A Psychoanalytical Study of Zal's Character; An Adlerian Approach

Among the various critical approaches to literary works, psychoanalytical criticism is of special eminence. Freud, the founder of psychoanalysis, was able to introduce a new reading of literary and mythical texts as well as art works to his readers, based on his new and innovatory perception of human mind and his discoveries of new aspects of human existence. His tendency to analyze the author's psyche through his/her work(s) is his greatest achievement in this field. After him, psychoanalytical criticism was subject to many developments. Jung, Adler, Ernest Jones, and Erik Erikson were amongst those whose activities have had magnificent effects on the development and evolution of this critical method. As a result of these developments, the practice of analyzing the characters of a literary work from a psychoanalytic perspective was pursued by Freud's pupils, and in particular by Ernest Jones and this critical approach became one of the most remarkable methods of literary work analysis.Due to its dynamic and structured nature, the method still remains a pre-eminent and well-known trend in modern psychoanalytical criticism. Thus in this study we have tried to analyze and scrutinize the character of "Zal" in Ferdowsi's Shahnameh from a psychoanalytical viewpoint in order to shed light on his psychic features. We have chosen Alfred Adler's psychoanalytic speculations on the inferiority complex, superiority, and compensation as our methodological guideline.