On 16 October Cindy M. wrote: <<Whether you're an analyst or not you have to admit that Freud was careful, and tried to tell everyone else to be careful - not to ever have an opinion about what they wanted to hear. Also, the analyst was only part of the interpretation process. The interpretation of the unconscious was supposed to be done by the analysand - with the assistance of the analyst, perhaps, but never BY the analyst.>>
Really? Since Little Hans has been mentioned, how about this from Freud�s case history. Undeterred by the fact that he had twice asked Hans direct questions to try to get the little boy to admit resemblances between the falling horse that had frightened him and his father, and been told �no� each time, Freud writes: �Finally I asked if by the black around the mouth [of the horse] he meant a moustache; and I then DISCLOSED TO HIM that he was afraid of his father, precisely because he was so fond of his mother� (my emphasis). In other words, the boy didn�t know that he was afraid of his father, so Freud had to tell him what he actually felt deep down. In this paper Freud tells us that �during the analysis Hans had to be told many things that he could not say himself, [and] had to be presented with thoughts which he had so far shown no signs of possessing.� This is in line with what Freud told physicians in a lecture �On Psychotherapy�, in which he said that the psychoanalytic procedure involved �persuading [the patient] to accept, by virtue of a better understanding, something that up to now, in consequence of this regulation by unpleasure [i.e., resistance], he has rejected.� << The interpretation of the unconscious was supposed to be done by the analysand - with the assistance of the analyst, perhaps, but never BY the analyst.>> So it was the Wolf Man who decided that his childhood dream of waking up and seeing a number of wolves in a tree actually represented a memory from infancy of seeing his parents engaging in coitus? I don�t think so. Cindy also wrote: <<On a more serious note, sexual sensation in babies can be observed in less rarified settings too. I've changed enough diapers as a babysitter and childcare provider to have any strange ideas that babies can't feel sexual pleasure. If you've ever put diaper rash ointment on a baby and seen him or her get the giggles from it you know exactly what I mean. I use this example all the time when people point to his - really, very clinical description - of child sexual pleasure and say that this is a sign that Freud was mentally ill, bizarre, sick, maybe even a pedophile. . .>> Of course it is nonsense to suggest that Freud was mentally ill, let alone a pedophile (that�s a new one on me). That infants experience strong feelings of sensual pleasure when their genital regions are touched was a commonplace, and the subject of childhood sexuality had been considered in detail by the eminent sexologist Albert Moll before Freud wrote about it. But there is a big jump from the kinds of sensations that Cindy writes about to Freud�s claiming that infant males �concentrate their sexual wishes upon their mother� so that their �first [libidinal] object choice is an incestuous one�, and that in infancy the male Oedipal �impulsion extends uninhibited into a straightforward sexual desire [for his mother]�. But have pity on the poor Wolf Man, who was unfortunate enough to have developed a negative Oedipus complex in early childhood, resulting in his having �a wish to be copulated with by his father�. No wonder he got depressed. Allen Esterson Former lecturer, Science Department Southwark College, London www.human-nature.com/esterson/index.html --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
