Lecter series - unified analysis - part 46: Hannibal Lecter's Self, anima, and shadow

CATEGORY: MOVIES




















Ranunculus flammula Illustration in: Jakob Sturm: "Deutschlands Flora in Abbildungen", Stuttgart (1796) [Image from the Wikipedia 'Ranunculus flammula' page, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.]


In this post, we will determine which movie characters (from The Silence of the Lambs) represent Hannibal Lecter's Self, anima, and shadow.

In the previous post in this analysis, we observed that Jack Crawford's surname can be traced to crowfoot, another name for the Ranunculus genus of plants. One species of Ranunculus is Ranunculus flammula. The Latin word flammula means "little flame." Also, in part 44 we noted that Lecter's kundalini is depicted as eventually having risen to the level of his anahata (heart) chakra. Jung tells us that "In the center of anahata there is again Siva in the form of the linga, and the small flame means the first germlike appearance of the Self."[a] Individuation begins in anahata[b]. Based on the symbolism for the name Crawford, Jack Crawford represents the small flame in Lecter's anahata chakra, and therefore, he represents at least an early stage of Lecter's Self.

Moving on to the anima, Jung tells us that there are four phases in its development in the male. The first is Eve, named after the Genesis account of Adam and Eve. It deals with the emergence of a male's object of desire. In the analysis of The Silence of the Lambs, it was observed that Lecter begins to sexually covet Starling at their first meeting. We are not told of Hannibal having any prior history with women. Thus, Clarice represents the first phase of Lecter's anima. The second phase of a man's anima is called Helen, an allusion to Helen of Troy in Greek mythology. In this phase, women are viewed as capable of worldly success and of being self-reliant, intelligent and insightful, even if not altogether virtuous. Clarice represents this phase's figure for Lecter also, since he recognizes that she has achieved a measure of worldly success, in that he realizes she is on her way to becoming an FBI agent.

The third phase of anima development is Mary, named after the Christian theological understanding of the Virgin Mary (Jesus' mother). At this level, females can now seem to possess virtue by the perceiving male (even if in an esoteric and dogmatic way), insomuch as certain activities deemed consciously unvirtuous cannot be applied to her. Since Starling represents the Virgin Mary (as indicated by Lecter's drawing at left - Mary holding her child, the Lamb, i.e., Jesus), she represents the third phase of Lecter's anima. The fourth and final phase of anima development is Sophia, named after the Greek word for wisdom. Complete integration has now occurred, which allows females to be seen and related to as particular individuals who possess both positive and negative qualities. The most important aspect of this final level is that, as the personification "Wisdom" suggests, the anima is now developed enough that no single object can fully and permanently contain the images to which it is related.[c] The fourth phase of Lecter's anima is represented, in The Silence of the Lambs, by Senator Martin, Catherine Martin's mother. Senator Martin is well into middle age, and she is a public official; taken together, these imply that she has attained a certain degree of wisdom, and Hannibal recognizes this.


a. C.G. Jung. The Psychology of Kundalini Yoga. Princeton University Press, 1996. Google Books, p. 95. URL = https://books.google.com.
b. The Psychology of Kundalini Yoga. Google Books, p. 95. URL = https://books.google.com.
c. Wikipedia, 'Anima and animus'. Web, n.d. URL = https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anima_and_animus.