Psychological Framework in Dickensian Realism: A Case Study of “The Signalman”

Abstract

The present paper argues that the absurdities in Dickens’s works are highly psychologically symbolic. By exploring further the psychological mechanism in G. H. Lewes’s illustration of the “poetry” of the real, I try to reveal the nature of reality in Dickens’s works and describe the peculiarly psychological mode of Dickensian realism, as seen in the short story “The Signalman.” The trinity pattern of characterization of the narrator, signalman, and spectre is highly psychological, which may be regarded as consciousness, subject, and unconsciousness respectively. Thus, the story, psychologically speaking, is a revelation of an anxious mentality, embodied by the signalman while “I” and the spectre represent his own conscious and unconscious struggles for survival.