A point that only occurred to me on reading my posted message on Mr Looney and Will Shakspere when it arrived in today�s Digest (1st April):
In �An Autobiographical Study� Freud wrote the passage on Hamlet that I reproduced in my last message as his first illustration of �the nature and value and of psycho-analysis� in fields beyond that for which it was originally developed (1925, SE 20, p. 63). You may recall that he had reported, with his usual casual modesty, that on the basis of psychoanalytic insights he had solved the three-hundred-year-old mystery of the underlying meaning of �Hamlet�. (Solution in a nutshell: For �Hamlet� read �Shakespeare�.) Then, dang me [to use an expression popularised in the UK by the comedian Tony Hancock], he finds that five years earlier someone going by the name of Looney had already shown (to Freud�s satisfaction, at any rate) that the play wasn�t written by Shakespeare, but by Edward de Vere, Earl of Essex! That should surely be in the Guinness Book of Records: Freud provided the solution to one of the great mysteries of English literature after 300 years of debate � only to find that some dang Englishman had undermined it five years *before* he proposed it! N.B. I see from the Oxford Concise English Dictionary that �dang�, euphemism for damn, is �chiefly N.Amer.� Well, dang me, I didn�t know that. Allen Esterson Former lecturer, Science Department Southwark College, London [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.human-nature.com/esterson/index.html http://www.butterfliesandwheels.com/articleprint.php?num=10 > Extract from �An Autobiographical Study� (Freud, 1925, SE 20, > pp. 63, 63-64, n.1.): > A number of suggestions came to me out of the Oedipus complex, the > ubiquity of which gradually dawned on me. The poet's choice, or his > invention, of such a terrible subject seemed puzzling; and so too did the > overwhelming effect of its dramatic treatment, and the general nature of > such tragedies of destiny. But all of this became intelligible when one > realized that a universal law of mental life had here been captured in all > its emotional significance. Fate and the oracle were no more than > materializations of an internal necessity; and the fact of the hero's > sinning without his knowledge and against his intentions was evidently a > right expression of the *unconscious* nature of his criminal tendencies. > From understanding this tragedy of destiny it was only a step further to > understanding a tragedy of character -- Hamlet, which had been admired for > three hundred years without its meaning being discovered or its author's > motives guessed. It could scarcely be a chance that this neurotic creation > of the poet should have come to grief, like his numberless fellows in the > real world, over the Oedipus complex. For Hamlet was faced with the task > of taking vengeance on another for the two deeds which are the subject of > the Oedipus desires; and before that task his arm was paralysed by his own > obscure sense of guilt. Shakespeare wrote Hamlet very soon after his > father's death. (1) > 1. (Footnote added 1935:) This is a construction which I should like > explicitly to withdraw. I no longer believe that William Shakespeare the > actor from Stratford was the author of the works which have so long been > attributed to him Since the publication of J. T. Looney's volume > *'Shakespeare' Identified* [1920], I am almost convinced that in fact > Edward de Vere, Earl of Oxford, is concealed behind this pseudonym. --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
