Different interpreters of alienation have given different definitions. According to Arnold Kaufman quoted in, Richard Schacht’s On Alienation (1970): To claim that a person is alienated, is to claim that his relations to something else has certain features which result in avoidable discontent or loss of satisfaction. In this regard Feur Lewis a psychoanalysis in, What is Alienation? In Richard Schacht’s Alienation (1970) says: …. The word alienation is used to convey the emotional tone which accompanies any behavior in which the person is compelled to act self destructively. (www.eajournals.org) …show more content…
In the definition of these thinkers there is an indication of an existing tension and disintegrating human relationships. Sidney Finkelstein in his work Existentialism and Alienation in American Literature (1965) defines alienation as: a psychological phenomenon, an internal conflict, a hostility felt towards something seemingly outside oneself which is linked to oneself, a barrier erected which is actually no defense but an impoverishment of oneself.