Nelly Oliensis, "Freud's Aeneid"
My starting point is likely to be Freud's The Interpretation of Dreams,
which
ushered in the new century with a Vergilian epigraph (flectere si nequeo
superos...). My discussion will be twofold. First, I want to explore
the extent to which Freud has influenced 20th century readings of Vergil.
I'm thinking of the renewed interest in the "darker" sides of the Aeneid
and also the prominence of Oedipal/Bloomian models of intertextual
engagement; there's also David Quint's work to be reckoned with here (Freud
via Peter Brooks). Second, I want to consider the question of Vergil's
influence on Freud. Interpretation of Dreams will feature here along
with Civilization and its Discontents, but actually I'm hoping to
focus on Freud's involvement with Moses (linked strongly to Rome via Michelangelo's
Moses); I have a mind to read Moses and Monotheism as a kind of anti-Aeneid.
I'm very interested in the Hannibal connection (esp. in light of the exoriare
aliquis slip discussed in Psychopathology of Everyday Life)
and also the whole Rome obsession, which helps me map Aeneas onto Moses
(or vice versa): founders who don't reach the promised land (a role
Freud seems to have inhabited vicariously).