Defence Mechanisms in the Sound and the Fury
Defence mechanisms are unconscious resources used by the ego to reduce conflict between the id and superego and thereby anxiety. In other words, they are processes by which the content of our conscious are kept in the unconscious. It is worth-emphasizing that defence mechanisms like any other psychic phenomena are mere unconscious processes and that these mechanisms cease to operate as soon as they reach the conscious surface. Sigmund Freud was the first person to develop the concept of defence mechanisms; however, it was his daughter Anna Freud who clarified and conceptualized it. Compson family, the disintegrating southerners depicted in the novel The Sound and the Fury, seem to have been suffering a myriad of psychological defences which can be traced in the course of the novel.
Selective Perception is hearing and seeing only what we feel we can handle or bear. Benjy, the mentally retarded narrator, unconsciously has a tendency to perceive the smells (of flowers, of Caddy) and lights (of glittering objects), those which revive his consolatory recollections, more impetuously and promptly than those irk-some ones reminding of Jason, Mother, Luster.
Selective Memory is a tendency to modify our memories so that we do not feel we are overwhelmed by them. Jason, being more concerned with the materialism attuned to the spirit of his age, has no sense of the past whatsoever, or at times he together with Mother evade the already disintegrated reality of the Compsons and bury their ignominious past (the promiscuity of Caddy, disillusioned intellectuality of Quentin and the idiocity the retarded Compson) under the elusive prospect of their future prosperity. Father, on the other hand, tends to get away the decline of his family with recourse to his noble ancestors, his glorious past, and the Classics though the alliance is a far-fetched one in his disreputable present.
Avoidance is to stay away from people or situations that are likely to make us anxious by bringing some unconscious experience up to the surface. This is very conspicuous in Mother with her never-ending naggings of Benjy's "slobbering and moaning" when she has Negro caretakers watch him or keep him away from her sight. In fact, Mother avoids the presence or the memory of all the Compsons except that of Jason to whom she has turned as the last resort and in whose so-called talent for business she finds her belated consolation and well-being. Finally, Jason contributes to Mother's avoidance by sending Benjy to asylum.
Denial is an ego defence mechanism that operates unconsciously to resolve emotional conflict, and to reduce anxiety by refusing to perceive the more unpleasant aspects of external reality; that is, to believe that the problem does not exist. Father with his indifference to and lack of concern about disintegration of the Compsons reveals that the Denial is at work in his defence mechanism.
Rejection is ascribing our fear, guilty desire or the problem to someone else condemning them for it in order to deny that we have it ourselves. This mechanism is active in Mother who by her incessant nagging tries to justify the decay of her family and her irresponsibility as a mother by ascribing them to Caddy's promiscuity and Quentin's idealism.
Displacement is an unconscious defence mechanism, whereby the mind redirects emotion from a ‘dangerous’ object to a ‘safe’ object. In psychoanalytic theory, displacement is a defence mechanism that shifts sexual or aggressive impulses to a more acceptable or less threatening target; redirecting emotion to a safer outlet. In other words, displacement is at work when we take out our strong emotion such as anger on some one less threatening than the one who caused the problem. Jason, bitter over his own failures and his family's loss honour, takes it out on Miss Quentin by clashing with her or stealing money from her account and also on Benjy by castrating him and sending him to asylum.
Regression is the reversion to an earlier stage of development in the face of unacceptable impulses or a temporary return to a former psychological state. It can be a return to a painful or a pleasant experience and it can have either a therapeutic or a destructive effect. Quentin, obsessed by a sense of guilt, doom and death, returns to the past every now and then. He is deeply disturbed by family affairs. His beloved sister's promiscuity, selling of Benjy's pasture to pay for Quentin's studies at Harvard, Father's alcoholism, and his morbid despair for his idiot brother, all and all make his recourse to the past useless and his obsession with time so destructive that makes his suicide irresistible and inevitable. In fact, as one gets closer to the point of suicide, psychoanalysts hold, all their defences seem to vanish and they finally seem to have no way out of the problem except suicide. Quentin having been dominated by his morality principle or his superego all through his life has finally been so much overwhelmed by the problem that suicide appears to him as the last resort.