Human beings live so that they could ready themselves for death. We are born as somewhat pure beings that grow by dealing with our imperfections and other potential mishaps we happen to meet along the way. We have seen the Freudian idea of beings dealing with their imperfect qualities before in previous readings, where a baby grows up with subconscious erotic thoughts of their mother. This pleasure-seeking part of the baby, called the id, is eventually diminished through the core representation of the baby’s father, called the superego. Our ego is made to help deal with these subconscious feelings we have that occur when we attempt to avoid any pain. This is the first struggle of the human being.

Peter Brooks’ “Freud’s Masterplot” delves into these beliefs by saying that the way people deal with pain is through revisiting their unpleasant experiences through narrative. The Freudian idea that “the aim of all life is death” is what Brooks connects to the narrative structure. Narrative structure consists of a beginning, middle, and end. For the most of the beginning and middle, the plot readies the reader for the end. The supposed traumas we face are akin to the events within the plot that ready readers for its end. For most, it can be said that the trauma of coming to terms with death is the largest there is. It is up to the people themselves if they want to ignore or deal with it head on. Brooks writes that, “All narration is obituary in that life acquires definable meaning only at, and through, death” (284).

Brooks links the connection between narrative structure to Freud’s own “Beyond the Pleasure Principle”. The pleasure principle is the previously aforementioned concept that, through the id, humans innately strive for pleasure and avoid pain. Avoiding pain creates trauma, that the ego subconsciously presents back to the person through their dreams. It is up to the superego to abstain from pleasure, so that they could face their painful trauma head on. This cycle of struggle continues with any supposed offspring. Brooks claims that this loop is Freud’s masterplot, where “life proceeds from beginning to end, and how each individual life in its own way repeats the masterplot.” (285).