FROM CASES OF HYSTERIA TO THE THERAPEUTIC SOCIETY
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these opposite realms were being confused; then and now, psychoanalysis
attracted its acolytes and its enemies; and then and now, it attempted to
respond to overwhelming and pressing dangers-wars, economic depres–
sions, and mental illness. But there the similarities stop: psychoanalysis
itself has changed our culture; and the individuals trying to answer Freud's
questions, whether following or opposing psychoanalysis, now live at a
faster pace, and with greater expectations. Moreover, since then popula–
tions have multiplied exponentially, technology has changed our daily lives,
and, at least in the West, the rights of individuals have expanded. The uni–
versal predicaments of humanity, however, have not been, and probably
never will be, resolved, although psychoanalytic therapy has taught many
people to better deal wi th their personal problems.
By 1896, Freud had not yet given birth to psychoanalysis. That would
wait until 1900, with the publication of
The Interpretation ofDreams.
But he
had treated, among others, Caecilie M., Frau Emmy von N., Elisabeth von
R., and Lucy R., by talking to them, and trying to uncover their early trau–
matic experiences for cl ues to their odd symptoms. He already had
published over sixty articles in medical journals, and his joint publication
with Breuer, their "Studies in Hysteria," was being reviewed and praised
in Germany, Hungary and England: Bleuler had minor reservations;
Havelock Ellis was enthusiastic; and the writer Alfred Berger compared
their cathartic cures to Orestes's cure in Goethe's
Iphigenia in Tauris.
In the
spring and summer of 1896, Freud's father was dying. Most of Freud's
biographers agree that he subsequently suffered from depression, from
what Ellenberger refers to as his "creative illness." But whatever the cause,
on September 21, 1897 he wrote to his friend, Wilhelm Fliess that his
seduction theory had collapsed-as a general theory of the origin of neu–
rosis. Fliess had applauded this explanation for the somatization of trauma
but, upon reflection and closer observations, Freud concluded that not
every female child could have been seduced by her father, but might have
had such fantasies just the same. He continued to speculate, however, about
exactly how psyche and soma are bound together. It is generally agreed
among psychoanalysts and historians that this insight was part of Freud's
"self-analysis"-although he himself stated that "true self-analysis is
impossible, otherwise there would be no [neurotic] illness" (November 14,
1897). Nevertheless, he had written to Fliess in August of that year, that
his self-analysis was necessary, though more difficult than any other. Here,
of course, I am not pursuing these theoretical issues, or the arguments they
have engendered over our entire century, except to briefly outline the cul–
tural components and circumstances that are likely to have been an
influence on Freud, as well as on subsequent developments in psychology.
In 1897, Arthur Schnitzler, the prolific and celebrated Viennese
writer, published
Der R eigen (The Merry-Co-Round).
In this dramatic work,
