Phloi from mirror image to death by madness: A Lacanian reading of Kukrit Pramoj ’s “Four Reigns”

Abstract

The Four Reigns is a renowned novel in modern Thai literature and is widely known in the history of world literature. The novel is rich and profound, and is often studied as a sociological or historical text. However, the psychological study of the characters is rarely addressed. The novel follows the life of the protagonist, Phloi, and is driven by her experiences and psychological metamorphosis. This research, from a psychoanalytic perspective, reveals that the novel conforms to Lacan’s Theory of the three orders: the imaginary order, the symbolic order, and the real order. As such, this paper uses the Theory of the Three Orders as a basis to analyse Phloi’s life journey, and explain the different stages of her personality development and the creation of tragedy from a psychoanalytical perspective. This paper offers a fresh perspective and new insights for the study of The Four Reigns.