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Within a literary context, psychoanalysis is that mode of criticism based on the insights of Sigmund Freud and on the reinter-pretation of those insights by Jacques Lacan, Julia Kristeva, and a constellation of important lesser stars, too numerous to name. This is not the place to embark on a full exposition of the principles of psychoanalytic theory: that has been done most efficiently elsewhere.¹ As my reading of "Snowed Up" progresses, I will show how various psychoanalytic concepts permit us new insights into the text. The set of clinical praxes dealing with people's psychological problems, and subject to development, diversification and controversy, is not obviously related to the needs of literary critics. Although the aim of the analyst is therapeutic, the critic has no patient, and can achieve no "cure". Frequently, as a result, the analyst's goal is not ours, though both deal with words: the discourse of a subject, whether living or fictional, through which desire is expressed. A literary critic aims for a greater understanding of a written work: success for us is to see the text sparkling and new, like a familiar landscape viewed at an unaccustomed time of day, and transformed by the insight that a new point of view brings to it.²

DOI: 10.1007/978-1-349-25028-8_6

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