Fear of Intimacy in Rabih Alameddine’s I, The Divine

Ikram LECHEHEB

Vol-5,Issue-1,January - February 2020

Author: Ikram LECHEHEB

Keywords: Rabih Alameddine; I, The Divine; Sigmund Freud; Psychology; Trauma; Fear of Intimacy.

Abstract: The paper examines how the Lebanese American novelist Rabih Alameddine in I, The Divine (2002) shows the psychology of hybrid subject in Diaspora. Through creating a fictional space, the author sheds light on how Sarah suffers from fear of intimacy due to a combination of past traumatic experiences: The Lebanese Civil War, the rape scene, separation from her mother. Through a close reading of Alameddine’s novel, the study does not only stress how fear of abandonment, fear of betrayal, and fear of low self- esteem intertwine to form a fear of intimacy in Sarah’s emotional relations, but it also highlights how the protagonist unconsciously avoids attachment as a defense mechanism employing Freud’s ideas.

DOI: 10.22161/ijels.51.27