Agency, desire, and power in Schnitzler's dream novel and Kubrick's adaptation eyes wide shut

Abstract

In his article "Agency, Desire, and Power in Schnitzler's Dream Novel and Kubrick's Adaptation Eyes Wide Shut" Ari Ofengenden explores Arthur Schnitzler's novella and Stanley Kubrick's adaptation to offer insights into the ways in which desire disrupts and clashes with social structures (i.e., family, relationships, and society in general). Ofengenden shows how the dynamic in which disruptive desire is ideologically narrativized back into acquiescence with the status quo. Ofengenden interprets the narrative of the film as unique intuitions into action and agency where sources of agency are opaque to the subject and arise by an impenetrable combination of desire and power.