Arthur Schnitzler's novella Fräulein Else is an inner monologue of a nineteen-year-old bourgeois woman of fin-de-siècle Vienna. This literary form allows direct access to both latent and manifest content, that is, to Else's conscious, preconscious, and unconscious thoughts. Insight into her mental data exposes psychical conflict and uncovers sexual desire. For Else, this desire creates the affect shame due to her internalization of the social code of Vienna, which denies her sexual expression. Her psychical conflict reflects inefficacious attempts to maintain the social bond by adhering to the social code and avoiding the shameful exposure of her sexuality. Else's failure to uphold the social standards regarding female sexuality in fin-de-siècle Vienna finds representation in an act of exhibitionism, which creates irrevocable shame that ultimately ends in self-destruction. This paper utilizes an amalgamation of psychoanalysis and sociological frameworks to locate the causality of Else's shame in the relationship between sexuality and society.
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