school seems to him to be spacious and liberating ‘large and free’ (p.161). The latter is of greater suffocation for encompassing the objects in his room, the costumes and games played by Mina and this makes the time spent at school to be an unrealistic, carefree distant dream : ‘telling his day to Mina was like telling a dream over breakfast, true and not true’ (p.161). This outlines his proclivity to be constricted within his symbolic order. The beginning of the narrative outlines that Mina has transformed him into a puppet to accommodate the obsession of role playing of hers.

Ultimately, Henry submits to the ‘girl laid neatly on the bed’ (p.169). Kiernan Ryan interprets this submission due to Henry’s new found love of his school friend Linda. Through his boyish love Henry learns to transform the ‘oppression of his costume into a source of pleasure and a refuge from guilt’. However, the dissolving of his masculine shell could be seen as a result of Henry’s submission to Mina, he finally submits to his training to become a puppet. McEwan illustrates this by the sudden change in personal pronouns:

Take a deeper dive into UK-Iran Academic Collaboration with our additional resources.

By succumbing Henry becomes ‘invisible inside this girl’ (p.170). His confusion and fear disappears, he stops trying to understand and defy Mina. Henry now fully trained, accepts that living a life ‘all disguised and no one knows who you are, anyone can do what they want because it doesn’t matter’ (p.175). His new symbolic order has become a forced refuge, he has let go of his reservations to appease Mina. At the conclusive stage, it could be observed that exploration of the psyche of McEwan from a Lacanian perspective could reveal the impact imparted by trauma, death and alteration in the symbolic order on identity of masculinity. The physical and psychological abuses by adults are noticed to have been experienced by children in the characters of McEwan. Conversation with a Cupboard Man brings forth the apprehensions of the narrator to experience the consequences of an adult life as he prefers to be cocooned within the cupboard, similar to the womb, as this was what he had become accustomed till his seventeen years of age with his domineering mother. The preference of the narrator is towards having a similar existence regarding his adult life which had experienced during his treatment as a child in most of his adolescent life. On the contrary, orphaned Henry had been subjected to a life of instability and confusion while living with his aunt. The change of symbolic order bars Henry from fully expressing and identifying his confusion towards Mina’s abuse, leading him to hide behind his fear initially. McEwan further illustrates the fragility of masculine identity by presenting complex characters who have become too buried in their traumatic environment that they are unable to extend their identity beyond the parameters of their abuse.