1925

 

470F

Vienna, Berggasse 191
27 January 1925

Dear Friend,

Today I received a letter from Pfister² about the Congress difficulty, in which he says he is bringing the same information to your attention at the same time. The decision is now yours, but I think that in such circumstances we cannot do anything else but accept Pfister's hint and do without Switzerland. Concessions on your part are excluded, as I was glad to hear from Eitingon. But perhaps, just when you show yourself inclined to renunciation, you may find the way to an agreement with the stubborn mules, in which none of the valuable features of our Congress will be sacrificed. If it does not happen, we will get over it.

Personal news will be brought to you by Eitingon, who left us yesterday.

With cordial greetings to all of you,

Yours,

Freud

1.  Typewritten.

2.  Letter of 24 January 1925, missing from Freud/Pfister correspondence. In preparation for its publication, Anna Freud compiled a list (SFC) of Pfister's letters to Freud, in which she wrote “No” (i.e. not to be printed) after the date of this letter.

471A

Berlin-Grünewald
6 February 1925

Dear Professor,

When your lines about the Congress arrived, I had already received from Pfister a copy of the letter he sent you. Of course I immediately informed both Pfister and Oberholzer that I agreed that the Congress should be moved to Germany. Immediately after that I discussed the remaining points with Max. The Congress will now take place from 3 to 5 September in Bad Homburg, near Frankfurt. In a few days you will learn everything necessary from a circular letter. The administrators of the spa in H. are very interested in the Congress. Landauer and Frau Dr Happel in Frankfurt have taken on the local arrangements, and we have already been informed about the venues for the meetings, lodgings, etc. This was done in three days, whereas the fruitless dealings with the Swiss took two months; a convolution of letters developed, which cannot be read without a shake of the head1 and a smile. So everything is going beautifully. Very soon the preparations for the 2nd German meeting in Weimar (2nd half of April) shall also begin.

I should like to let you have some good news without waiting for the circular letter. In all my 17 years of work in Berlin, no medical society has ever asked me to speak on Ψα. I have now been invited, and have accepted the invitation, to speak to the Berlin Society for Gynaecology and Obstetrics on 13 March. Subject: “Ψα and Gynaecology”.² If the paper meets with a favourable reception, this will have a very positive effect, since other specialist medical societies will follow suit, and then a first official recognition of Ψα in Germany will have been achieved.

Various other good news shall be told in the circular letter.

Now I want to say a few frank words about another matter. Sándor's article on sexual habits³ is to be the first in the new volume of the Zeitschrift. As far as wealth of ideas is concerned, this is perhaps his most mature and best work, but I have grave doubts about its technical content. At the end of 1923 the Entwicklungsziele⁴ appeared, with the technical rule of setting a time limit and altogether with a strong active tendency. After one year, the time-limit rule is greatly cut back, but a new activity is now recommended in its stead, which can hardly have been tested for more than a year in this form and the rules of which are somewhat vague and aphoristic. Perhaps it might have been better not to have been in such a hurry with a new set of technical innovations and with their publication. Max has already suggested to you that it would be preferable if it were to follow after your essay on the mystic writing-pad (which I read with the greatest pleasure, since one feels so secure in the clear and unassailable structuring of your thoughts!). Max's suggestion has my full approval. If Sándor's paper were placed before yours, this would give it an official character; otherwise it is, like any other paper, the author's own responsibility.

This leads to another question. We cannot in the long run avoid discussing technical problems. What would you, dear Professor, prefer: to arrange a symposium at the Congress or to have an exchange of opinions in several issues of the Zeitschrift? And, in the latter case, would you yourself wish to participate?

I am very glad to have continued good news about your health.

With the most cordial greetings from house to house,

Yours,

Abraham

1.  Allusion to an expression in Wilhelm Busch's [1832–1908] Jobsiade.

2.  Abraham, 1925[111].

3.  Ferenczi, 1925[269].

4.  Ferenczi & Rank, 1924.

472F

Vienna, Berggasse 19¹
11 February 1925

Dear Friend,

Naturally in complete agreement with the settlement of the Congress question. If I continue to be well, I too shall be there. My wife and sister-in-law do not want to miss the chance to be in Germany again, and people are already used to Anna as my companion. What is more, I am ready to set a bad example and go for a drive instead of listening to talks. So actually you should not invite me at all.

Your invitation to speak at the Berlin Gynaecological Society is really a good sign. You are right to expect that others will follow.

I have just written to Eitingon that I submit to the editorial decision with regard to the precedence of the “Mystic Writing-Pad” over Ferenczi's work. But I find your judgement of this note too kind. Despite the probable short-livedness of some stimuli, I would rather have perpetrated Ferenczi's work.

Your proposal to open a discussion on technical questions in the Zeitschrift seems to me very useful and preferable to postponing it until the Congress. Very many contributions will surely come in. I too am prepared to do something. But do not make me say the first and the last word, let me come somewhere in the middle. Indeed I often have occasion to note that my utterances have a kind of living paralysing effect on the liveliness of the others', and I think I must be careful.

With cordial greetings to you and your house,

Yours,

Freud

1.  Typewritten.

473A

[by Abraham and Eitingon]1

INTERNATIONAL PSYCHO-ANALYTICAL ASSOCIATION

Berlin
11 February 1925

Dear President,

At last year's Congress in Salzburg it was decided to hold the next assembly in Autumn 1925 in England or Switzerland. Particularly in consideration of our American colleagues, it was necessary to change the date of the Congress to the first week in September. It will therefore take place from 3 to 5 September.

Special circumstances make it impossible to meet in England or in Switzerland. In agreement with the Berlin Psychoanalytical Association, we have therefore decided to hold the Congress in Germany. We looked for a place situated as conveniently as possible for colleagues from the Western countries, as they had had to travel a particularly long way to Salzburg. As a large part of West Germany is occupied, the most suitable place seemed to us to be Bad Homburg. This place, situated near Frankfurt am Main, has particularly favourable connections on all sides and enjoys special popularity in England. We hope that the choice we have made will meet with general agreement. For participants from eastern countries the distance is no greater than to Switzerland.

We should like to ask you to decide within your groups already whether a definite subject for discussion (symposium) should be fixed; we are asking for suggestions in this respect. Also, we ask you to let us know approximately how many participants there will be from your Society.

You are asked kindly to let us have the answers to both questions by 15 April.

With collegial regards,

devotedly,

Dr K. Abraham	Dr M. Eitingon
President	Secretary

1.  Typewritten and hand-signed circular letter, with a note on top (“Herrn Prof. Dr S.Freud, Wien”) in Abraham's handwriting.

474A

Berlin-Grünewald
26 February 1925

Dear Professor,

First of all very hearty thanks for the Autobiographical Study1; I read it again at once with the same enjoyment as I did half a year ago on the Semmering. And then I must express my great joy about your intention of coming to the Congress! To me that is proof of your good state of health, that you are making plans again and regard your attendance at the Congress as self-evident.

In the meantime you have probably received from London my correspondence with the Swiss. I gave it to Ernest first, because he had raised objections in the circular letter to the change in venue for the Congress. Already today I received a letter from him in which he withdraws his objections.

With regard to the date of the Congress, I convinced myself later on that it was decided in Salzburg to meet at the end of August or the beginning of September. The change in the date already fixed (3–5 September) would thus be no obstacle to us, except for the general objection that such alterations always have something awkward about them. Landauer inquired in Homburg and found out that the last week in August is still part of the “season”, and that we would not find such good and comfortable accommodation. I should now like to ask your opinion of a suggestion by Ernest, naturally taking into account your comfort with regard to the journey. Would you agree to meet the wishes of the English at least by a few days, that is to say from 31 August to 2 September instead of 3–5 September? In that case we would fix the change and make it known at once by means of a circular.—-

I shall come back very soon to the question of the discussion on technique in the Zeitschrift!

With cordial greetings to you and yours from my wife and me,

Yours,

Abraham

1.  Freud, 1925d [1924].

475F

Vienna, Berggasse 19¹
3 March 1925

Dear Friend,

The correspondence on the Congress is already with Ferenczi, who fetched it himself the day before yesterday, Sunday. There is no doubt that you could not have done or said anything else.

With regard to the date of the Congress, I do not dare to emphasize consideration for me. You are right to remark that I am making plans again, but when it comes to it I often lose the courage to carry them out. For example, if at the time of the Congress I was not doing better with my prosthesis than in the past weeks, I should certainly not make the journey. So you decide, without taking me into account. Unofficially I can tell you that the early date, whether 31 August or 3 September, does not appeal to me much at all. But that does not matter much.

Rank is back and says that he did his best in America to make good the damage caused, and a letter from Brill that arrived today confirms it completely. This letter will come to you from Budapest and should then be sent to Jones. Rank himself is weakened and hardly capable of scientific work. I again have complete trust in him and was glad to learn that Ferenczi, who has just seen him again, has reached the same conclusion.

I had a letter today from Miss Newton, telling me of her recovery and thanking you very much for your tactful intervention.2

With cordial greetings to you and your house,

Yours,

Freud

1.  Typewritten.

2.  The New York Society had refused to accept lay analyst Newton as its member, and the correctness of her having previously been accepted a member of the Vienna Society had been questioned (cf. Berlin circular letter, 11 February 1925, LOC; Freud & Jones, 1993: pp. 570, 571, and 582).

476A

Berlin-Grünewald
15 March 1925

Dear Professor,

I have just written the circular letter, which contains most of the information worth giving. So today I will tell you only a few personal things. I very much hope that the troubles of which you complained in your last letter are over, and will gradually occur more rarely.

I entirely agree that it would have been nicer to meet in Geneva than in Homburg. You know that for me there is nothing better than Switzerland, and I shall probably spend a few weeks' holiday there before the Congress. If you should feel lively and ready for anything, would you perhaps do the same thing this year? But I know well enough that for the time being these plans can only be uncertain. So I will at once come out with the confession that I should like to be in Vienna for a few days during Easter week. So many subjects for discussion are accumulating, and I should also like to convince myself personally of how you are getting on. So I ask you, dear Professor, to get Fräulein Anna to send me a short but frank note as to whether my visit—which I should naturally arrange entirely in accordance with times suitable to you—is convenient to you or not. I should like to bring my wife, who does not yet know Vienna at all.

Something else to tell you from my house—my daughter recently had to write a school essay on the psychology of dreams, and was especially requested by her teacher to describe Freudian doctrines without restriction. Yet another sign of progress, which only a few years ago would have been impossible!

I was very glad to hear of Rank's safe return and the satisfactory result of his journey!

Finally, one more little piece of information! I hear a Dr Frensdorff gave you notice of a visit. I should say in connection with this that he is one of my manic-depressive patients. Unfortunately he was coerced by his family to marry before the end of his analysis, very much against my will and advice. Since then he has occasionally been in a really bad way. There is a possibility that his wish to speak to you was prompted by a hypomanic frame of mind. He is, incidentally, an absolutely reliable, decent man. Naturally he must not know anything of what I have told you.

With the most cordial greetings to you and yours from my wife and me!

Yours,

Karl Abraham

477F

Vienna, Berggasse 191
20 March 1925

Dear Friend,

Your offer pleased me very much at first, but later on upset me somewhat, which is not your fault but mine. I find it very bitter to turn you down, and I do not dare to accept your visit because it would probably only be a disappointment to you. Without wanting to offend your “famo famous optimism, I must confess that I am not really of much use. Witness to my great inclination to meet you, so hard to overcome, is the fact that I am leaving the reply to my daughter, as you asked.

With the most cordial greetings,

Yours,

Freud

Dear Doctor,2

Papa says that to spare him you asked that I should reply, but he has written the beginning himself in any case. When your letter came, he was particularly happy about your request, and his doubts about whether he would really be able to be visited in the four free days of Easter did not come until later. He wanted to use those days for a complete rest without any obligations, because he has had a great deal to bother him in the last few weeks and could never rest. Pichler wants finally to “sanitize” the prosthesis, as he puts it, and now he is suffering from it, as Austria is from its sanitation. Naturally he does not like to tell you all this, and that is very understandable. But I believe he would get much more out of a summer visit from you, if you could make it possible again. Or is it a great sacrifice for you to come from your beautiful Switzerland to our Semmering, for which we have already arranged again?

Papa hopes you will not be angry about his reply, which is really very candid. I too would have been very pleased to help to show your wife Vienna. The other members of the family say the same.

With cordial greetings, and I hope to be able to take you instead to the Sonnwendstein again.

Yours,

Anna Freud

1.  Typewritten.

2.  The rest of the letter in Anna Freud's handwriting.

478A

Berlin-Grünewald
5 April 1925

Dear Professor,

Certainly your reply was a disappointment for me, but much less so than if I had come to Vienna and then found you in a state in which you were in need of care. So we are postponing our meeting! Whether I come to the Semmering in the summer will have to remain undecided for the present. For I am hoping, provisionally, that you will come to Homburg, and then, perhaps, it would be possible to meet without too many complications. However, to encourage you to come to Homburg, I will tell you—in case you have not heard it direct from Landauer—that the directors of the Spa will put at your disposal and that of your family part of a peacefully situated villa. We shall all have great reductions, for example free accommodation for 25–30 participants and very moderate prices for the rest. H. is an excellently equipped spa with beautiful, convenient paths through the forest and the opportunity for excursions of all kinds.—

We are now staying in Berlin over Easter. Today I received from Ophuijsen the official request to give a few lectures in Holland at the end of May. As I am going to write and accept,1 it is probable that we shall be in Holland for Whitsuntide.

Talking of Holland brings me to Lampl, whose engagement² has surprised all of us. He has given us in the Society a second surprise by his first lecture,³ which was quite excellent.

I shall now publish the lecture that I gave recently to the gynaecologists in the Archiv für Gynäkologie. Not so long ago such an invitation could scarcely have been conceivable.

And now I will express the hope that the alterations to the prosthesis will finally meet with your entire satisfaction, and that you will have a trouble-free summer! With this wish and cordial greetings to you and all your family,

Yours,

Karl Abraham

Recently I had a visit from Prof. Kayserling,⁴ whom you kindly referred to me. I will see if I can give him a little help. A neurosis existing from childhood, with organic brain disease in addition, is not very encouraging, but perhaps one can be of some use to him in any case.—

This letter needs no reply!!

1.  Abraham held three talks (1925[113], 1925[114]; see letter 479A, 4 May 1925).

2.  To Jeanne de Groot.

3.  On “A Case of Borrowed [entlehnt] Guilt Feeling”, at the meeting of 28 March (Zeitschrift, 1925, 11: 250).

4.  Perhaps Hermann Graf von Keyserling [1880–1946], German philosopher (cf. Freud & Groddeck, 1974, letters of 28 and 21 December 1924).

479A

Grünewald
4 May 1925

Dear Professor,

Your birthday is just around the corner and, as it is not possible for me to bring you my good wishes in person this year either, it has once again to be done by letter (and with the waiver of a written answer!). Even though your state of health often leaves much to be desired, I firmly believe you have made good progress since your last birthday. May this progress be accelerated in the new year!

So that you hear also on your birthday that Ψα matters have not come to a standstill in Berlin (about which Eitingon will also inform you), I wish to tell you that, apart from three lectures on “Crime” in Berlin,1 I have to give three further lectures in Holland this month: one in The Hague to the Medical Association on the “Hysterical Symptom”, and two in Leyden to psychiatrists on the “Ψα Treatment of Schizophrenic States”.

In the Berlin Medical Society Moll launched a very nasty, spiteful attack on Ψα. We did not react at all and are pleased with that. Kraus, who was chairman, very loyally clamped down on M's behaviour, and the audience in general was painfully affected by M's tactless action. Indirectly he helped us instead of harming us. The behaviour of the chairman and of the assembly is also a sign of the times.

Our news is that my daughter has started her last year at grammar school. In the summer she will spend the holidays with a friend in western Switzerland. Gerd is already as tall as his sister and his mother. Both his intellectual and his physical development please us greatly. In the summer I am thinking of taking him on a high-mountain tour through the Berner Oberland and Wallis. My wife wants to accompany me to Paris for a short time after the Congress, and then to spend a few weeks in Italy.

If all goes according to plan, I hope to see you, dear Professor, and yours in exactly four weeks' time in Homburg. Please accept the most cordial greetings to all of you from all of us!

With many good wishes,

Yours,

Abraham

1.  During the second quarter-term of the year, Abraham gave a course on “Psychoanalytic Theory of Crime. (For jurists, medical doctors and pedagogues)” (Zeitschrift, 1925, 11: 503) at the Institute.

480F

Vienna, Berggasse 19¹
20 May 1925

Dear Friend,

In spite of your waiver of a reply, herewith my heartfelt thanks! And the request to pass them on also to the Society. It was splendid, though rather tiring, in fact it was a test to which I did not stand up very well. As the annual general meeting happened to have been arranged for the same afternoon, apart from Eitingon, Ferenczi was present too.

The good news about your family and work gave me great pleasure. If one is a hopeless (I mean incurable) optimist, one should at least have good reason to be so.

In contrast to your travel plans, we propose to spend the summer quietly on the Semmering at the villa that you know.

With cordial greetings to you, your wife and children,

Yours,

Freud

1.  Typewritten.

481A

Wassenaar¹
29 May 1925

Dear Professor,

On the 3rd day of my lecture tour in Holland we are enjoying a splendid afternoon in the Wassenaar Park and thinking of you and all your family. With cordial greetings,

Yours,

Karl Abraham²

1.  Picture postcard “Den Haag”, stamped in Leyden.

2.  And several other signatures, of which only van Ophuijsen's is legible.

482A

Grünewald
7 June 1925

Dear Professor,

This time I am writing from my bed; I brought back a feverish bronchial catarrh from Holland, which appears persistent.¹ Just before I went to bed, the day before yesterday, an unexpected question was put to me about which I must tell you.

The owner of an important film company came to see me and told me of his decision to produce a popular scientific Ψα film² with your authorization and with the collaboration and supervision of your recognized scholars. With regard to the latter, I am to have the right to make suggestions.

I need hardly mention that this kind of thing is really not up my street; nor that this type of project is typical of our times and that it is sure to be carried out, if not with us then with people who know nothing about it. We have so many “wild” analysts in Berlin—if only to mention Kronfeld,3 Schultz,⁴ and Hattingberg,⁵ who would be only too keen to grasp at such an offer should we decline. In that event, they would have the financial gain and our cause would be damaged.

From the enclosed writing, which I should like back as soon as possible, you can see the provisional proposition. I also enclose a sheet of paper, which you might sign if you agree with it.

In the final agreement, in which my brother-in-law, who is a lawyer, will support me, it must be expressly emphasized that the 10% profit-sharing refers to the gross income, as was agreed verbally. Your share of the profits, dear Professor, remains as in the agreement between us; there will surely not be any difficulties there.

The difference between this correct offer compared with that of the American Goldwyn⁶ is obvious. The actual plan for the film is as follows: the first part is to serve as an introduction and will give impressive single examples illustrating repression, the unconscious, the dream, parapraxis, anxiety, etc. The manager of this company, who knows some of your writings, is, for instance, very enthusiastic about the analogy of the invader used in the five lectures to illustrate repression and resistance.⁷ The 2nd part will present a life history from the viewpoint of Ψα and will show the cure of neurotic symptoms.

Furthermore, Herr Neumann suggests the drafting of an easily comprehensible popular pamphlet on Ψα. My idea is not to describe Ψα systematically but to give examples from life and to develop the theory around them. N. would like to publish this pamphlet, which should be sold at 2–3 marks, either through a large publishing firm, which would ensure the widest circulation, or through our Verlag. This may present an opportunity of helping the fortunes of the Verlag.

I assume, dear Professor, that you will have no great sympathy for the plan as a whole, but that you will come to acknowledge the force of the practical argument. Our influence should extend into every detail in order to avoid anything that seems to us to discredit the cause in any way.

Tomorrow I shall discuss the whole matter with Hanns if my voice has returned by then. I shall, with his and Max's help, choose some suitable young colleagues from our circle. It goes without saying that I am grateful to you for any kind of advice.

I am limiting myself today to this one subject; writing in bed is rather uncomfortable. I shall tell you about Holland and other matters in the circular letter on the 15th.

In the hope that your reply will also bring very, very good news about your health,

I remain, with cordial greetings,

Yours,

Karl Abraham

Addendum 1

NEUMANN PRODUKTION8

FERNSPRUCH: AMT ZENTRUM 11471 9834 / TELEGRAMM-ADRESSE: NEUPRODUKT BERLIN

Berlin SW 19; Leipziger Strasse 77

5 June 1925

DIREKTION

Herrn Dr Karl A b r a h a m,

Berlin/Grünewald,

Bismarck Allee 14.

 

Dear Dr Abraham,

With reference to our consultation today, I am repeating to you once again the business part of it in writing as follows:

Our Company wishes to make a popular-scientific film on the doctrines of Freud's psychoanalysis and to seek official authority for this from Herr Geheimrat S. Freud.

The manuscript and the other necessary work for this film will be carried out by our gentlemen, together with a psychoanalyst to be proposed by you, who will be paid an honorarium by us.

We should like to ask you to act as scientific adviser and also to help us with the elaboration of the manuscript.

We would pay you and Herr Geheimrat Freud together 10% (ten per cent) of the proceeds from the film, and guarantee for 10,000 M (ten thousand marks); part of this would be paid on the conclusion of the contract and the rest on the completion of the film.

Our condition is that Herr Geheimrat Freud and you, for a period of three years, do not authorize the making of a film on Freudian theory, or take part in any way in the making of a film of this type

In accordance with your wishes we are sending you at the same time a few leaflets about our principal films in recent years, from which you can see that we are no novices in the field of this type of cultural film.

We should be greatly obliged to you if you would take this matter in hand at your earliest convenience, and hoping to hear from you very soon, we remain,

Yours sincerely,

NEUMANN PRODUKTION
L. T. D.

Addendum 2

Vienna9
June 1925

To

Neumann Produktion Ltd,

Berlin, S.W. 19

On condition that I agree with the proposed contract between you and Dr Karl Abraham, I am prepared to give my authorization to a popular-scientific film on the doctrine of psychoanalysis to be made by you, and, for a period of three years, neither to take part in any way in the making of a film of this type, nor to authorize its making.

Yours sincerely,

 

1.  According to the editors of Freud & Abraham, 1965, “[t]his apparent bronchitis was the first manifestation of Abraham's fatal illness. It in fact started with an injury to the pharynx from a fish-bone and was followed by septic broncho-pneumonia, lung abscess, and terminal subphrenic abscess. The illness took the typical course of septicaemia, prior to the introduction of antibiotics, with swinging temperatures, remissions, and euphoria. Abraham's previous emphysema had doubtless made him susceptible to such infection” (p. 382). It is possible, however, that Abraham suffered from an undiagnosed lung cancer.

2.  Geheimnisse einer Seele [Secrets of the Soul], directed by G. W. Pabst, was eventually produced by Neumann. Shooting began in September and lasted 12 weeks. The “film affair” would overshadow the remaining months of this correspondence. (For details, see Fallend & Reichmayr, 1992; Ries, 1995.)

3.  See letter 121F, 14 January 1912, & n. 1.

4.  See letter 275A, 26 April 1915, & n. 6.

5.  Hans Ritter von Hattingberg [1879–1944], l.l.d., m.d., of Munich. Hattingberg later became a member of the Aryanized German General Medical Society for Psychotherapy and the German Institute for Psychological Research and Psychotherapy in Berlin. He was editor, with Niels Kampmann, of the Zeitschrift für Menschenkunde.

6.  “Samuel Goldwyn, the well-known film director, [had approached] Freud with an offer of $100,000.00 if he would cooperate in making a film depicting scenes from the famous love stories of history, beginning with Antony and Cleopatra” (Jones, 1957: p. 114).

7.  Freud, 1910a [1909]: p. 25.

8.  Typewritten letter with pre-printed letterhead.

9.  Typewritten.

483F

Vienna, Berggasse 19¹
9 June 1925

Dear Friend,

First of all let me express the hope that by the time you receive this letter—written an hour after receiving yours—you will be out of bed and have the use of your voice again. My news is not bad, I have my usual small complaints to put up with, but on the whole I am better. I stop work on the 27th inst.

I do not feel comfortable about the magnificent project. Your argument that if we do not do it, it will be done by others seemed at first irresistible. But then it struck me that what these people are willing to pay for is obviously the authorization. That they can get only from us. If they do something completely wild because we refuse, we cannot stop them and are not implicated. After all, we cannot stop anyone from making such a film without obtaining our consent.

After settling this argument, the matter can at least be discussed. My chief objection is still that I do not believe that satisfactory plastic representation of our abstractions is at all possible. We do not want to give our consent to anything insipid. Mr Goldwyn was at any rate clever enough to stick to the aspect of our subject that can be plastically represented very well, that is to say, love. The small example that you mentioned, the representation of repression by means of my Worcester simile, would have an absurd rather than an instructive impact.

I am naturally completely confident that you yourself would never approve of anything susceptible to such or similar objections. As you seem not disinclined to engage in the matter, I suggest that you do the following. Tell them that I do not believe in the possibility that anything good can be produced and therefore for the time being cannot give my authorization. But if examination of the script should satisfy you, and me also, of the opposite, I shall be willing to give it afterwards. I do not deny that I should prefer my name not to come into it at all.

If, contrary to expectations, everything were to turn out satisfactorily, we should need no judge, as they say in Vienna, with regard to the 10%. If anything came of it, I should gladly give my share to the Verlag.

I am retaining the letter to the company.

With cordial greetings and in the expectation of a rapid wish-fulfilment

Yours,

Freud

1.  Typewritten.

484F

Vienna, Berggasse 19¹
21 June 1925

Dear Friend,

I hear from Sachs, to my surprise and also to my dismay, that your illness is still not a thing of the past. That does not fit in with my picture of you. I like to think of you only as a man continually and unfailingly at work. I feel your illness to be a kind of unfair competition and appeal to you to stop it as quickly as possible. I expect news about your condition from someone very close to you and meanwhile send you my cordial good wishes.

Yours,

Freud

1.  Typewritten.

485A

[25 June 1925]¹

IMPROVEMENT CONTINUING THANKS—GREETINGS ABRAHAM

1.  Telegram.

486A

Berlin-Grünewald¹
26 June 1925

Dear Professor,

Your letter with the inquiry arrived some days ago, and almost simultaneously Dr Deutsch telephoned to enquire about my health. My wife gave him detailed information and asked him afterwards by letter to pass this on to you, dear Professor. This morning an unsigned telegram arrived from Vienna; my wife assumed that it was from you and telegraphed the reply to your address. I am however dictating this to her in order to give you detailed news.

The actual illness had run its course by the beginning of this week— the bronchial pneumonic foci have healed, but part of the pleura is still sensitive, so that I shall have to stay in bed for the time being. In about a fortnight I am to go to the mountains to recuperate, do feel quite exhausted from my illness, though I hope everything will clear up satisfactorily.

Thanking you very much for your sympathy and wishing you and your family an extremely restful summer, I am, with kind regards, in which the writer of these lines joins me,

Yours,

Karl Abraham

1.  In Frau Abraham's handwriting.

487F

Semmering, Villa Schüler
1 July 1925

Dear Friend,

It was not I who sent you the telegram, at the time I had already been reassured by Deutsch by telephone, but I was glad to have received your telegram. I was delighted to hear that you see yourself as convalescent again—but be conscientious in that as well, for your own sake as well as ours.

We arrived here yesterday; overjoyed to be here in spite of the gales and the modesty of the natural surroundings. Everything is so comfortable and quiet, as is only appropriate to the old, it is a kind of Austragstüberl,1 if you know that Alpine expression.

My own state of health, which unfortunately is still a matter of interest to my friends, promises well. With truly angelic—or asinine—patience, my worthy physician dealt with all the complaints that disturbed the peace of my prosthesis until he got a tolerable result. Finally he paid me the parting compliment of saying that, considering my age and the troubles that I had been through, I was in “pretty smart condition”. I notice above all a reluctance to work and a need of rest.

The foundation in Teramo (Abruzzi)² has surely been reported to you. Bianchini³ is asking for it to be publicized.

I have written a memorial for J. Breuer, which will appear in No. 2 of the Zeitschrift.⁴ I exchanged cordial letters with the family and so brought my fateful relations with Breuer to a dignified conclusion.

Do not fail to keep me informed of the progress of your recovery. With good wishes to you and your family,

Yours,

Freud,
who has been worrying.

1.  Room set aside in a peasant's house for parents who have retired from work.

2.  The foundation of the Italian Psychoanalytical Society (cf. letter 427A, 26 December 1923, n. 3).

3.  See letter 254F, 31 October 1914, & n. 7.

4.  Freud, 1925g.

488A

Berlin-Grünewald
6 July 1925

Dear Professor,

This is to show you that I am making good progress; at the same time I want to tell you how pleased I was with your warm and fatherly letter. I was glad to hear that your health continues to improve. Although I am 21 years younger than you, I shall have to spend just as quiet a holiday. We have decided on Wengen in the Bernese Oberland. It is at an altitude of 1,270 metres and has the advantage of mountain railways for riding up if one cannot climb much. Address from 17 July: Hotel Victoria.

Max came to see me yesterday. He has, during my illness, made excellent preparations for the Congress. The programmes are already in print.

If you, dear Professor, are not coming to Homburg, I am afraid that I shall not see you for the time being, as I cannot do very much for a while. It is only now I realize how much strength this month has cost me. I shall therefore not be able to help you with raspberry picking.

With the most cordial greetings from my family and myself to you all,

Yours,

Karl Abraham

489F

Semmering, Villa Schüler
9 July 1925

Dear Friend,

Anna, with her telepathic sensitivity, remarked yesterday that it was time we had news of A. We lacked confirmation that on the occasion of your recent exertions you had coughed up all the noxious substances.

Now I am delighted to have that confirmation. Precisely because of the 21 years' difference in our ages, your illness means more to our cause than mine. But the quiet holidays must be doing you good, I myself am feeling the good effect. If I did not have a capriciously sensitive spot—Pichler seriously assures me that there is no disease of the tissue and that it is only hyper-aesthesia—I should feel very well, and the bits of writing I have started would go ahead quickly. Before he left, the good man attacked the bad spot with a galvano-caustic “horse-cure”, as he called it, and so I now have the burn to complain about instead of the spontaneous sore. Strangely enough, however, this is a gain.

For your amusement, let me tell you that a copy of the Matin arrived today with a leader1 on psychoanalysis. Nothing remarkable about that, you may say, but this Matin is published in Port-au-Prince in Haiti, with which one does not have correspondence every day.

It is at present the strawberry season on the Semmering; with the raspberries I shall certainly remember your help.

Accept my warmest and most genuine—because fundamentally rather selfish—wishes for a quick and complete recovery, and give my kindest regards to your certainly delighted wife and children.

Cordially yours,

Freud

1.  In English in original.

490A

Wengen, Hotel Victoria
18 July 1925

Dear Professor,

Here are my first greetings from Wengen, where I am conscientiously resting in a deck-chair to recover my health. I have weathered the long journey well and am pleased with the choice of place and hotel. The situation of Wengen, exactly opposite the Jungfrau, is extraordinarily beautiful; besides, the peace here is unique considering present conditions. Wengen can be reached from Lauterbrunnen only by funicular or on a path. There is no road, therefore no cars or dust. We are also very lucky with the weather. Thus all prerequisites for my recovery are fulfilled. But for the time being the patient's egocentric mode of thinking remains with me, owing to the unaccustomed necessity of having to consider myself at every step. Until now I did not even know that one could walk so slowly or that a lift could become one of the necessities of life. In other words, my breathing is not yet freed, but I confidently hope that the high mountain air will have a good effect.

So much about myself! My wife, who nursed me until it became impossible to go on without an outside nurse, is also rather exhausted, but I hope she too will benefit from our stay here.

I should like to know what became of the discomforts you mentioned in your last letter. I hope to hear about it soon. If writing is a nuisance for you, dear Professor, I shall be well content with a few lines from Fräulein Anna.

Before my departure there were negotiations about the question of the film. Today I only want to say that Sachs and I believe that we have every guarantee that the matter will be carried out with genuine seriousness. In particular, we think we have succeeded in principle in presenting even the most abstract concepts. Each of us had an idea concerning these, and they complemented each other in the most fortunate way. More about this another time!

Otherwise, I am completely inactive scientifically and intend to remain so for some time. Instead, I am reading, since I can read again, I am enjoying my old favourites, Aristophanes1 and Heine, and as a semi-invalid have learned really to value the game of solitaire.

With the most cordial greetings from my wife and myself to you and all your family,

Yours,

Karl Abraham

Addendum²

Lapsus linguae

In the fifth act of the “Pfefferrösel” of Birch-Pfeiffer,³ at the banquet of the Emperor “Adolph von Nassau”, the representatives of the nobility have to offer him their congratulations. The first speaker among them (Herr P., choral singer and player of small parts) has to speak as follows: “God keep Your Majesty always with an open ear and a healthy body.” Unfortunately, however, he turns the sentence round and says: “God keep Your Majesty always with a healthy ear and an open body.”—The Emperor's thanks, which followed, went on amid cheerful murmuring from a surprised audience.

1.  Whom Abraham read in Greek, according to Hilda Abraham.

2.  Newspaper cutting pasted to the original letter; “Frankfurter Ztg.” and “15.7.1925” added in Abraham's handwriting.

3.  Charlotte Birch-Pfeiffer [1800–1868], German actress and writer.

491F

Villa Schüler, Semmering
21 July 1925

Dear Friend,

No, writing is really no burden to me. I was delighted to have news of you so soon, because my thoughts often stray from an ego the claims of which have become a nuisance to other objects of love. When you describe how much you are occupied with the unaccustomed needs of your own “poor Conrad,”¹ I am consoled, being experienced in the matter, by the certainty that you are having to practise this adaptation only for a short time. A permanent re-adaptation is far more difficult.

The unexpected situation has occurred that on looking through the list of Congress papers I was glad to see that your name is not among the speakers. With such a task ahead it would be difficult to rest the intellectual faculties. But we all hope that by the first week of September our president will have re-acquired his freedom of respiration and of action.

We are very comfortable this year in the Semmering surroundings that you know. This summer has a different, friendlier character, and with prolonged familiarity the modest charms of the neighbourhood make a strong impact. The women find the housekeeping very convenient, and living in this well-equipped house can be called almost ideal.

The day goes by without one's really noticing it. If one thinks about it in the evening, its content has been little. Giving some free play to one's phantasy at the writing desk, an hour with the crazy American who is supposed to pay the high rent, some adventures with Wolf,2 whom you do not know yet—with his passionate affection and jealousy, his mistrust of strangers, and his mixture of wildness and quickness to learn he is an object of the most general interest. A few letters, some proof-correcting, family visitors from America, etc. The firm intervention with which my doctor took leave of me three weeks ago has changed the character of my complaints thoroughly for the better. All the paraesthesias that tyrannically forced themselves upon my attention have disappeared and have left behind an individual free to complain, if he feels like it, about his awkward speech and never-ending nasal catarrh. So life is admittedly tolerable, but after this spoiling and weaning process what will regular work taste like in October?

I have written a few short papers, but they are not meant very seriously. Perhaps, if I am willing to admit their parentage, I shall tell you about them later. Their titles I can reveal to you: “Negation”,³ “Inhibition and Symptom”,⁴ and “Some Psychological Consequences of the Anatomical Distinction between the Sexes”.⁵

Now get well quickly, and may you find in Wengen whatever you need to bring your period of illness to an end. Our heartfelt thanks are due to your wife for her nice contribution to your recovery. I can remember something similar.

Heartfelt greetings to you all!

Yours,

Freud

P.S.: The slip of the print tongue was very impressive!

1.  The character Viktor in Carl Spitteler's novel Imago (1906) “was accustomed…to calling his body Konrad in a comradely way, because he got along so well with it” (p. 21). Freud borrowed the expression, which became a standard in psychoanalytic circles, and certainly talked frequently about “poor” Konrad. Carl Spitteler [1845–1924]; Swiss writer, won Nobel Prize in 1919.

2.  Anna's Alsatian.

3.  Freud, 1925h.

4.  Freud, 1926d [1925].

5.  Freud, 1925j.

492F

Semmering1
10 August 1925

Dear Friend,

My nephew Edward Bernays from New York,² who has been especially active in the processing of public relations—a profession still unknown in Europe—was recently here in my home and declared himself ready to undertake an appeal for the Psychoanalytic Fund in his rich and crazy native country. Success may be doubtful, but nothing can be lost either.

Asked by him to propose the European section of a Committee to share with me in the administration of the Fund, I proposed our personalities charged with the most official functions, that is, you, Eitingon, Storfer, and in continuation of the former Committee, Ferenczi. He will provide the Americans, among whom there are to be a financier and a banker. I am now asking you for your written agreement to the use of your name.

I am corresponding with Sachs today about an incorrect procedure of your film people.³ One should not, after all, get mixed up with such people.

We are doing splendidly in this lovely summer. I hope your recovery is making great progress, and I expect that your family will prevent you from exceeding your strength at the Congress.

With cordial greetings to all of you.

Yours,

Freud

1.  Typewritten.

2.  Edward Louis Bernays [1891–1995], son of Anna Freud and Eli Bernays.

3.  The UFA had advertised: “In ‘Ufa's' Neumann-Film Geheimnisse einer Seele…everything worth knowing about Psycho-analysis will be disclosed by means of an interesting story.” The New York Times (26 July 1925) had even reported that Freud himself was going to direct the film, and The Times (4 August 1925) had claimed that the film would be “supervised by Professor Freud” (all in Ries, 1995: pp. 765, 771). “The company which turned the heads of Sachs and Abraham, have of course not been able to refrain from proclaiming my ‘agreement' to all the world. I have protested vehemently to Sachs. The N[eue] F[reie] Presse has brought out a correction already today” (Freud to Ferenczi, 14 August 1925).

493A

Sils-Maria, Hotel Edelweiss1
14 August 1925

Dear Professor,

Naturally I fully and gladly agree with the use of my name!

I am very glad to hear that you and yours feel so well and happy. In the circumstances I am not yielding to the temptation to ask you to come to Homburg. But we can surely count on Fräulein Anna, if only because of the Committee meeting!

I am improving from week to week, but certain residues of my illness remain—for instance, my breathing, which is not yet quite freed. But the results of the examination are very favourable and promise a complete restitution of the status quo. My wife has just left for home; I shall stay until the 31st of the month in this, my favourite spot, which is unequalled by anything else in the Alps.—

I am sorry to hear that there has been some upset to do with the film (incidentally, I do not know what), but the work is progressing well and I feel sure that one day you will come round to agreeing with Sachs and myself.

Cordially yours,

Abraham

1.  Postcard.

494A

Sils-Maria, Hotel Edelweiss
20 August 1925

Dear Professor,

When you wrote to me recently about the American affair, I hastened to assure you of my agreement, but I postponed answering the rest of the letter until a later date.

I am so glad to hear continuing good reports of you. Ferenczi too found you well and energetic.¹ However it is painful for me that I see no chance of coming to convince myself in person of this for some time. A year has passed since I had the last “Kück” of you on the Semmering.

Of myself, I can give increasingly good news. Yesterday I had a particularly good day and walked for several hours—very slowly of course and with breaks—and climbed about 400 metres. Certainly a good sign. Other days leave much to be desired, and, particularly for the first hour after getting up, I cough and have difficulty in breathing. I still feel all the time how weakening my illness has been. I hope with confidence that the Engadine air will have helped me even further by the end of this month.

My stay in Sils suits me far better than the first stay in the Bernese Oberland. The level woodland paths along the shores of the lakes, the valleys and slopes have greater variety than I have ever found anywhere else. My wife and I are toying with the phantasy of building a holiday cottage here. This dream will probably be shattered by lack of money, especially as these months of my illness have not done anything to help me financially.

The work on the film is progressing well. Sachs is devoting himself to it and is proving very competent, and I am also trying to do my share. All the same, I agree with you, in view of their advertisement, that one should not have anything to do with these people. Our attitude in the matter is very far removed from theirs. But one thing you will admit, dear Professor: the advertisement is much more harmless than what has happened in our own circle. Storfer's behaviour can really not be judged in any other way than Sachs judged it, to you as well. It seems to me that there is only one way out of the situation: the Verlag must repudiate that notice, if you like, because it was based on inadequate information, and it must be guaranteed that this repudiation is sent faithfully to every place that has received the first notice. As perhaps they may not all wish to print it, the Verlag will have to state toward the respective journals that it is ready to bear the cost of this second notice.2

It can be most clearly seen how little the Verlag was hurt from our side by the fact that already in my first letter on the question of the film I mentioned that the proposed explanatory brochure might well be very lucrative for the Verlag. If it handles the matter sensibly, this income could be ensured for the Verlag even now. At any rate, the firm with which we are working must not be treated with such discourtesy any more.

This letter needs no reply. Whatever you, dear Professor, may think or intend to do about the latter matter, would you please inform Sachs only, so that you are spared the trouble of writing twice.

I shall try to follow your advice not to tire myself too much at the Congress but should like to know, too, how to do this successfully.³

With the most cordial greetings to you and yours,

Yours,

Abraham

1.  Ferenczi had visited Freud on 3 August (Ferenczi to Freud, 27 July 1925).

2.  Bernfeld and Storfer planned to make a rival film, with Bernfeld as script author, and the Verlag had issued a press release in August to the effect that “the Verlag…has itself decided to provide for the production of a psycho-analytic film, so that the danger of a misleading representation or an objectionable or nonsensical bowdlerization may be eliminated” (in Fallend & Reichmayr, 1992: p. 137; translation in Ries, 1995: p. 773)— a barely disguised attack on Abraham and Sachs. Nothing came of this project, however.

3.  The Ninth International Psychoanalytic Congress took place in Bad Homburg, 3–5 September. Presided over by Abraham (who did not give a talk himself), it was opened with Freud's paper on “Some Psychical Consequences of the Anatomical Distinction between the Sexes” (Freud, 1925j), read by Anna. Abraham was re-elected president. Furthermore, an International Training Committee [Internationale Unterrichtskommission] was constituted to deal with the problems of analytic education. (See the Congress report in the Zeitschrift, 1926, 12: 506–528.) Behind the scenes, the conflict raged between Abraham/Sachs and Bernfeld/Storfer about their rival film projects.

495A

Berlin-Grünewald
8 September 1925

Dear Professor,

I started writing a report in Homburg about my impression of the Congress which I intended to send to you. But hundreds of things claimed my attention, and I could not finish it. Meanwhile you have already received first-hand reports about all that happened, and the photograph, which turned out well, is also in your hands. So I prefer to start anew and only to emphasize what I may see somewhat differently from your other informants. To begin with, the assurance that the Congress was scientifically of a satisfying standard and that what I have to report is mainly favourable. It was better attended than Salzburg and more international. America was strongly represented and—to my delight—some of the American colleagues proved more capable and better informed than we had expected. Coriat¹ made the soundest impression on me. Papers given by the others were less good, though Pierce Clark's,² at least, had an interesting core. Among the other papers, there was only one that was really bad, and that was Groddeck's,³ who, at his first talk, seemed full of brilliant ideas but this time was incredibly platitudinous and monotonous. Reik, Ophuijsen, Reich, Alexander, and Róheim all spoke splendidly.⁴ Ferenczi's new statement regarding the problem of therapy⁵ implies a rapprochement that gave me much pleasure, but this time his paper was not as rich as usual in original ideas. Rank tried in a commendable way to come closer to us and we, on our part, have—I believe—helped him in this. On the evening of the banquet I had a lengthy discussion with him which should certainly have a good effect on our future relationship. One thing, however, I could not say to him—that even now he seems really ill to me. He read his paper⁶ at a furious speed, so that no one could follow, and once again all his statements were without foundation and completely unproven. Added to this, the euphoric mood and another journey to America. For me all this means a new manic phase, this time however with more euphoric than irritable colouring. That is why I could not really get any pleasure from our meeting.

His new journey to America is very unwelcome to the Americans, and it would have been better for him not to go. One of my main efforts at the Congress was to establish good personal relations with the Americans, not only in order to provide a counterbalance to the painful incidents of the past year (Rank's appearance, the Newton case, etc.), but also to counteract all ideas about secession. I think the business meeting greatly contributed to this. As regards the “lay analysts”,7 a rapprochement has been reached. The appeal that training should be as uniform as possible in the various countries was sympathetically received, and it would be far more effective to lay down strict demands about this rather than issue printed rules about the acceptance of candidates. Federn's open admission of the mistakes made in Vienna had a favourable effect, as did my own plea for considering the different circumstances in other Societies. The question of discussions at future Congresses was also settled in a satisfactory manner. My re-election took place in a form that I can certainly regard as a vote of confidence. The replacement of the Council, consisting of all the Presidents of Societies by only two representatives, gave me the welcome opportunity of getting Hitschmann nominated to the Executive.

But now I come to the best part of the whole Congress. The news that Fräulein Anna would read a paper of yours evoked spontaneous Freundäusserung [friend-expression]⁸ at the beginning of the Congress, which I wish you could have heard for yourself! Her extremely clear way of speaking did full justice to the contents. But it was not only its scientific content that gave the Congress its brilliant send-off; the personal note in certain trains of thought aroused strong emotions in all of us. The impression that, in the one and a half years since the last Congress, there has been immense improvement in your health and vitality was intensified by the distribution of the latest issue of Imago, containing three of your papers.⁹

Immediately before the Congress, the Frankfurter Zeitung published an article by Drill, who was highly appreciative of Ψα, provided it left religion undisturbed.

On the whole, therefore, I am satisfied with the Congress. I quite understand, incidentally, why you kept away. I really had some exhausting days. All the people who only wanted to speak to me for “half a minute” exacted such an amount of talking from me that I found it a very great strain, and I shall need several days to rest my breathing organs again. I will in any case have to undergo some treatment for my nose and throat from Fliess. If this letter were not already unduly long, I would tell you how my illness has most strikingly confirmed all Fliess's views on periodicity.

I have still to go into the matter in dispute with Storfer and Bernfeld. I have tried every way I could to keep the peace and, not least, exerted myself more than was good for me in these hour-long discussions. But the result was negative. Storfer took an attitude of harsh refusal. Bernfeld openly admitted the mistakes made by him and Storfer, but for the rest I had a really bad impression of him. He tried with the promise of fantastic amounts of dollars to induce me to ignore the agreement I had signed in July, in order to take part in his project. When I showed him that that was inadmissible both legally and morally, he began to make proposals to me that I can only describe as dirty tricks.10 As I hear, he appears subsequently to have taken a different attitude. But my judgement of him, which has never been very favourable, has been confirmed. As little as I would entrust a child's education to him, would I expect anything else good from him. Fortunately we seem to have been able to avoid a controversy in the press. In a discussion about our film this evening I shall try again to do something about it. In addition I want to emphasize once more that Sachs has put too much emotion into this affair, which has perhaps made many things more difficult. But I think this is nothing in comparison with the completely unfair activities of the other side. As you will have heard from Eitingon, Storfer has resigned. But he has flung himself into all questions concerning the Verlag as though he were remaining in office for all time. It is very doubtful whether one should want him to go or stay. It will be hard to match him in enthusiasm and good ideas. On the other hand, he is certainly to blame for the repeated financial crises of the Verlag; he is obviously no good at mathematics. And it is also not very pleasant that everybody dealing with him has always to watch out for his morbid sensitivity.

I am gradually resuming my work, starting with a few hours each day. After these months of scientific sterility, I want first of all to write a short paper on a criminal psychological theme (history of an impostor).¹¹

In the Berliner Tageblatt I found the little story enclosed, which is interesting as a demonstration of the nature of “forebodings” as wishes. Only we would like to know whether it is authentic.

And now, only all good wishes for the remainder of your stay on the Semmering to you and your family, and most cordial greetings!

Yours,

Karl Abraham

Addendum¹²

The dream

The wife of a miner had a terrible dream one night. She dreamt that the walls of the mine-tunnel in which her husband worked caved in, so that all miners were buried. In her dream she saw the dreadfully mutilated bodies being unearthed, and her husband whom she loved was among them.

When she awoke in the morning she hurried to tell her husband the dream and then she implored him not to go down to the depths, for she knew that disaster was imminent. Her husband laughed at first and tried to chase away his wife's forebodings, but then when she did not stop pleading with him, he agreed not to work on that day and asked his wife to report his illness at the office.

He enjoyed the light of the day, which he had to miss most of the time, looked from his lonely room longingly at the countryside, and when it got dark he sat down at the oven-bench and blew blue clouds of tobacco, which he drew from his pipe, in the air. His wife then stepped to him and said gravely:

“The disaster I had seen in my dream came true.”

“No”, he said, “you are joking!”

“By God, I am not joking. A tunnel has caved in; luckily no one is seriously injured. Your comrades have all been brought up, they are well, only a few have small injuries. How good that you gave in to my plea and stayed at home—who knows whether fate would have been as kind to you as to the others.”

He leaned back against the oven, full of amazement and filled with emotions of gratitude.

Then a smoothing iron, which his wife had leaned against the edge of the oven, fell down with its tip exactly onto the most sensitive part of his scull, so that he sank down with a soft scream and died on the spot.

Hans Bethge.

 

1.  Isador Henry Coriat [1875–1943], m.d., founding member and first secretary of the Boston Psychoanalytic Society [1914]. He talked about “The Oral-Erotic Components of Stammering” (Coriat, 1927). Abstracts of this and of the other papers in the Zeitschrift, l.c.

2.  L. Pierce Clark [1870–1933], m.d., neurologist and psychoanalyst in New York, consulting neurologist at Manhattan State Hospital, specialist in epilepsy. He gave a paper on “The Phantasy Method of Analysing Narcissistic Neuroses” (Clark, 1926).

3.  “Psychoanalysis and the It”.

4.  Reik, “The Origin of Psychology” (1925); Ophuijsen, “Some Observations on the Origin of Sadism” (1926); Reich, “On the Structure and Aetiology of ‘Hypochondriacal Neurasthenia'” (not published); Alexander, “Neurosis and the Whole Personality [Gesamtpersönlichkeit]” (1926); Róheim, “The Scapegoat” (not published).

5.  Ferenczi, 1925[269].

6.  “On the Genesis of Genitality” (Rank, 1925).

7.  These words in English in original.

8.  A slip for Freudenäuβerung [rejoicing].

9.  In fact, the number in question contained two articles by Freud (1925e [1924], 1925h).

10.  These two words in English in original.

11.  Abraham, 1923[95].

12.  Newspaper cutting pasted to the original letter.

 

496F

Semmering
11 September 1925

Dear Friend,

So what I feared has happened. The Congress was a great strain on you, and I can only hope that your youth will soon get the better of the disturbance.

Many thanks for the trouble you took in compensating me for my absence by your detailed report. To me the only fully enjoyable thing was your pleasure at the appearance of my paper on the programme. I had not thought of it myself, it was a last-minute idea of my daughter's.

There are many other things I should rather have liked to discuss with you; in writing, differences stand out too luridly. For example, I think the Americans are quite worthless. Coriat is likeable and is, incidentally, not close to the New Yorkers, Jelliffe is very clever and capable, and not very scrupulous. I know P. Clark least well, and the others are not worth consideration. Their resistance against Rank's return is based on the pettiest motives, exactly like their attitude to lay analysis. Rank's latest visit to America is not a manic symptom; there are several important real reasons for it, and I had advised him very definitely to go. Whether I was right will only appear later.

The business of the film, now happily solved, has left me with an unpleasant aftertaste. Imagine what sort of impression it makes when first one, then another, resigns over such a worthless affair. I judge Sachs much more strictly and Bernfeld and Storfer much more mildly than you, and would like to seek the protection of those two against your harshness. Storfer has withdrawn his resignation, he would have been irreplaceable. You cannot maintain that he is to blame for the embarrassments of the Verlag. Like everyone else, he has his foibles, and they call for tolerance. In all these years I have never heard anything bad about Bernfeld.

I do not want to be a Cato, but I do not like the victrix causa¹ of the Ufa. I only hope that Sachs, who is pleading its cause more and more, does not try again to enlist me for it. I should have preferred you too not to have got involved. Our circle has not stood up well to this test. Let us rather turn our attention to worthier causes.

I am staying here until the end of September. The weather is unfortunately very bad, but I hear that you are just as cold in Berlin.

Let me hear of your complete recovery and with cordial greetings from

Your

Freud

1.  After the Latin “Victrix causa diis placuit, sed victa Catoni”: the victorious cause pleased the Gods, but the inferior one pleased Cato (Lucanus [39–65 ad], Pharsalia)—referring to Cato Uticensis, who committed suicide when the cause of the Roman Republic was lost in the wake of Caesar's victories.

497F

Vienna, Berggasse 19¹
16 October 1925

Dear Friend,

Your direct letter² gave me more pleasure, of course, and was more reassuring than all the indirect news. I hope you will soon be able to write and say that in this respect you have become completely uninteresting again.

Your short paper³ is enchanting. I think you should not wait for your turn in Imago, but that it should be used as the introductory article in the next annual series of the Zeitschrift. The subject is interesting enough for physicians too. In one respect I should have stated the train of thought rather differently, I should have emphasized not the deprivation of pleasure but the fact that he could form no superego because he had been unable to achieve an Oedipus complex. The fact that in these circumstances he was able to establish an unconscious need of punishment instead of a normal conscience could be the point of departure for further reflections.

We have almost forgotten the summer, though the weather is now more summer-like than it was at the end on the Semmering. I have interesting work and not too much of it, and am still struggling with my usual minor complaints.

With cordial greetings to you and your family,

Yours,

Freud

1.  Typewritten.

2.  Missing.

3.  Abraham, 1923[95].

498A

Berlin-Grünewald
19 October 1925

Dear Professor,

Your letter has just arrived. You probably already know from the circular letter1 that I am very much better. The process in the lung appears to be healing: I did not completely get over the infection when it occurred the first time in June. The very disagreeable addition of gall-bladder colic has also disappeared and, according to the last examination, the liver enlargement seems to have gone down. I still need to be careful and shall probably resume work at the end of the month, provided no further trouble occurs.

I am so sorry to hear that you are continuously troubled by certain discomforts. As far as I know these are due to a disturbing amount of secretion, and I have been wondering whether a stay in a very dry climate might be beneficial. But I do not know whether you still need to be near your surgeon. You may be interested to hear that Fliess, who heard about your illness two years ago, has repeatedly asked after your health with the warmest interest. As far as I am concerned, I must repeat here once again that I owe him the utmost gratitude.

I gladly accept your hint about the one point in my manuscript on the Impostor. I have, after all, mentioned elsewhere the failure to form an ego-ideal and need only put it more precisely in the place you mention. As far as publication is concerned, Radó had already accepted the manuscript for No. 1 of the Zeitschrift. I heard from Sachs that Imago was short of material and said I agreed to having it published there if necessary. Then Storfer was here and complained to Radó that the next issue of Imago could not be published because it could not be completed. So R. gave him the manuscript, and I think it is already being printed. If I take it back now, I shall cause an awkward situation, so I do not know what to do. Under these circumstances I would like to lay the decision into your hands. Perhaps Fräulein Anna would discuss the matter on the telephone with Storfer, and a way out might be found. I should be very grateful for that. Naturally it is perfectly all right by me for it to appear in the Zeitschrift.

With the most cordial greetings from house to house,

Yours,

Abraham

1.  Letter of 17 October (LOC).

499A

Berlin-Grünewald
27 October 1925

Dear Professor,

Our last correspondence referring to the publication of my short paper (The Impostor) was overtaken by events. I received the proofs for correction some days ago, so that in any case nothing could be done about its publication in Imago. It seems it was needed to fill a gap there. I am now writing an essay of similar length—”Psycho-Analytical Notes on Coué's System of Self-Mastery”1—which leans on your group psychology. Radó wants to include it in Number 1 of 1926, and I shall therefore appear in that issue in a different way.

You know, dear Professor, that I am very unwilling to enter once again into a discussion of the Bernfeld and Storfer affair. But because of your reproach of harshness (in your circular letter), I find myself in the same position again as on several previous occasions. In almost 20 years, we have had no differences of opinion except where personalities were concerned whom I, very much to my regret, had to criticize. The same sequence of events repeated itself each time; you indulgently overlooked everything that could be challenged in the behaviour of the persons concerned, while all the blame—which you subsequently recognized as unjustified—was directed against me. In Jung's case your criticism was that of “jealousy”; in the case of Rank “unfriendly behaviour”, and this time “harshness”. Could the sequence of events not be the same once again? I advanced an opinion that is basically yours as well, but which you did not admit into consciousness. All the unpleasure linked to the relevant facts is then turned against the person who has drawn attention to them.

What has actually happened—I mean on the part of Sachs and myself—that could leave you with so unpleasant an “after-taste”? Neither of us ever thought to plan a Ψα film and to seek a company to make it. We were approached by “Neumann Productions” to work with them because they wanted competent analysts. If we had refused, all the “wild” analysts in Berlin would eagerly have rushed in. The “Ufa” already had “Ψα” film outlines of the most minor sort waiting to be tried. Besides, I told you about the situation immediately, even though I was already ill in bed. In addition, Sachs and I have not done the slightest thing that would have been open to ethical objections.

I know that Sachs got very worked up about the notice issued by Storfer, but that is simply a matter of temperament. But I must say that in the last few months he has worked with more enthusiasm and spirit of self-sacrifice than anyone else would have done.

On the other side there are the following facts: (1.) the nasty notice about the “bowdlerization” directed against Sachs and me. (2.) the offering of Bernfeld's draft to various firms, none of which had spontaneously approached St. and B. (3.) the underhandedness of the letter to Sachs and me, dripping with loyalty while at the same time they sent the notice to the press that I have mentioned. Thus an unfair competitive manoeuvre under the cloak of friendship. (4.) Storfer wrote to Eitingon that he would comply with his instructions. When Eitingon gave him some, he did not follow them. (5.) The “resignation” was an empty gesture. Immediately after announcing his resignation in Homburg, Storfer took part in a meeting about matters of the Verlag (Fräulein Anna was present as well) and let nobody get a word in, but went on developing his plans for the future of the Verlag. The “resignation” was thus as untrue as everything else. I saw this at once but did not protest because I wanted to keep the peace. (Harshness?) (6.) Bernfeld tried to get me to break my word or my contract with regard to the Neumann Company, always juggling with promises of gigantic sums in dollars. After that, he spread it about in Homburg that I wanted to eliminate his film out of greed for money. He knew that Sachs and I had only had a moderate fixed amount for our work, and because of it had accused the Ufa of deceiving us, whereas he had assured us of enormous profits. He left the Congress prematurely because—according to his own statement—he could not bear to be there when I was elected President again. A strange repetition; Rank had said and done exactly the same in Salzburg. (7.) The news that you doubted, dear Professor, certainly did not come from the Ufa. It is as such that the head of the only company that could make such a film in Vienna (Pan-company), Dr Robert Wiene, gave Sachs the verbal explanation that St. and B. had approached “Pan” with the statement that they had an offer from the Ufa but were waiting in Homburg for an even higher one from the American side. Negotiations came to a swift and negative end.

These are a few main points that show that on that side an underhanded and untruthful game was being played from the very beginning.

And where is the harshness I am accused of? Sachs and I demanded that the notice in the press should be withdrawn; that did not happen. The “satisfaction” given to us was St.'s resignation, which—as I have said—was only a manner of speaking. We gave in and did everything to keep the “Ufa” out of all proceedings, and we did it successfully. As I have recently mentioned, I am corresponding with Storfer as though nothing had happened. Thus we gave in all along the line, and when some time ago you wrote about the “causa victrix of the Ufa”, it was a great mistake. So what is there left that could be called harshness on our part? Only a few open statements in the circular letters (and in other correspondence), which is actually intended for free utterances. In addition, as far as my means of voice allowed, I mediated and smoothed things over in Homburg at every turn, and the whole of my behaviour within the Society makes it improbable that I would be so hard and harsh towards a few people.

Much as I regret it, I cannot alter my opinion of Bernfeld and Storfer. The former is a talented person, but one for whom the boundaries between reality and phantasy, between idealistic love of truth and instinctive compulsive pseudologia are completely blurred. I have always had a personal sympathy for Storfer; I have always patiently put up with his peculiarities in respect to his earlier illness, and have come to terms with him in all earlier cases. I also value his enthusiasm for the Verlag and his good ideas; only a few days before that notice appeared in the press I had written to him in a friendly way, most warmly recognizing the excellence of the idea of the Almanach2 and how it was carried out in detail. But I have absolutely no doubt that this pitiable person is in his ambivalence helping the Verlag with one hand and harming it with the other. You know better than I into what constantly renewed difficulties the Verlag has fallen through his bad management, and it is to be wondered whether the harm does not greatly outweigh the good. I cannot decide this question.

This whole affair is to me a bagatelle that I should have liked to pass over long ago to return to the order of the day. But it gives me pain to have aroused your displeasure once again, although I am certain that this time, as on previous occasions, you will one day reconsider your judgement of me; but I on my part wanted to do everything to get the facts clear. I am, with kindest regards to you and your family, in unaltered and unalterable cordiality!

Yours,

Karl Abraham

1.  Abraham, 1926[115], published posthumously.

2.  The Almanach (first issue 1926; from 1930 on Almanach der Psychoanalyse), ed. Storfer, a yearly periodical containing reprints and original works of a more popular character.

500F

Vienna, Berggasse 19
5 November 1925

Dear Friend,

I note with pleasure that your illness has not changed you in any way, and I am willing to regard you as having again recovered. That takes a great load off my mind.

It does not make a deep impression on me that I cannot be converted to your point of view in the affair B-St film. There are things that I see differently and things that I know differently. The ready admission that B. and St. were in the wrong gives me a right to point out the errors of the other side. I do not find Sachs's threat to resign any more praiseworthy than Storfer's; the behaviour of the Ufa towards me was so incorrect that I lost patience and made my own denial instead of waiting for the promised denial. Because of your complaint that St. did not comply after Eitingon had reached his decision, I turned directly to Eitingon, and from him I learned the contrary.1

Let us also not give too much play to repetition compulsion. You were certainly right about Jung, and not quite so right about Rank. That matter took a different course and would have passed more easily if it had not been taken so very seriously in Berlin. It is still quite possible that you may be even less right in the matter with which we are concerned now. It does not have to be the case that you are always right. But should you turn out to be right this time too, nothing would prevent me from once again admitting it.

With that, let us close the argument about something that you yourself describe as a bagatelle. Such differences of opinion can never be avoided, but only quickly overcome.

What matters more to me is to hear whether you intend to stay in Berlin or spend the winter in a milder climate. I am not quite sure in my mind what to wish for you, but in any case let the outcome be that you cause us no more worry.

With cordial greetings to you and your wife and children.

Yours,

Freud

1.  On 30 October 1925 Freud had sent Abraham's letter of 27 October to Eitingon with the request “to hear from you, who witnessed everything, if I really do A. an injustice and if I am misled by sympathy for those who live nearer to me” (SFC). Eitingon's answer of 3 November sharply criticized Abraham, his “harshness”, “lack of humour”, “love for himself”, “intellectual self-righteousness” and “moral contentedness” (ibid.).