The subject of my research is the 1891 play Salomé, by Oscar Wilde and my thesis addresses the modern psychological implications of the cultural truths revealed by Wilde's re-vision of the myth of that biblical femme fatale. I argue that in fashioning a tragic heroine out of a female monster figure of “Immortal Vice”, Oscar Wilde created a document that captures two contradictory narratives: one in which Salomé plays the heroine of a tragedy and another in which she performs the role and functions of a villain. By employing Carl Jung's psychology of the archetypes, I am enabled to read Wilde’s play as a cultural and psychological phenomenon that (self-consciously) constructs a religious and patriarchal narrative around its central female character, which captures her in a tragedy of socially imposed destruction. Ultimately, this paper poses a psychological assessment of Salomé, in which Jungian archetypes illustrate--at a psychic level--Oscar Wilde’s precocious and liberal-minded modernizations of a two thousand-year old myth.
","abstract_html":"<p>The subject of my research is the 1891 play <em>Salom</em><em>é</em>, by Oscar Wilde and my thesis addresses the modern psychological implications of the cultural truths revealed by Wilde's re-vision of the myth of that biblical femme fatale. I argue that in fashioning a tragic heroine out of a female monster figure of “Immortal Vice”, Oscar Wilde created a document that captures two contradictory narratives: one in which Salomé plays the heroine of a tragedy and another in which she performs the role and functions of a villain. By employing Carl Jung's psychology of the archetypes, I am enabled to read Wilde’s play as a cultural and psychological phenomenon that (self-consciously) constructs a religious and patriarchal narrative around its central female character, which captures her in a tragedy of socially imposed destruction. Ultimately, this paper poses a psychological assessment of <em>Salom</em><em>é</em>, in which Jungian archetypes illustrate--at a psychic level--Oscar Wilde’s precocious and liberal-minded modernizations of a two thousand-year old myth.</p>","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Rajnish, Nayana"],"institution":null,"degree_name":"Master of Arts (MA)","degree_level":"Thesis","degree_discipline":"English","degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":["Myron Yeager","Joanna Levin","Richard Ruppel"],"advisors":[],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2021,"date_issued":"2021-01-01T08:00:00Z","date_published":"2021-01-01T08:00:00Z","updated_at":"2026-07-24T01:38:09Z","subjects":["Jung","Wilde","Salome","Archetypes","Psychology","Literature in English, British Isles","Other Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies","Psychological Phenomena and Processes"],"languages":[],"rights":[],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"https://digitalcommons.chapman.edu/english_theses/25","outbound_label":"Repository record","outbound_source":"dc:identifier"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor","label":"Contributor","values":["Myron Yeager","Joanna Levin","Richard Ruppel"]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Rajnish, Nayana"]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date.available","label":"Dc Date Available","values":["2021-10-01T07:00:00Z"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_discipline","label":"Discipline","values":["English"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_level","label":"Degree Level","values":["Thesis"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_name","label":"Degree Name","values":["Master of Arts (MA)"]}]},{"id":"subjects_keywords","label":"Subjects and Keywords","entries":[{"key":"dc:subject","label":"Dc Subject","values":["Jung","Wilde","Salome","Archetypes","Psychology","Literature in English, British Isles","Other Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies","Psychological Phenomena and Processes"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier","label":"Identifier","values":["https://digitalcommons.chapman.edu/english_theses/25"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description.abstract","label":"Abstract","values":["The subject of my research is the 1891 play Salomé, by Oscar Wilde and my thesis addresses the modern psychological implications of the cultural truths revealed by Wilde's re-vision of the myth of that biblical femme fatale. I argue that in fashioning a tragic heroine out of a female monster figure of “Immortal Vice”, Oscar Wilde created a document that captures two contradictory narratives: one in which Salomé plays the heroine of a tragedy and another in which she performs the role and functions of a villain. By employing Carl Jung's psychology of the archetypes, I am enabled to read Wilde’s play as a cultural and psychological phenomenon that (self-consciously) constructs a religious and patriarchal narrative around its central female character, which captures her in a tragedy of socially imposed destruction. Ultimately, this paper poses a psychological assessment of Salomé, in which Jungian archetypes illustrate--at a psychic level--Oscar Wilde’s precocious and liberal-minded modernizations of a two thousand-year old myth.
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"],"dc:identifier":["https://digitalcommons.chapman.edu/english_theses/25"],"dc:source":["Rajnish, Nayana. Monstrous and Beautiful: Jungian Archetypes in Wilde’s Salomé. 2021. Chapman University, MA Thesis. Chapman University Digital Commons, https://doi.org/10.36837/chapman.000203"],"dc:subject":["Jung","Wilde","Salome","Archetypes","Psychology","Literature in English, British Isles","Other Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies","Psychological Phenomena and Processes"],"dc:title":["Monstrous and Beautiful: Jungian Archetypes in Wilde’s Salomé"],"thesis:degree_discipline":["English"],"thesis:degree_level":["Thesis"],"thesis:degree_name":["Master of Arts (MA)"]},"updated_at":"2026-07-24T01:38:09Z"}