Volume VI Special Issue I January 2026

Name of Author : Kodukula Venkata Lakshmi Prudhvila

Title of the paper : The unconscious architect- The defence mechanisms in psychological fiction of Indian Women writers

Abstract: Women protagonists in Indian fiction are characterised by a psychological complexity that allows the application of Sigmund Freuds defence mechanism theory. In this paper we intend to study how Indian women writers utilize the genre of psychological fiction to uncover the unconscious conflicts, repressions and coping mechanisms of their women characters. The paper analyses the use of defence mechanisms of women writers like Anita Desai, Shashi Deshpande, Meena Kandasamy, Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni and Kamala Das in their narratives by placing literature as an artistic creation as well a psychological healing site. Denial, projection, displacement, sublimation, and fantasy are some mechanisms that the paper attempts to understand in the context of Indian English women writing. The depiction of women negotiating identity, autonomy, and patriarchal subjugation through unconscious psychological defences, which are at once shields and signifiers of defiance, is something that these authors essentially present. This study extends a framework to classify the employment of these mechanisms as pathological, immature, neurotic and mature defences. Literature displays internalisation of struggles in the life of women and the changing consciousness of Indian women. A psychoanalytical reading reveals fiction as a medium for articulating suppressed trauma, emotional turmoil and gendered realities. Indian women writers emerge as the unconscious architects of psychological resilience and resistance.

Keywords : defence mechanisms, psychological fiction, unconscious architect

DOI :

Page Number : 202-207