History FreudianExcuse / Literature

* ''Literature/PercyJacksonAndTheOlympians'' Luke Castellan, once we learn his backstory in the fifth book. His mother tried to host the Oracle when Luke was a baby and it went horribly wrong. She ended up driven insane, being [[TheOphelia not quite there at the best of times]], and at random moments she'd have visions of her son's fate. His father was [[DisappearedDad never there]]. He eventually ran away from home, and took up with Thalia and Annabeth. They had a horribly eventful trip to camp, during which Thalia was turned into a tree. He was later given a quest 'to keep him busy', and it resulted in him being permanently scarred. Yikes. No wonder he's given up on the world. Sadly, Hermes actually loves his son. He arranged the quest to let Luke be a real hero before his doom came down on him. It worked about as well as trying to beat fate ever does in Greek mythology.
* Gaston Leroux's ''Literature/ThePhantomOfTheOpera'' gives an excuse for Erik's cold bloodedness: [[spoiler: humanity hates him because of his deformity, so he hates humanity]]. The ''Phantom'' adaptation gives more of a {{backstory}} to this: [[spoiler: in addition to the deformity, his mother shows him no love and keeps him shut inside where he can't fully use his genius.]] Still a creepy guy for a protagonist.

-->See you later [[spoiler:Mrs. Hitler!]]

** [[InvisibleJerkass Bug]] had a abusive step father who beat him, and a sick, alcoholic mother. His brother also got high a lot on class A drugs and liked to torment and bully him. The reason he was sent to Coates was apparently for "his own safety".

* In ''Literature/WatershipDown'', General Woundwort's violent and un-rabbitlike behavior stem from his traumatic kittenhood, in which his father was shot, his siblings scattered, and his wounded mother killed and partially eaten by a weasel right in front of him. Adopted and nurtured by a kindly human, who nevertheless failed to keep his cat from menacing the young rabbit, Woundwort never learned to interact civilly with other rabbits, and his lapine psyche became warped, his natural flight-instincts supplanted by aggression.
** TruthInTelevision, as captive-reared wild animals tend to develop behavioral problems and socialize poorly with their own species.

* Urfin Jus in ''Literature/TalesOfTheMagicLand''. He didn't get along with others and isolated himself from society for years, becoming Gingema's petty and sadistic {{Dragon}} and, after her demise, a self-styled successor. After two unsuccessful attempts to conquer all of Magic Land he is sent into exile, cuts down on his arrogance and suddenly finds himself treated with consistent unconditional kindness -- at which point he realizes that this was what he wanted and needed all along. This finally pushes him into a HeelFaceTurn.

* ''[[Creator/TimDorsey Serge A. Storms]]'': ''Florida Roadkill'' indicates that Coleman's obsession with doing drugs over socializing and his complacency in following SerialKiller Serge around stems from an abusive childhood. His father stuck him in a cooler for several hours for interrupting his viewing of a football game, and [[KidsAreCruel his classmates mocked him for years afterward whenever they heard the story]].

* DiscussedTrope; St. Augustine's ''Literature/{{Confessions}}'' makes the claim that almost every evil is committed because the perpetrator was tragically fixated on a specific good without reference to any greater goods. Even the irrationally vile murderer [[Creator/{{Cicero}} Catiline]] had sympathetic reason to do his evil: to overthrow the city so that his poverty and low regard would not weigh his family down. In contrast to this killer, young Augustine had no such excuse for stealing pears, besides doing it ForTheEvulz.

* In ''Literature/TheManchurianCandidate'', Raymond's mother is a seething pool of Freudian motives. She had [[ParentalIncest an incestuous relationship with her father]] and [[OedipusComplex hated her mother as a sexual rival]], complaining that she could not understand how he could lie down with such an ugly woman (people said that as an adult she was nearly a twin for her mother). When her father died, her older brother claimed leadership of the family and she swore that she would follow him into any profession he chose to outdo him and crush him. He chose politics.

** Same with [[ScaryBlackMan Desmond McCain]], who was bullied for being black and criticized in the newspapers. [[FreudianExcuseIsNoExcuse Still doesn't justify]] [[spoiler: his evil charity and his love of killing]].

** [[DarkChick Diana Ladris's]] father was a alcoholic who cheated on her mother, who, upon finding out, threatened to divorce before being suspiciously paralysed from the neck down that very night. [[FridgeHorror (Who pushed her is left ambigious...)]] Diana's father was then imprisoned, leaving Diana with nowhere to go except [[AcademyOfEvil Coates academy]], which she described in ''PLAGUE'' as "horrible". Diana was also implied in the fourth book to be [[RapeAsDrama sexually abused as a child.]] So basically, her pre-FAYZ life was just one big [[TraumaCongaLine Trauma Conga Lina]].

* ''Literature/OneHundredYearsOfSolitude'': Arcadio being neglected and forgotten within the family leads to him going to extreme, violent lengths when he has a chance to have power over Macondo.

** Snape was revealed to have had an abusive father and poor home life in ''[[Literature/HarryPotterAndTheOrderOfThePhoenix Order of the Phoenix]]''. This in turn led to him gaining a mutual and deep hatred with James Potter, both having pushed one another's buttons. [[spoiler: he was also very unpopular kid growing up, with his only real friend being Lily Evans, Harry's mother (who he had a crush on). He also hung out with a group of kids who would grow up to be Death Eaters, and absorbed their racist views -- resulting in Lily breaking off their friendship when he called her a "mudblood". Lily later went on to marry James Potter, once Snape's chief bully. Harry, having inherited James's looks but Lily's eyes, constantly reminds Snape of how he lost her. To Snape's credit, Harry being Lily's son is also the reason he protects him despite his bullying of him. Furthermore, he never blamed James for Lily's death but blamed himself. This probably meant that even if Lily wasn't in the picture, Snape would still be TheResenter to James. And ''then'', with nowhere else to go, he ended up becoming a Death Eater and overhearing part of a prophecy about a kid who'd grow up to defeat the Dark Lord -- which Voldemort interpreted as referring to Lily's kid and deciding to kill her along with her family. Snape pleaded with him to spare her, but he ended up killing her when she wouldn't get out of his way and let him kill her 1-year-old baby.]]

* Snape from ''Literature/HarryPotter'' was revealed to have had an abusive father and poor home life in ''[[Literature/HarryPotterAndTheOrderOfThePhoenix Order of the Phoenix]]''. This in turn led to him gaining a mutual and deep hatred with James Potter, both having pushed one another's buttons.
** Oh, it's worse than that: [[spoiler: Snape was a very unpopular kid growing up, with his only real friend being Lily Evans, Harry's mother (who he had a crush on). He also hung out with a group of kids who would grow up to be Death Eaters, and absorbed their racist views -- resulting in Lily breaking off their friendship when he called her a "mudblood". Lily later went on to marry James Potter, once Snape's chief bully. Harry, having inherited James's looks but Lily's eyes, constantly reminds Snape of how he lost her. To Snape's credit, Harry being Lily's son is also the reason he protects him despite his bullying of him. Furthermore, he never blamed James for Lily's death but blamed himself. This probably meant that even if Lily wasn't in the picture, Snape would still be TheResenter to James. And ''then'', with nowhere else to go, he ended up becoming a Death Eater and overhearing part of a prophecy about a kid who'd grow up to defeat the Dark Lord -- which Voldemort interpreted as referring to Lily's kid and deciding to kill her along with her family. Snape pleaded with him to spare her, but he ended up killing her when she wouldn't get out of his way and let him kill her 1-year-old baby.]]

* ''Literature/EpithetErasedPrisonOfPlastic: Lorelai Blyndeff's immense immaturity, irresponsibility, and [[ItsAllAboutMe self-centeredness]], which edge into downright abusive territory and make her the BigBad of the story, are in fact an attempt at coping with the loss of her mother, who died in a house fire [[spoiler:which Lorelai believes she unintentionally started due to PowerIncontinence]].