The Denial of Death

With this chapter, Becker discusses the 19th-century theologian Søren Kierkegaard, whose works he argues overlap with psychoanalysis. Describing the myth of Adam and Eve, Kierkegaard argued that the story illustrates that “man is a union of opposites, of self-consciousness and of physical body” (58-59). Humanity is both an animal and an angel, but without the power to fully be either. The curse from the fruit of knowledge that Adam and Eve eat against God’s orders is self-consciousness and the knowledge of death that comes with it.

According to Becker, Kierkegaard also viewed the personality of each person as designed to cover up the reality of death. For example, there is the repressed personality, which Kierkegaard describes as “shut-upness” and the “lie of character” (71-72). Kierkegaard believes that allowing a child to experience the world on their own terms keeps that child from becoming a repressed adult. This also explains why adults accept what Kierkegaard labels “philistinism.” Philistinism is defined by Becker as “triviality, man lulled by the daily routines of his society, content with the satisfactions that it offers him: in today’s world the car, the shopping center, the two-week summer vacation” (74). Such benefits offer a valuable sense of security, even if it means compromising the inner self.

However, Becker argues that giving oneself up to repression leads to depressive psychosis. He defines depressive psychosis as “the extreme on the continuum of too much necessity, that is, too much finitude, too much limitation by the body and the behaviors of the person in the real world, and not enough freedom of the inner self, of inner symbolic possibility” (78). Overwhelmed by their situation, a depressed person becomes frozen in action and blames themselves for their own failures. By doing so, the depressed person actually avoids the threat of “too much life” (80). Still, most people avoid developing harmful psychoses coming from too much or too little repression, but Becker still describes philistinism as a neurosis, just a “normal” one (81).

Another concept from Kierkegaard that Becker discusses is that of the introvert (82). They become concerned, at least on a subconscious level, throughout their lives with their secret self and their true calling. Meanwhile, Becker argues, most people become unconcerned about their inner selves and instead become “purely external” (82) once they reach adulthood. However, introverts have a hard time reconciling this true, inner self with their dependency on things like a job or family and may become suicidal. Sometimes an introvert’s desire to assert their uniqueness becomes a “revolt against existence itself,” which Becker argues results in atrocities like the Vietnam War and the career of Adolf Hitler (84-85).

Becker interprets Kierkegaard as urging people to transcend themselves by accepting the truth of the human condition and facing their own anxieties. What Kierkegaard calls “real freedom” can only come from demolishing a person’s own sense of self and their ideas of cultural heroism, to see what he describes as the “Ultimate Power of Creation” (89-90).