Abstract

This thesis comprises a critical essay and a portfolio of creative writing consisting of four stage plays.

The critical essay explores the psychological motives that engender the creative writing process and how these influence the content of the writing. Drawing on literary and psychological theory and with reference to the work contained in the accompanying portfolio, it begins with a consideration of the issues confronting a creative writer in conducting an analysis of the writing process. This leads to a discussion of narrative structure and the way in which it relates to the creative process in terms of gathering and shaping material for fiction and how it is bound up with the psyche. Illustrated with examples from the available literature, the essay next explores the challenges facing aspirant writers, introducing Sigmund Freud’s hypotheses on the motives for creative writing. The ensuing exploration of Freudian thought surmises that the inconsistency of Freud’s ideas about the goals of the creative writer means that they cannot be used to formulate an entirely coherent motivational model, and the essay draws subsequently on the more complex reasoning of the French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan. Lacan’s structuralist linguistics approach allows for the essay’s conclusion that creative writing, in common with the majority of human behaviour, is motivated by the perpetual pursuit of an unattainable, abstract goal.

The four plays included in the creative writing portfolio – Touchy Feely, Have-a-Go Hero, Bacon Sandwich and Christmas with Johnny and Dee – are presented in chronological order according to the dates of their original productions.