Essay 2: The Werewolf and the Shadow Self
The winter of 1765 Gévaudan, Fance was the birthplace of the infamous werewolf. The werewolf was known as “the mysterious beast” that “attacked and killed dozens of people” most of them “virtually all of them women and children” (Monsters of the Gévaudan :The Making of the Beast). The beast brought many anxieties throughout the small village, and then the rest of Europe. The image of the werewolf was brought by the anxieties in the town, the dismemberment, and reflected their timeline. The victims were always dismembered in the neck, the jugular to be specific . Most of them were completely decapitated. This brought an image to the stories in the village and created the werewolf.
The werewolf became known for its sneaky and conniving ways. The modern werewolf represents the shadow self, which is one of the four jungian archetypes. The shadow self is our deepest repressed feelings, our animalistic instincts, and our utmost desires. Think of the shadow self as your doppelgänger in a way. If you know a little something about doppelgängers then you know that they are typically the evil side of you. The same with the werewolf, the werewolf arose from a curse, which curses are also known to derive from evil. Evil is often seen as unhinged and chaotic. The shadow self is also the unhinged, chaotic, and wild side of ourselves. I see the shadow self as what we used to be before we had laws and a moral compass. Today people have to have filters, better mannerisms, and basic control around our peers. However, everyone seems to have bad thoughts, known as intrusive thoughts, which to me is our shadow selves wanting to come out. When people lose our conformity, we are seen mysterious, dangerous, weird, chaotic, and just plain different.
Larry from the film The Wolfman, really played the role of the unhinged crazy man of the village, unlike someone to behave with his type of status. Larry showed his “hunting” like instincts even before he was cursed to be a werewolf. He shows this when he hunts his “prey”. That is a young woman he seemed to fancy. He proceeded to approach her, even when she displayed the utmost discomfort when he brought up her earring from up in her bedroom. He even went as far as to purchase something he didn’t care for and knew nothing about, but it was something of interest for the woman. Then once the shop closes he comes out from a dark walkway scaring the young woman he desired. He then talks her into going to see some gypsies and getting his fortune told. All of this was unlike him, and quite creepy. He was either just really nervous, or an all out stalker. Those that study wolves, dogs, or any type of predator knows it is very typical for the predator to stalk its prey before they strike.
The modern werewolf today is now more like a human. Say for example, Jacob from Twilight, he is depicted as very sweet, cautious, and his almost like sixth sense for danger when it involves Bella. His character has a lot of deep feelings like a human, he has the power to control when and where he can turn into a werewolf, and how protective he is with humans and his pack. Then there is the versions Harry Potter provides, with Lupin and Severus Black. Lupin is a true werewolf, he turns on a full moon as well as he can not control his animal behavior or who he decides to attack. He has no recollection of who he is going to attack or why, he just does it because his “shadow self” completely takes over. Then on the other hand we have Severus black who is an animus, which he can decide when, where, and his behavior of turning into a wolf. All of these characters are modern and the audience feels for them dearly. Unlike Larry the audience is just completely creeped out by him. Larry was the first werewolf to ever come to film, like I said before people saw him as creepy, the characters in the film hunted for him and wanted him out of the village, he was a straight up killer and his kind didn’t belong in the village. He was dangerous to all, especially young woman. I would say the same goes for psychopaths. They want the empathy and the control for their actions instead of acting out on impulse and their desires. If you watch any series of psychopaths they want control and when they do not have control their animalistic behaviors come to light. They go on kills sprees or binges. Just like psychopaths minds are unknown so are werewolves, both interesting creature with similar qualities to the shadow self.
In a way the werewolf really helps us out everything we fear of ourselves into a little package that helps us understand what our dark side is. Why we kill? Why we have intrusive thoughts? Why do we have these dark feelings? Why do we wish the worst on some people? Why do I feel this way? Should we feel this way? Is this way of thinking acceptable in society? This is just some of the anxieties people have themselves and with the creation of the werewolf we are able to make a beast that is like us, but animal side of us. If there is one thing I truly believe it’s that as humans we wish to not think of ourselves in such a way. We do not want to believe we are capable of being serial killer. We do not want to believe we are bad people, maybe the creation of having a higher power gave us hope that we can be selfless people instead of selfish people. Selfish like monsters, like the vampire, the zombie, and the werewolf. We created these creatures as a way to feel okay with our anxieties. The werewolf is just the one that is who we are before morals. Hearing stories from the 1700s goes to show how different society used to be and how ruthless we used to be. At some point we decided as a society to mask that, and what better way to do that than creating a fictional creature we fear and continue creating stories and monsters to this day.
Cherry, Kendra. “The 4 Major Jungian Archetypes.” Verywell Mind,www.verywellmind.com/what-are-jungs-4-major-archetypes-2795439.
Smith, Jay M. “Introduction.” Monsters of the Gévaudan: the Making of a Beast, Harvard Univ. Press, 2011, pp. 1–59.
