Änglar och sorg
Angels and mourning
Psychological realismDeathMourningGuardian angelRelationshipRealityPsykologisk realismDödSorgSkyddsängelRelationerRealism
What psychologial processes are activated in experiencing mourning after a loss of a belovedperson? How is death described in other authors? novels and short stories compared to mine?This essay aims at analysing my two short stories The follower and The price for love fromdifferent aspects. I discuss the psychological realism and the spirituality using the method ofclose reading, interpreting and applying ideas of texts from other authors in my short stories.Death is a central phenomenon in both of my texts. Therefore I discuss death frompsychological and philosophical aspects in this essay. To get a philosophical frame of death Iturn to Jacques Derrida, Emmanuel Levinas and Martin Heidegger. They express different opinions but important to point out is their truism that death is waiting for us all.Then I turn to Sigmund Freud, Ann-Kristin Lundmark and Lars Rönnmark to get the psychological view of death. Because of the character of the texts, I use concepts of mourning and losses from Sigmund Freud, Barbro Lennéer Axelson and Lars Rönnmark. I discuss the characters, their inner psychological processes, and relationships between persons. In this essay I indicate that mourning is a natural reaction to the loss of a beloved person. The usual mourning often follow four phases. The first phase is the chock phase, then comes the reaction phase, followed by the process phase. Finally comes the reorientation phase.The religious aspect of the stories is also explored. There my starting point is authors as Staffan Ljungman and Inger Waern, who discuss the occurrence of angels in human beings lifes. The narrator in The follower is a guardian angel, something that makes the question ofangels interesting to study.The reality aspect in the short stories is also discussed in this essay. I turn to James Wood and compare his ideas and hypotheses with my texts. James Wood present the importance of giving the reader an appearance of reality and creating vitality of the literary characters. My stories are planted in a realistic environment, the characters act and react the way real people could do in their culture and epoch. Their mourning is also similar to what human beings could experience. Therefore I come to the conclusion that my stories could regard realistic for some readers but not to other. My intention is to give the reader an atmosphere of probability. If I success is both depending on the way I send my messages as well as on the way the reader receives it.I use no special school of philosophy or psychology to analyse these texts. I analyse from the point of view of a social worker.My own conclusion of this essay is that relationships are important in my stories, as well as a capability of mourning. The religious facet is an attempt to raise the question of a possible invisible world.