Freud: Darkness in the midst of vision: Book review.

Abstract

How does experience turn into explanation? How does the private life of the theorist become realized in his or her theory? A specific moment of disorder and early sorrow, viewed from the inside, may so sensitize the theorist to certain aspects of the human condition that he or she sees connections that the rest of us never discover. From these insights may come a plausible and useful theory. But the same private event may also bring with it a feeling of inevitability that becomes translated into theoretical rigidity and an intolerance for disagreement, discussion, or accommodation. Because it happened to me, goes the argument, it must happen to everyone, and I am the authority.Louis Breger's new biography, Freud: Darkness in the Midst of Vision, brings us the clearest picture to date of these two sides of Freud's history. We see, in perhaps more detail than ever before, the bleak nature of his early childhood; can begin to sense how exposed he was to loss, to separation, and to unrelieved misery; and begin to understand how these early impressions may have sensitized him to certain developmental traumas that few others were aware of, making for a significantly different theory of the mind. But Breger also makes clear Freud's ruthless need to be right, to stifle argument and dissension and claim discovery of universal laws when, at best, he was only catching sight of a possible hypothesis. Opposing views were dismissed by polemic and ad hominem accusation, and Breger's chapters on Adler and Jung give us a sobering picture of the

Anna O and Hanna Q

“…Traumatology did not yet exist when Breuer, presented with Anna O, chose to take seriously a complex individual with a condition (‘hysteria’), the naming of which even had strong pejorative overtones. It should be borne in mind that Breuer's contemporary, the great Charcot, around this time had been treating hysteria by having his patients ingest iron before hanging them from the ceiling in iron harnesses 11 .…”

“…When one has a traumatized individual who simultaneously has had the benefit of an otherwise comfortable middle‐class upbringing and social stability, who is intelligent, psychologically minded, creative and practised in the use of imagery, who has photographic memory, and who is motivated to grasp at therapeutic opportunity, then it does not surprise me at all that the natural outcome includes presentations such as that of Anna O and Hanna Q. (Interestingly, Freud and his psychoanalytic colleague Sandor Rado, also had photographic memory 11 . )…”

“…Jones, both a publicizer and censor for the psychoanalytic movement, was described by Roazen as ‘a fiery little man, with a staccato, military manner’, and who ‘at his worst, could be spiteful, jealous, and querulous… He did not make friends easily and was much hated’ (p. 345) 17 . Breger recounts how James and Alix Strachey, who were colleagues and ostensible friends of Jones's for many years, referred to him in their private letters as ‘the l.b.’ for ‘little beast’ 11 .…”

A Historical Perspective of Local Anesthesia

“…But our “simple little tale” really begins in the physiology laboratory of Sigmund Freud, who became interested in cocaine after reading enthusiastic reports from the United States about its use as a cure for morphine addiction. He obtained samples of the drug, began taking it, and found that it removed his depression, made him feel cheerful while at the same time filled him with energy for work and exercise 7 . Freud prescribed his new wonder drug for his great friend, the brilliant young physiologist Ernst Fleischl von‐Marxow who, having suffered an infected thumb during an autopsy, had to have it amputated.…”

Teaching ‘origins of depth psychology’: overview and candidate‐members' experience

“…The readings for the seminar included Ellenberger's Discovery of the Unconscious (1970); Freud: Darkness in the Midst of Vision by Breger (2000); Jung and the Making of Modern Psychology by Shamdasani (2003); and Kirsch's The Jungians (2000). Acquaintance with Memories, Dreams, Reflections (Jung 1963) and one major biography of Jung was required.…”