A Jungian Analysis of the Male Protagonist's Personality in Stephen Sondheim's Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
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Abstract
Stephen Sondheim’s musical Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street features a protagonist who can be viewed as a victim of England’s classism. In this study, Carl Jung’s theory of analytical psychology has been adopted to analyze Todd’s personality as perceived in Sondheim’s musical. The results reveal that Todd, having been unjustly separated from his wife and daughter, is driven by the Personal Unconscious, which is part of a psychological complex that blocks the logical utilization of the Ego. At the same time, he displays a calm and earnest-looking Persona while embodying the Shadow of a cold-blooded killer. His Anima is revealed as his weakness when he is distracted as well as being driven by the desire for a family reunion. However, he cannot attain the Self, which is central to a balanced personality. In brief, psychologically, Sweeney Todd is a thinking and feeling introvert, a product of both causal motivation and regressive adaptation.
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