1916
286A
Allenstein1
12 January 1916
Dear Professor,
Your letter of the 8th2 has just arrived. I shall answer it in detail soon, but for the moment will only tell you that the promised work is ready. A copy is in Berlin, my wife is typing the copy and will then send you the finished opus. I had already told Rank about this; as I now hear from you, he is no longer in Vienna, so I am repeating the news directly. I am very glad that you have such good news of your sons.3
In haste, with kind regards,
Yours,
Karl Abraham
1. Military postcard [Feldpostkarte].
2. Missing.
3. On 1 January 1916, Ernst had become Fähnrich [cadet] and Martin lieutenant (Freud's calendar entry, LOC).
287A
Allenstein
23 January 1916
Dear Professor,
Due to my wife's rather lengthy indisposition—she had a painful inflammation of the mucous membrane of the mouth—the manuscript is not yet finished, but I hope it will be ready this week. In a few days, too, I am going to take up my new psychiatric post. I have recently had many interesting experiences, especially on traumatic neuroses. In February I shall be speaking here on hysteria in an “Evening on Medicine in Wartime”.
It does not surprise me that activity in the Association in Vienna is falling off. On the contrary, I am astonished that it has remained quite high for so long.—I think it is very right of you to have rejected a few scientific contributions from Switzerland. I have long regretted the fact that Pfister, for example—who is probably the person in question—was still one of our collaborators. He wavers here and there, and his changes in position are entirely dependent on his personal attitude to you and Jung. His letter, which you quoted in the “History of the Psychoanalytic Movement”1 was indeed factually correct, but it was written in a period of personal resistance against J., and with his changed attitude all his fine discernment has vanished again.
I am glad to hear such good news about your sons. My brother-in-law, who has been in Russia since December, has also advanced pleasingly. How is your Hamburg son-in-law in the West? It is a pity that he cannot do X-ray photography, or he would now be of capital use everywhere. Is your Viennese son-in-law still there?
As soon as I am settled in my new post, I hope to find time for a small work for Imago.
Cordial greetings to all of you, at home and at the front!
Yours,
Karl Abraham
Would you kindly forward the enclosed?2 I have not got Reik's address here! Many thanks in advance!
1. No letter of Pfister's is quoted therein (but cf. letters 228F, 15 July 1914; 230A, 17 July 1914).
2. Missing.
288A
Allenstein
13 February 1916
Dear Professor,
I hope you have fully recovered from influenza, and also that you have satisfying news from all your family!
I am naturally very pleased that my paper meets with your approval.1 Incidentally, I personally felt, on the last reading, that the work was good. This is undoubtedly due in part to the slow way in which it matured. In the course of writing it piecemeal over the last seven or eight months, the whole train of thought could be worked through in my mind. In a few days, when I am rid of my official talk on hysteria, my wife will visit me for a week or so. After that, I may put pen to paper again, probably first of all something for Imago.
I recently received the issue of Imago with Reik's excellent paper on “Puberty Rites”,2 and then the Zeitschrift with your Unconscious,3 the first half of which I have already read. I would rather wait until I have read the whole work before making any comment. Incidentally, Heller sent one copy to Berlin and one to Allenstein; I conclude from this symptomatic action that he would like to publish twice the editions he does.
You are quite right, dear Herr Professor, in remarking that I could have given more consideration in my paper to hysterical anorexia. I can explain why I only mentioned this condition in passing and did not investigate it in detail by the fact that I have not yet thoroughly analysed such a case. But there must be a deeper personal reason, just as you consider your passion for smoking to be a hindrance in your investigation of certain problems. I know from experience that my reaction to unpleasant events regularly makes itself felt by a loss of appetite. Therefore, inadvertently, I have avoided analysis of this symptom. However, I believe I have analysed it quite fully in myself and therefore could have taken myself as an example! Instead of this, I paid tribute to repression while working on the paper. Perhaps it will be possible to make a small addition to the text before the final printing.4
With cordial greetings to you and all your family, near and far,
Yours,
Karl Abraham
Reserve Hospital II Bahnhofstrasse
1. Another letter of Freud's is missing.
2. The first part of Reik, 1915b.
3. Freud, 1915e.
4. Cf. the concluding sections VII and VIII of Abraham's paper (probably added later) and letter 273A, 31 March 1915.
289A
Allenstein
1 April 1916
Dear Professor,
During the last few weeks I have spent my somewhat limited leisure time studying your new paper on the Unconscious. I am not quite sure how many times I have read it. I had the same experience as with the Three Essays ten years ago. Once again I am amazed how you have succeeded in saying everything of importance so concisely and systematically and linked it all up to form a complete structure. As with the earlier work, every subsequent reading uncovered for me something new that I had not yet assimilated in previous readings. It is probably the most fundamental and important of your papers for a long time; it provides a final and firm foundation for our whole science, leaving none of the familiar concepts unexamined and developing new concepts so naturally from the old ones that one has occasionally to remind oneself how different they had been before. My only regret is that this exceptionally important paper should appear in wartime, when it cannot attract the attention it deserves. But I take it that the whole series will appear in book form as soon as the war is over?
I hope in the next few weeks to be quite productive myself. Incidentally, on my ward here I am able to make many interesting observations, which I should like to use later on; they concern in particular the neuroses following explosions, etc.
I hope all of you, including those at the front, are as well as is possible in these times. I have already spent more than a year here. In May I intend to bring my wife and children here. There is a chance that I shall take a furnished flat. Since there are lovely woods in the neighbourhood, Allenstein is to be the place for this year's summer holiday. My wife was really down for a while with ulcerous stomatitis and ulcerations on her fingers. It looked as though she had caught foot-and-mouth disease, but it turned out to be a pneumococcal infection. She is now quite well again.1
I am enclosing a newspaper cutting2 that has some interesting bits.
With cordial greetings,
Yours,
Karl Abraham
1. Interestingly, Abraham had asked Wilhelm Fliess to treat his wife (Abraham to Fliess, 2 March 1916; Abraham, 1991: pp. 249–251).
2. Missing.
290A
Allenstein
15 April 1916
Dear Professor,
Yesterday I received your letter of the 10th,1 for which I thank you very much. I am answering soon. Today I am only sending you a very small contribution2 for our journals. I leave it to you which one you put it in.
In haste, with cordial greetings,
Yours,
Karl Abraham
1. Missing.
2. Probably Abraham, 1917[53].
291A
Allenstein, Kreuzstrasse 2 pt.
1 May 1916
Dear Professor,
I have just moved into “our” flat and am expecting my wife and children in a fortnight's time. It is a five-room, furnished flat on the ground floor of a fairly old house entirely in midst of nature, a reasonable substitute for a summer holiday. My first task is to write to you so that these lines will reach you in time. In accordance with your wish, your birthday1 shall be celebrated very quietly. Surely, however, I may participate in this celebration—in the absolute silence imposed by distance—by sending my most sincere good wishes to you and all your family. Nevertheless I wanted to give you at least a small sign of my affection and gratitude. Since the Festschrift that was originally planned has not materialized, I have taken the liberty of preparing a small issue all on my own. I am sending the manuscript2 by registered post at the same time as this letter. The work was in preparation for a long time, which is all to the good, but was put to paper hastily, within a few days, and then only in the rare hours of leisure. I hope it will contribute to keeping our journals going. (I expect it to cover at least 20 printed pages.) It does in fact contain some new ideas, for instance on narcissism.
When I think, dear Herr Professor, of the abundance of original ideas contained in every one of your new publications, I see all the more clearly the difference between our achievements, that is to say the achievements of your five closest followers,3 as compared with your own. The five of us, however, seem to be able to accept this fact well enough and to be quite immune from the Jungian type of reaction. The undeniable fact that you have passed your 60th year appears completely irrelevant to me in the light of the continuous and upward progress your papers have shown over the last few years. It is something conventional, rather like putting the clocks forward one hour, as we did last night. May you retain for many years the brightness and creative enthusiasm that are the envy of many a younger man!
My wife asks me to convey to you her sincere good wishes. I send greetings, also in her name, to you and yours, and remain, as always,
Your faithful and devoted
Karl Abraham
1. Freud's 60th birthday on 6 May.
2. Definitely Abraham, 1917[54], not the (1916[52]) paper on the oral phase and depression sent shortly before, as is sometimes stated in the literature (e.g. in Abraham, 1969: p. 84). Consequently, Freud's remarks in the following letter refer to the former, not to the latter.
3. The members of the Secret Committee (cf. Grosskurth, 1991; Wittenberger, 1995): Abraham, Ferenczi, Jones, Rank, and Sachs.
292F
Vienna IX, Berggasse 19
8 May 1916
Dear Friend,
I have just got round to answering your letter last of all, though it was the first to arrive. Because of announcements in the Berlin papers the day could not be kept as secret as I should have wished, and it was just those in the middle distance, who knew nothing about my wishes, who did the most and thus gave me a great deal of work. I have also received so many flowers from Vienna that I have lost all claim to further funeral wreaths, and Hitschmann slipped me an “undelivered speech” that was so moving and laudatory that when the time comes I shall be entitled to ask to be buried without a funeral oration.
The paper with which you presented me is as excellent as—everything that you have been doing in recent years, distinguished by its many-sidedness, depth, correctness, and, incidentally, it is in full agreement with the truth as it is known to me. It is so crystal clear that it seems to cry out for a graphic representation of the intersecting and merging mental forces. It shall not, however, remain mine in the sense of being kept from others. Shall we keep it in reserve for a while in case our Jahrbuch is resurrected? Otherwise we shall print it into the Zeitschrift.
I have little news to tell you. I have probably already written to you that my second son's marriage will be formally dissolved in a few weeks.1 It is no misfortune, although he is taking it rather hard, but quite the contrary, besides it is quite a respectable simple business. The girl, who had beforehand thought that she could cope with all possible difficulties, is a runaway, and took flight from the task of combining her medical studies with his engineer's life. We only hear from the other two with a fortnight's delay. My son-in-law is still convalescing in Hamburg; he has had a bit of a traumatic neurosis. I do not know whether it will be taken into account. My daughter and grandchild are naturally staying there.
We are all tremendously pleased that you have your wife and children with you again. Give them my cordial greetings and accept my taciturn thanks for all you have said to me.
Your faithfully devoted
Freud
1. See letter 285A, 28 December 1915, n. 1.
293A
Allenstein
19 June 1916
Dear Professor,
Your last letter has lain unanswered for a month. In the meantime my family has settled here completely. In the little town, in the garden house near the forest, we feel as though we were on a summer holiday; we shall not be able to have one in the true sense this year. After a separation of 1¼ years we are happy to be together again. We have removed our little girl completely from school for the summer and are having her privately taught here for a while. The boy, who is developing splendidly, is still a source of psychological education for me. The various tasks of moving here in these hard times, and, besides, the hospital work, which is still strenuous, have stopped me from writing for a long time.
I must thank you for your kind words about my last article. I do not mind at all where it is published. First of all the work I sent first will probably appear in the Zeitschrift. We cannot for the moment think of a new volume of the Jahrbuch. Even if the times were more favourable to our work, we should probably be scarcely able to get the necessary contributions together. So it would probably be best to print the second article in the Zeitschrift, as soon as it is short of other material. I am very glad to have won your approval for the new work, too. I am sorry there is now no opportunity to discuss these subjects. Are the sessions of the Vienna Association actually still taking place?
I am eager to hear more about how all your family is getting on, at home and in the field. I hope your next letter will bring good news. Are you making plans for the summer? And what are they? Karlsbad first of all? Are you coming to Germany at any time? And then will there be a chance to meet? I shall probably be coming in September to the Neurologists' Congress in Munich, that is to say in an official capacity. Then it might be possible to meet in Salzburg or in some other place.
From a scientific point of view I have hardly anything new to report. So I add, on behalf of my wife also, only the most cordial greetings to all of you!
As always,
Yours devotedly,
Abraham
294A
Allenstein
16 July 1916
Dear Professor,
The first issue of your Lectures,1 together with your greetings, arrived the day before yesterday. I have already read the three of them to my wife, and we both sincerely thank you for some stimulating hours. This paper is of particular interest to me in view of the future. Since I have held an official psychiatric post here, I hope it will be easier for me to achieve the Habilitation later in peacetime, and through the reading I am learning a bit how it is done. Unfortunately I am without any other news but hope that you are all well! Did you get my last letter which must have been written some four weeks ago?
After delivering two manuscripts in the last few months, there is now a little pause in my productivity. But I am using it in a way that it will probably become the germinal phase for a new paper; in my free hours I am once again studying Totem and Taboo and The Interpretation of Dreams, always with renewed enjoyment. My medical work offers much of interest, but little that is relevant to our particular purpose. However, I am at present occupied with a court case that is psychologically most remarkable and may be worth writing up one day.2
My wife was in Berlin for a week. We have given up our flat and put the furniture into store with the forwarding agency. As I shall probably stay on in Allenstein, my family will stay here for the winter; we can scarcely hope for an early end to the war.
How are all your plans for the holidays, dear Herr Professor? I shall probably take a few weeks' leave at the end of August. Would it be possible to meet?
When you write to me again, please mention what has happened to our friends. I hear nothing at all any more from Reik, Rank, Eitingon, etc. Have you heard anything from Jones?
With cordial greetings to you and your family at home and at the front, also from my wife,
Yours,
Karl Abraham
1. On 23 October 1915, Freud had begun his famous Introductory Lectures on Psycho-Analysis at the University, delivered in two successive winter semesters [1915–16, 1916–17], and published by Hugo Heller in three instalments (Freud, 1916–17a). Part I, “Parapraxes”, had just appeared.
2. Perhaps Abraham, 1923[95].
295F
Salzburg, Hotel Bristol
22 July 1916
Dear Friend,
The address will tell you everything. After a short stay in Gastein, where we wanted to stay, we were repelled, and the four of us, my wife and I and my sister-in-law and daughter, came for a longer stay here,1 where we are at any rate uninhibited and free from food worries. It is very difficult to find accommodation in the country this year. There are a great many things that are missing, naturally, forest for instance, but who can now get all he wants? You will remember the hotel and the rooms; it is a kind of regression; this was where our first, so hopeful, Congress took place in the year 1908.
I received your letter of four weeks ago. Delayed replies call for no apology nowadays. If you are able to cross the border in August, we shall certainly not miss the chance of seeing each other again.
I am at present without news of either of my two sons; I have not heard from Martin, who is fighting the Russians somewhere, since the 11th; but from Ernst, who is still in the conquered Italian territory, I have not heard since 2 July. Perhaps our move has something to do with it, too. My son-in-law, with his wife and child, is now in the immediate neighbourhood of Marcinowski,2 who has been very kind to them.
Perhaps I shall manage to finish one or two things here. The Dutch translation of Everyday Life by Stärcke3 was forwarded to me yesterday.
Reik has just sent me a card from Trieste; he is with the medical service. We saw Rank in Vienna recently; he was happier than formerly because of certain private improvements, otherwise, naturally, unchanged. Sachs is on leave somewhere until the end of July with his beloved; about Eitingon I know only that he is in Miskolcz (Hungary). Lou still writes the most delightful, sympathetic letters. Jones has managed to get in touch again through Emden.4 Things are different with him, he has eleven analytic sessions daily, and has now bought himself a small car and a cottage just over 50 miles from London.5 He too is phantasizing about a meeting. I have at last heard again from Brill, who is engaged in several translations, is squabbling with the Jungians, and hopes that we shall win. Putnam has published an excellent repudiation of Adler in the latest issue of the Ψα Review.6 Thus interest in our science is not dying out in America.
I am delighted that you are at least constantly united with your family, and also tell myself that you are sure to build everything up again.
With cordial greetings to you and your whole house,
Your faithfully devoted
Freud
1. Freud had gone to the city of Salzburg on 16 July, from where he went for one day to Gastein (in the district of Salzburg) on 18 July; on 20 August he went to Gastein again, then once more to Salzburg on 12 September, and on 15 September returned to Vienna (Freud's calendar entries, LOC).
2. See letter 71F, 23 May 1909, n. 4.
3. Translation of Freud, 1901b, by August Stärcke (Amsterdam, 1916).
4. Letter of 30 May 1916 (Freud & Jones, 1993: pp. 318–319).
5. The Plat, Elsted, Surrey, south of London.
6. Putnam, 1916; cf. Ferenczi's review in the Zeitschrift, 1917[204].
296A
Allenstein
31 July 1916
Dear Professor,
I was glad to hear again from you at last. As you mention only one of my letters, a second has perhaps not arrived.
So it is in Salzburg that four of you are spending the holidays. It goes without saying that I should like to visit you there, though it is not so easy to do. But I have worked it out like this. On 22/23 September the Neurologists' Congress takes place in Munich, the main paper being neuroses after war wounds. I think it is probable that I shall be officially sent to the Congress. We could then meet before or after it. But it is very questionable whether I can cross the border to come to Salzburg. As far as I can see I will not be able to do that while I am on army leave. But there is nothing to stop me from coming to Berchtesgaden, which is so near S[alzburg]. There we could arrange a meeting! How would you feel about that? I should be very happy to see your family too. My wife is hardly likely to accompany me, partly because of the cost, partly because she would not like to go so far from the children (it is more than 24 hours by train). We no longer have a domicile in Berlin; my wife was there recently, cleared the flat, and put our things into store.
I very much hope that in the meantime you have had news—and good news—of your two sons in the field.
I was very interested in what you told me about all the acquaintances. Incidentally, I had a card from Reik this very day.
I have read to the end with pleasure the Lectures, for which I thanked you in my last letter!
With cordial greetings to all of you from my wife and me.
Yours,
Karl Abraham
297F
Salzburg, Hotel Bristol
10 August 1916
Dear Friend,
This time my pleasure in your letter was spoilt by the vexatious news in it. I was counting on your being able to cross the border during your leave, because the latest regulations have made that absolutely impossible for me. This year I even have to give up seeing my daughter and grandson. Here I am in Salzburg without being able to go even once to Berchtesgaden, nor shall I be able to do so in September. So of what use to me is your trip to Munich? Rank writes today that he may attend the Congress as a reporter.
Our intentions are still not definite. Perhaps we shall after all go to Gastein from 20 August to 10 September and then probably back to Vienna. So do revise your plans once more, taking into account the fact that you, belonging as you do to the army in some way or other, are more mobile than I.
We have been having some enjoyable family days here. My brother and my daughter were here for a short while, both with their other halves, as well as both my sons from the field, both proud lieutenants.1 Ernst is still with us, as lively as ever. Martin we found tired this time. He went through a great deal during the Russian offensive.
Salzburg is still wonderful. This stay has been blessed with unusually fine weather. Also I am writing in my free time; five lectures, thus roughly one third, are finished. The first issue of the Zeitschrift is said at last to be on the way from Teschen!2 Sachs will hasten the second.
Otherwise—well, otherwise one tries to put oneself in a state of peace of mind, which, however, one does not have. Dreadful things are happening in the world. There is no prospect of a nice, peaceful end, and there are all sorts of dark threats to the necessary victory. C. C.! I hope you still remember (Coraggio, Casimiro!).
With cordial greetings to you and to your dear wife and in expectation of your news,
Yours,
Freud
1. Freud's brother Alexander and his wife Sophie [1878–1970], Mathilde and Robert Hollitscher, and Ernst and Martin. Ernst had become lieutenant on 1 August, Martin on 1 January.
2. The location of Prochaska, the printing-office, in the Carpathians.
298A
Allenstein, Kreuzstrasse 2
18 August 1916
Dear Professor,
It is difficult to make plans this year! I must first of all wait and see whether I am sent to the Congress. The decision on that is not made here, but in Berlin; I shall therefore know about it in some weeks at the earliest. There is also another difficulty: my hospital ward, the only one for psychiatry and neuroses in the district of the Corps, has had to be extended. I have now had for a week my own hospital, of which I am medical director, with 75 beds. I am to have a second doctor, because I cannot deal with all the work. Probably my Berlin colleague Liebermann, whom you know by name, will shortly come here to take up the post. Only when is still doubtful. The later he arrives here, the later he can stand in for me, so I do not even know when I shall be able to go on leave. Perhaps you will have gone off to Gastein long before my arrival in Munich. I can see only two possibilities: either I get permission to cross the border and can then visit you—no matter where—or you would have to come to Munich for the Congress, which you would be allowed to do as much as any other doctor. I will do my best to be able to tell you something more definite soon.
We were very glad to hear that you could see your two lieutenants in good shape at home: our best wishes continue to go with them! The days of being together were surely the best of the journey. I am delighted for you and for all of us that you even find time to write down the rest of the Lectures.
Here we go on with our semi-rural existence, content that we can be together. I have far too much to do, but am standing up to the work of an entire post, and have the great advantage of completely independent activity and a position of authority.
I have started to read Putnam's article, and I like the beginning very much. I always get the American journal as a review copy for our Jahrbuch, but the latter is dormant. Exactly two years have passed since it had appeared only once. As soon as peace breaks out we will catch up with what the war has delayed. I should like to believe that we shall then have more favourable ground for our research than before. After the long time during which the war has absorbed almost all interests, there will be a hunger for science that will perhaps be very good for us. I often think how we shall take up the threads again. In any case we shall behave like Casimiro.
Cordial greetings from my wife and me to you and yours, there and in the field!
Yours,
Karl Abraham
299F
Badgastein, Villa Wassing
27 August 1916
Dear Friend,
You see what has happened. I have been here with the two women for a week. My little daughter is in Aussee, both the soldiers are again in the field. Gastein is tremendously beautiful, far more so than San Martino,1 where we were so peacefully together last time. The baths make me so tired that a rejuvenation of at least ten years is to be expected. We intend to stay here over 10 September unless—unless the spa administration drives out its remaining guests. However, there will be no water shortage in Gastein. When I am very tired, I continue writing the lectures. Seven of those on the theory of neurosis are already finished. The printing of the dream2 is also going ahead. Two Chinese porcelain dogs are on my desk, laughing at me, I think, as I write. I spur myself on by remembering my intention to present the royalties to my grandson for his student days. My son-in-law is still doing badly. As you can imagine, giving up his studio has done him a great deal of harm materially.
I should very much like to see you, but I do not want to go to Munich. I cannot mingle with those attending the Congress, and I cannot do things like crossing the border under some invented pretext. So ceterum censeo: it is you who must cross the border, and I shall come to meet you in Salzburg or anywhere else you like, even if I have returned to Vienna by the middle of September. I hope you will get permission; my Ernst was on holiday in Hamburg and Berlin.
I think I can congratulate you on Liebermann. The best thing about these conditions is that you are able to have your little family with you. You will be interested to hear (unless I have told you so already) that Ophuijsen has written solemnly declaring himself one of us.
Eitingon wrote yesterday from Miskolcz and asked about you. I have now re-read your orality paper in print with the greatest pleasure.
Answer soon. Cordial greetings to you all!
Yours,
Freud
1. San Martino di Castrozza in the South Tyrol, where the Freuds had spent their summer holidays in 1913.
2. That is, part II of the Introductory Lectures.
301A
Allenstein
1 September 1916
Dear Professor,
Your letter of the 27th arrived today. How glad I would be to comply with your suggestion! But, from enquiries I have made in the meantime, I understand it is not possible to visit you on Austrian soil. The fact that your son had leave to visit Germany means nothing. I have been told that travel from Austria into Germany is far less restricted. There is, however, a strict blockade in the opposite direction, with exceptions made only for very special cases such as severe illness in the family. It is therefore impossible for me to come to Gastein or anywhere else.
I can understand that you do not wish to come to Munich. But how about meeting in some other Bavarian town? The Congress in Munich is from the 21st to the 23rd. I could keep a few days for you before the 22nd. As I am mainly interested in the proceedings of the 22nd, I could be with you also on the 23rd and 24th and the morning of the 25th. I have to be back in Allenstein by the morning of the 26th. I do not think you will have any difficulty, as you are no longer liable for military service. So if we could not meet in Munich, we could meet in Nuremberg or Regensburg, or naturally in any mountain region on German soil. It is some two years since we last met, and I should be so happy to see you again.
The three weeks of my leave will be spent as follows:
5–11 Sept.—with my wife on the nearby Baltic coast.
12 Sept.—Allenstein, to Bremen in the evening.
13–18 Sept.—Bremen.
18 or 19 18th—Berlin. In the evening to Munich or another place to be agreed on.
I hope I shall have a favourable reply from you, dear Herr Professor. Meanwhile I send written greetings—also from my wife—to you and your family near and far, including the Chinese dogs! Letters will reach me best here, up to 12 September, and after that in Bremen, Uhlandstrasse 20.
Hoping to see you looking as rejuvenated as you promised,
Yours,
Karl Abraham
301A
Regensburg1
23 September 1916
Dear Professor,
So it was not to be! I am very put out to be staying here alone on the return journey. The town is splendid, and the Museum of Antiquities would certainly have satisfied you. So when are we going to see each other? In Munich I spoke to Dr Weiss from Vienna.2 The Congress was just as I had expected. With many cordial greetings from your
Karl Abraham
On the 26th I am back in Allenstein.
1. Picture postcard: “Prehistoric-Roman museum in the Ulrich church; Roman tomb of the legionary Aurelius Patreinus (erected by his parents).”
2. See letter 65F, 18 February 1909, n. 8.
302F
Vienna IX, Berggasse 19
26 September 1916
Dear Friend,
It was impossible, I returned to Vienna on 16 September, and have given up the rest of the travelling season for this year. It was impossible, for various reasons, to be discussed in person. In addition, Ferenczi had announced a visit for the middle of this month to work on his analysis;1 however, he was prevented and is still not here today. Rank was here until yesterday evening on his return journey from Constantinople, where he had spent his leave, and was utterly enchanted by the Orient.2 Otherwise many of our members have been transferred, Tausk is ill, etc. We shall be a very small circle when we open in October, and then we shall only see each other occasionally.
Naturally we are keeping the journals to the last possible moment. The printing of the second instalment of the Lectures is now going ahead fast. Today I have had from Berlin an idiotic essay by Placzek on friendship3 and a piece of prattle by Eulenburg on morality and sexuality.4 So much for science.
We have had our two boys on leave in Salzburg at the same time, as you know. Since then they have both been in the South Tyrol region, and occasionally send us good news. My son-in-law drags himself around, he is not being discharged and is being given no other duties. His traumatic neurosis appears to be flourishing. He is recognized as no longer fit for field service.
Your card from Regensburg was the midwife of this letter, which otherwise would have seen the light of the censorship a few days later. Believe me, I for my part am very sorry, too, for the restriction I have imposed on myself. Also at my age one should postpone nothing. But there were certain difficulties I could not overcome.
I have finished nine of the lectures on the theory of the neuroses which I shall deliver this term. After that I propose to give no more lectures whatever.
In Gastein we shared table every evening with his Excellency Waldeyer,5 who at the age of 80 is sound as a bell and seems to be a very nice man.
Let me have news of you again soon. With cordial greetings to your wife and children,
Freud
1. Ferenczi had three tranches of analysis with Freud during the First World War: the first started on 1 October 1914 and lasted for three-and-a-half weeks; the second was from 14 June to 5 July 1916; and the third and final period was between 29 September and 13 October 1916.
2. “Rank will leave on holidays on 4 September for Constantinople via Budapest” (Freud to Eitingon, 26 August 1916, SFC). He returned to Vienna on 18 September (Freud's calendar entry, LOC).
3. Placzek, 1915. Siegfried Placzek [1866–193?], Berlin physician, had studied under Binswanger and Ziehen, worked with Oppenheim, and wrote widely on sexual and legal problems. In 1907 he had published a complimentary review of Freud's Sammlung kleiner Schriften zur Neurosenlehre.
4. Eulenburg, 1916.
5. See letter 149A, 5 January 1913, & n. 2.
303A
Allenstein
12 November 1916
Dear Professor,
Your last letter has been waiting for weeks to be answered. The strain of work is certainly one of the reasons; but added to this is the feeling of discontent that for a long while I have been able to write about nothing but petty domestic and personal matters. It was quite different when I had the pleasure of writing to you on scientific progress, and always eagerly awaited your reactions to what I had to say.
My leave in September was rather rich in impressions. First I had eight days with my wife on the Baltic coast, which is marvellously beautiful in East Prussia. Then I spent a week with my mother in Bremen. From there I went to Munich. There is not much to report about the Congress. Dr Weiss from Vienna was the only acquaintance I met. It struck us during the discussion on neuroses how official neurology is gradually taking this and that over from us, without acknowledging the source either to themselves or to the world. After the Congress I spent one day in Regensburg and enjoyed all that I could of the Roman and mediaeval traces to be found there. Then a day in Berlin and back to Allenstein.
The collaboration of our colleague Liebermann, who had been very ardent in acquainting himself with his work, was unfortunately soon interrupted, as he fell ill with severe otitis also involving the labyrinth. He is now getting better. In the meantime I had to look after the hospital, which had been increased to 77 beds, by myself.
My family has now been with me for exactly half a year. Both the children are now going to school here; the boy is giving us grounds for great hope.
If both your sons are still in the Alps, they will have had a rather easier time recently; I am glad they are both bearing up so well in the matter of health, too. Is your son-in-law no better? And how are your family at home?
When is the 2nd instalment of your Lectures due? I assume that the first of my two papers will also appear in the Zeitschrift soon? And another question: are you going to Hamburg again at Christmas, as you did two years ago? And is there a chance of us meeting?
Adding the most cordial greetings from my wife and myself to you and all your family,
Yours,
Karl Abraham
304A
Allenstein, Kreuzstrasse 2
10 December 1916
Dear Professor,
I have once again just emerged from a period of excessive work. My collaborator Liebermann, who has been suffering from severe otitis, is now improving, but I had in the meantime to deal with up to 90 cases of neurosis and psychosis entirely on my own, and feel quite exhausted. Today I can breathe a little more freely as I have been given a temporary assistant. Otherwise, we are well here. I was glad to hear the same of yourself and your family. Your guests from Hamburg will certainly help you over this difficult time.1 It is most praiseworthy of the little boy to try to thank his grandfather for his hospitality by producing “material”. Incidentally, I can report that our six-year-old boy eagerly enquired today whether one can marry one's sister. Next time I hope to hear more about your sons and sons-in-law and how they are getting on in the war, and hope it will be only good news!
The Zeitschrift containing my contribution has not yet arrived. I am particularly pleased to hear that you have finished your Lectures: for your sake, because you are now once again free for something new; and for my sake, because I look forward to reading them; and for all our sakes, because a better introduction to Ψα cannot be produced. I can sympathize with your wish not to give any more lectures in future, but I regret this, since our science will then be completely removed from the academic domain, and we do not know whether anyone will get a chance to speak in the foreseeable future in Vienna or anywhere else. After the war I shall try my luck, but am doubtful of success.
I am particularly pleased that the proposal for the Nobel prize was made by Bárány,2 one of the most original thinkers among doctors. Furthermore, this is the realization of a long-standing wish I have had for you. It is four years since I tried to get Bjerre to contact the leading authorities in Sweden in this matter. There are sufficient reasons why I would wish now more than ever that this should be realized for you!— Ophuijsen is a good acquisition if he now stands firm and does not begin to waver on account of various resistances.
Nothing more to add for today except cordial greetings and good wishes, also in the name of my wife, to you and yours, large and small, near and far. Perhaps more another time!
Yours,
Karl Abraham
What is Reik's present address?
1. A letter from Freud seems to be missing. On 17 November, Freud's daughter Sophie and her son Ernst had come to Vienna (Freud's calendar entry, LOC).
2. Robert Bárány [1876–1936], Austrian physician of Hungarian descent; professor at the University of Vienna, and from 1917 on in Uppsala. In 1914 he had received the Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine for his work on the physiology and pathology of the vestibular apparatus. His recommendation of Freud for the Nobel Prize was not successful. (Cf. Freud to Ferenczi, 31 October 1915, Freud & Ferenczi, 1996: pp. 86–87.)
305F
Vienna IX, Berggasse 19
18 December 1916
Dear Friend,
No. 2 of the Zeitschrift with your splendid paper1 has at last appeared. The dream lectures went off to your address today. Your letter turned up at the right moment. I am delighted to hear that things are going well, or what is called that nowadays, with you and yours! I gladly give you the same news about ourselves.
My eldest is at present with the cadre in Vienna and often stays with us, he is still holding out. Ernst is in the same place on the Italian front. Oliver is now with the Engineers in Cracow, is doing his first training there, and will then come to the training school in Krems. He has settled in quite well. My son-in-law, who is in an occupation suited to him, seems to be recovering well; he is still in Hanover. The little boy is charming and amusing; if there were as much good will and understanding on the part of the Entente as there is with him, we should long since have had peace. Meanwhile he has long since passed beyond the early stages that are so instructive to us.
It pains me to hear that you are so overburdened. I have little to do, so that at Christmas, for instance, I will again have reached rock-bottom.2 Leisure is not good for me, because my mental constitution urgently requires me to earn and spend money on my family in fulfilment of my father complex. In these circumstances, entirely against my intention, my hopes turn to the Nobel Prize, though we are all aware that there too we must count on the resistances that are that are so familiar to us. This makes the conflict very irritating, almost humiliating. (Perseveration!3) C.C. is often very necessary.
Reik's most recent address known to me is Lieutenant Dr Th. R., k. u. k. mob. Res. Hospital Nr. 4/3, Forces' postal service 279.
I cannot vouch for its still being valid. Last month he came here on leave and asked a great deal about you. Why does he not write to you?
With cordial greetings for Christmas-time. I hope I shall hear from you again soon.
Yours,
Freud
1. Abraham, 1916[52].
2. On 28 December, Freud wrote in his calendar: “without income!” (LOC).
3. Referring to the crossed-out words.