Murfin's Psychoanalytic Criticism

In Murfin's Psychoanalytical Criticism he explores many aspects of Conrad's Heart of Darkness. Among his many ideas include an analysis of dreams and their correlation to language as they are mere unconscious representations of our innermost thoughts that even we may not be aware we have. This goes along with the Freudian concepts of the ego, superego, and the id. Essentially, Marlow completely emobodies the id as he dives into the "heart of darkness." Another interesting point that Murfin makes is that most readers are drawn to stories that do not resemble one's own life because the reader can vicariously live through the characters in the story. Additionally, the reader has the power to interpret each story as he or she wishes and visualize it how he or she believes it is meant to be visualized. I think this is very true among most readers and their processes in reading different stories.