Some neurotic mechanisms in jealousy, paranoia and homosexuality 4 страница

When, during his last years, he came to know psycho-analysis, it seemed to him to promise the fulfilment of his two great wishes. He set himself the task of helping the masses by psycho-analysis and of making use of the therapeutic effects of that medical technique, which had hitherto only been at the service of the rich, in order to mitigate the neurotic suffering of the poor. Since the State took no heed of the neuroses of the common people, since hospital clinics for the most part rejected psycho-analytic therapy without being able to offer any substitute for it, and since the few psycho-analytic physicians, tied by the necessity for maintaining themselves, were unequal to such a gigantic task, Anton von Freund sought, by his private initiative, to open a path for every one towards the fulfilment of this important social duty. During the years of the war he had collected what was then the very considerable sum of one and a half million kronen for humanitarian purposes in the city of Budapest. With the concurrence of Dr Stephan von Bárczy, the then Burgomaster, he assigned this sum for the foundation of a psycho-analytic Institute in Budapest, in which analysis was to be practised, taught and made accessible to the people. It was intended to train a considerable number of physicians in this Institute who would then receive an honorarium from it for the treatment of poor neurotics in an out-patient clinic. The Institute, furthermore, was to be a centre for further scientific research in analysis. Dr. Ferenczi was to be the scientific head of the Institute; von Freund himself was to undertake its organization and finances. The founder handed over a relatively smaller sum to Professor Freud for the foundation of an international psycho-analytic publishing house. But,

Was sind Hoffnungen, was sind Entwürfe,

die der Mensch, der vergängliche, baut?

Von Freund’s premature death has put an end to these philanthropic schemes, with all their scientific hopes. Though the fund which he collected is still in existence, the attitude of those who are now in power in the Hungarian capital gives no promise that his intentions will be fulfilled. Only the psycho-analytical publishing house has come to birth in Vienna.

None the less, the example which von Freund sought to set has already had its effect. A few weeks after his death, thanks to the energy and liberality of Dr. Max Eitingon, the first psycho-analytical out-patients’ clinic has been opened in Berlin. Thus von Freund’s work is carried on, though he himself can never be replaced or forgotten.

PREFACE TO J. J. PUTNAM’S ADDRESSES ON PSYCHO-ANALYSIS

(1921)

The editor of this series must feel a special satisfaction in being able to issue as its opening volume this collection of the psycho-analytical writings of Professor James J. Putnam, the distinguished neurologist of Harvard University. Professor Putnam, who died in 1918 at the age of seventy-two, was not only the first American to interest himself in psycho-analysis, but soon became its most decided supporter and its most influential representative in America. In consequence of the established reputation which he had gained through his activities as a teacher, as well as through his important work in the domain of organic nervous disease, and thanks to the universal respect which his personality enjoyed, he was able to do perhaps more than anyone for the spread of psycho-analysis in his own country, and was able to protect it from aspersions which, on the other side of the Atlantic no less than this, would inevitably have been cast upon it. But all such reproaches were bound to be silenced when a man of Putnam’s lofty ethical standards and moral rectitude had ranged himself among the supporters of the new science and of the therapeutics based upon it.

The papers here collected into a single volume, which were written by Putnam between 1909 and the end of his life, give a good picture of his relations to psycho-analysis. They show how he was at first occupied in correcting a provisional judgement which was based on insufficient knowledge; how he then accepted the essence of analysis, recognized its capacity for throwing a clear light upon the origin of human imperfections and failings, and how he was struck by the prospect of contributing towards the improvement of humanity along analytical lines; how he then became convinced by his own activities as a physician as to the truth of most of the psycho-analytical conclusions and postulates, and then in his turn bore witness to the fact that the physician who makes use of analysis understands far more about the sufferings of his patients and can do far more for them than was possible with the earlier methods of treatment; and finally how he began to extend beyond the limits of analysis, demanding that as a science it should be linked on to a particular philosophical system, and that its practice should be openly associated with a particular set of ethical doctrines.

So it is not to be wondered at that a mind with such pre-eminently ethical and philosophical tendencies as Putnam’s should have desired, after he had plunged deep into psycho-analysis, to establish the closest relation between it and the aims which lay nearest his heart. But his enthusiasm, so admirable in a man of his advanced age, did not succeed in carrying others along with him. Younger people remained cooler. It was especially Ferenczi who expressed the opposite view. The decisive reason for the rejection of Putnam’s proposals was the doubt as to which of the countless philosophical systems should be accepted, since they all seemed to rest on an equally insecure basis, and since everything had up till then been sacrificed for the sake of the relative certainty of the results of psycho-analysis. It seemed more prudent to wait, and to discover whether a particular attitude towards life might be forced upon us with all the weight of necessity by analytical investigation itself.

It is our duty to express our thanks to the author’s widow, Mrs. Putnam, for her assistance with the manuscripts, with the copyrights, and with financial support, without all of which the publication of this volume would have been impossible. No English manuscripts were forthcoming in the case of the papers numbered VI, VII, and X. They have been translated into English by Dr. Katherine Jones from the German text which originated from Putnam himself.

This volume will keep fresh in analytical circles the memory of the friend whose loss we so profoundly deplore. May it be the first of a series of publications which shall serve the end of furthering the understanding and application of psycho-analysis among those who speak the English tongue - an end to which James J. Putnam dedicated the last ten years of his fruitful life.

January 1921

INTRODUCTION TO J. VARENDONCK’S THE PSYCHOLOGY OF DAY-DREAMS

(1921)

This present volume of Dr. Varendonck’s contains a significant novelty, and will justly arouse the interest of all philosophers, psychologists and psycho-analysts. After an effort lasting for some years the author has succeeded in getting hold of the mode of thought-activity to which one abandons oneself during the state of distraction into which we readily pass before sleep or upon incomplete awakening. He has brought to the consciousness the chains of thought originating in these conditions without the interference of the will; he has written them down, studied their peculiarities and differences with directed conscious thinking, and has made thereby a series of important discoveries which lead to still vaster problems and give rise to the formulation of still more far-reaching questions. Many a point in the psychology of the dream and the defective act finds, thanks to the observations of Dr. Varendonck, a trustworthy settlement.

It is not my intention to give a review of the author’s results. I will content myself with pointing to the significance of his work and will permit myself only a remark concerning the terminology which he has adopted. He includes the sort of thought-activity which he has observed in Bleuler’s autistic thinking, but calls it, as a rule, fore-conscious thinking, according to the custom prevailing in psycho-analysis. However, the autistic thinking of Bleuler does not by any means correspond with the extension and the contents of the fore-conscious, neither can I admit that the name used by Bleuler has been happily chosen. The designation ‘fore-conscious’ thinking itself as a characteristic appears to me misleading and unsatisfactory. The point in question is that the sort of thought-activity of which the well-known day-dream is an example - complete by itself, developing a situation or an act that is being brought to a close - constitutes the best and until now the only studied example. This day-dreaming does not owe its peculiarities to the circumstances that it proceeds mostly fore-consciously, nor are the forms changed when it is accomplished consciously. From another point of view we know also that even strictly directed reflection may be achieved without the co-operation of consciousness, that is to say, fore-consciously. For that reason I think it is advisable, when establishing a distinction between the different modes of thought-activity, not to utilize the relation to consciousness in the first instance, and to designate the day-dream, as well as the chains of thought studied by Varendonck, as freely wandering or phantastic thinking, in opposition to intentionally directed reflection. At the same time it should be taken into consideration that even phantastic thinking is not invariably in want of an aim and end-representations.3

MEDUSA’S HEAD (1940 [1922])

We have not often attempted to interpret individual mythological themes, but an interpretation suggests itself easily in the case of the horrifying decapitated head of Medusa.

To decapitate = to castrate. The terror of Medusa is thus a terror of castration that is linked to the sight of something. Numerous analyses have made us familiar with the occasion for this: it occurs when a boy, who has hitherto been unwilling to believe the threat of castration, catches sight of the female genitals, probably those of an adult, surrounded by hair, and essentially those of his mother.

The hair upon Medusa’s head is frequently represented in works of art in the form of snakes, and these once again are derived from the castration complex. It is a remarkable fact that, however frightening they may be in themselves, they nevertheless serve actually as a mitigation of the horror, for they replace the penis, the absence of which is the cause of the horror. This is a confirmation of the technical rule according to which a multiplication of penis symbols signifies castration.

The sight of Medusa’s head makes the spectator stiff with terror, turns him to stone. Observe that we have here once again the same origin from the castration complex and the same transformation of affect! For becoming stiff means an erection. Thus in the original situation it offers consolation to the spectator: he is still in possession of a penis, and the stiffening reassures him of the fact.

This symbol of horror is worn upon her dress by the virgin goddess Athene. And rightly so, for thus she becomes a woman who is unapproachable and repels all sexual desires - since she displays the terrifying genitals of the Mother. Since the Greeks were in the main strongly homosexual, it was inevitable that we should find among them a representation of woman as a being who frightens and repels because she is castrated.

If Medusa’s head takes the place of a representation of the female genitals, or rather if it isolates their horrifying effects from their pleasure-giving ones, it may be recalled that displaying the genitals is familiar in other connections as an apotropaic act. What arouses horror in oneself will produce the same effect upon the enemy against whom one is seeking to defend oneself. We read in Rabelais of how the Devil took to flight when the woman showed him her vulva.

The erect male organ also has an apotropaic effect, but thanks to another mechanism. To display the penis (or any of its surrogates) is to say: ‘I am not afraid of you. I defy you. I have a penis.’ Here, then, is another way of intimidating the Evil Spirit.

In order seriously to substantiate this interpretation it would be necessary to investigate the origin of this isolated symbol of horror in Greek mythology as well as parallels to it in other mythologies.4

THE EGO AND THE ID (1923)

The present discussions are a further development of some trains of thought which I opened up in Beyond the Pleasure Principle (1920g), and to which, as I remarked there, my attitude was one of a kind of benevolent curiosity. In the following pages these thoughts are linked to various facts of analytic observation and an attempt is made to arrive at new conclusions from this conjunction; in the present work, however, there are no fresh borrowings from biology, and on that account it stands closer to psycho-analysis than does Beyond the Pleasure Principle. It is more in the nature of a synthesis than of a speculation and seems to have had an ambitious aim in view. I am conscious, however, that it does not go beyond the roughest outline and with that limitation I am perfectly content.

In these pages things are touched on which have not yet been the subject of psycho-analytic consideration, and it has not been possible to avoid trenching upon some theories which have been put forward by non-analysts or by former analysts on their retreat from analysis. I have elsewhere always been ready to acknowledge what I owe to other workers; but in this instance I feel burdened by no such debt of gratitude. If psycho-analysis has not hitherto shown its appreciation of certain things, this has never been because it overlooked their achievement or sought to deny their importance, but because it followed a particular path, which had not yet led so far. And finally, when it has reached them, things have a different look to it from what they have to others.

ICONSCIOUSNESS AND WHAT IS UNCONSCIOUS

In this introductory chapter there is nothing new to be said and it will not be possible to avoid repeating what has often been said before. The division of the psychical into what is conscious and what is unconscious is the fundamental premiss of psycho-analysis; and it alone makes it possible for psycho-analysis to understand the pathological processes in mental life, which are as common as they are important, and to find a place for them in the framework of science. To put it once more, in a different way: psycho-analysis cannot situate the essence of the psychical in consciousness, but is obliged to regard consciousness as a quality of the psychical, which may be present in addition to other qualities or may be absent.

If I could suppose that everyone interested in psychology would read this book, I should also be prepared to find that at this point some of my readers would already stop short and would go no further; for here we have the first shibboleth of psycho-analysis. To most people who have been educated in philosophy the idea of anything psychical which is not also conscious is so inconceivable that it seems to them absurd and refutable simply by logic. I believe this is only because they have never studied the relevant phenomena of hypnosis and dreams, which - quite apart from pathological manifestations -necessitate this view. Their psychology of consciousness is incapable of solving the problems of dreams and hypnosis.8

‘Being conscious’ is in the first place a purely descriptive term, resting on perception of the most immediate and certain character. Experience goes on to show that a psychical element (for instance, an idea) is not as a rule conscious for a protracted length of time. On the contrary, a state of consciousness is characteristically very transitory; an idea that is conscious now is no longer so a moment later, although it can become so again under certain conditions that are easily brought about. In the interval the idea was - we do not know what. We can say that it was latent, and by this we mean that it was capable of becoming conscious at any time. Or, if we say that is was unconscious, we shall also be giving a correct description of it. Here ‘unconscious’ coincides with ‘latent and capable of becoming conscious’. The philosophers would no doubt object: ‘No, the term "unconscious" is not applicable here; so long as the idea was in a state of latency it was not anything psychical at all.’ To contradict them at this point would lead to nothing more profitable than a verbal dispute.

But we have arrived at the term or concept of the unconscious along another path, by considering certain experiences in which mental dynamics play a part. We have found - that is, we have been obliged to assume - that very powerful mental processes or ideas exist (and here a quantitative or economic factor comes into question for the first time) which can produce all the effects in mental life that ordinary ideas do (including effects that can in their turn become conscious as ideas), though they themselves do not become conscious. It is unnecessary to repeat in detail here what has been explained so often before. It is enough to say that at this point psycho-analytic theory steps in and asserts that the reason why such ideas cannot become conscious is that a certain force opposes them, that otherwise they could become conscious, and that it would then be apparent how little they differ from other elements which are admittedly psychical. The fact that in the technique of psycho-analysis a means has been found by which the opposing force can be removed and the ideas in question made conscious renders this theory irrefutable. The state in which the ideas existed before being made conscious is called by us repression, and we assert that the force which instituted the repression and maintains it is perceived as resistance during the work of analysis

Thus we obtain our concept of the unconscious from the theory of repression. The repressed is the prototype of the unconscious for us. We see, however, that we have two kinds of unconscious - the one which is latent but capable of becoming conscious, and the one which is repressed and which is not, in itself and without more ado, capable of becoming conscious. This piece of insight into psychical dynamics cannot fail to affect terminology and description. The latent, which is unconscious only descriptively, not in the dynamic sense, we call preconscious; we restrict the term unconscious to the dynamically unconscious repressed; so that now we have three terms, conscious (Cs.), preconscious (Pcs.), and unconscious (Ucs.), whose sense is no longer purely descriptive. The Pcs. is presumably a great deal closer to the Cs. than is the Ucs., and since we have called the Ucs. psychical we shall with even less hesitation call the latent Pcs. psychical. But why do we not rather, instead of this, remain in agreement with the philosophers and, in a consistent way, distinguish the Pcs. as well as the Ucs. from the conscious psychical? The philosophers would then propose that the Pcs. and the Ucs. should be described as two species or stages of the ‘psychoid’, and harmony would be established. But end less difficulties in exposition would follow; and the one important fact, that these two kinds of ‘psychoid’ coincide in almost every other respect with what is admittedly psychical, would be forced into the background in the interests of a prejudice dating from a period in which these psychoids, or the most important part of them, were still unknown.

We can now play about comfortably with our three terms, Cs., Pcs., and Ucs., so long as we do not forget that in the descriptive sense there are two kinds of unconscious, but in the dynamic sense only one. For purposes of exposition this distinction can in some cases be ignored, but in others it is of course indispensable. At the same time, we have become more or less accustomed to this ambiguity of the unconscious and have managed pretty well with it. As far as I can see, it is impossible to avoid this ambiguity; the distinction between conscious and unconscious is in the last resort a question of perception, which must be answered ‘yes’ or ‘no’, and the act of perception itself tells us nothing of the reason why a thing is or is not perceived. No one has a right to complain because the actual phenomenon expresses the dynamic factor ambiguously.¹

¹ This may be compared so far with my ‘Note on the Unconscious in Psycho-Analysis’ (1912g). A new turn taken by criticisms of the unconscious deserves consideration at this point. Some investigators, who do not refuse to recognize the facts of psycho-analysis but who are unwilling to accept the unconscious, find a way out of the difficulty in the fact, which no one contests, that in consciousness (regarded as a phenomenon) it is possible to distinguish a great variety of gradations in intensity or clarity. Just as there are processes which are very vividly, glaringly, and tangibly conscious, so we also experience others which are only faintly, hardly even noticeably conscious; those that are most faintly conscious are, it is argued, the ones to which psycho-analysis wishes to apply the unsuitable name ‘unconscious’. These too, however (the argument proceeds), are conscious or ‘in consciousness’, and can be made fully and intensely conscious if sufficient attention is paid to them.

In so far as it is possible to influence by arguments the decision of a question of this kind which depends either on convention or on emotional factors, we may make the following comments. The reference to gradations of clarity in consciousness is in no way conclusive and has no more evidential value than such analogous statements as: ‘There are so very many gradations in illumination - from the most glaring and dazzling light to the dimmest glimmer - therefore there is no such thing as darkness at all’; or, ‘There are varying degrees of vitality, therefore there is no such thing as death.’ Such statements may in a certain way have a meaning, but for practical purposes they are worthless. This will be seen if one tries to draw particular conclusions from them, such as, ‘there is therefore no need to strike a light’, or, ‘therefore all organisms are immortal’. Further, to include ‘what is unnoticeable’ under the concept of ‘what is conscious’ is simply to play havoc with the one and only piece of direct and certain knowledge that we have about the mind. And after all, a consciousness of which one knows nothing seems to me a good deal more absurd than something mental that is unconscious. Finally, this attempt to equate what is unnoticed with what is unconscious is obviously made without taking into account the dynamic conditions involved, which were the decisive factors in forming the psycho-analytic view. For it ignores two facts: first, that it is exceedingly difficult and requires very great effort to concentrate enough attention on something unnoticed of this kind; and secondly, that when this has been achieved the thought which was previously unnoticed is not recognized by consciousness, but often seems entirely alien and opposed to it and is promptly disavowed by it. Thus, seeking refuge from the unconscious in what is scarcely noticed or unnoticed is after all only a derivative of the preconceived belief which regards the identity of the psychical and the conscious as settled once and for all.

In the further course of psycho-analytic work, however, even these distinctions have proved to be inadequate and, for practical purposes, insufficient. This has become clear in more ways than one; but the decisive instance is as follows. We have formed the idea that in each individual there is a coherent organization of mental processes; and we call this his ego. It is to this ego that consciousness is attached; the ego controls the approaches to motility - that is, to the discharge of excitations into the external world; it is the mental agency which supervises all its own constituent processes, and which goes to sleep at night, though even then it exercises the censorship on dreams. From this ego proceed the repressions, too, by means of which it is sought to exclude certain trends in the mind not merely from consciousness but also from other forms of effectiveness and activity. In analysis these trends which have been shut out stand in opposition to the ego, and the analysis is faced with the task of removing the resistances which the ego displays against concerning itself with the repressed. Now we find during analysis that, when we put certain tasks before the patient, he gets into difficulties; his associations fail when they should be coming near the repressed. We then tell him that he is dominated by a resistance; but he is quite unaware of the fact, and, even if he guesses from his unpleasurable feelings that a resistance is now at work in him, he does not know what it is or how to describe it. Since, however, there can be no question but that this resistance emanates from his ego and belongs to it, we find ourselves in an unforeseen situation. We have come upon something in the ego itself which is also unconscious, which behaves exactly like the repressed - that is, which produces powerful effects without itself being conscious and which requires special work before it can be made conscious. From the point of view of analytic practice, the consequence of this discovery is that we land in endless obscurities and difficulties if we keep to our habitual forms of expression and try, for instance, to derive neuroses from a conflict between the conscious and the unconscious. We shall have to substitute for this antithesis another, taken from our insight into the structural conditions of the mind - the antithesis between the coherent ego and the repressed which is split off from it.¹

¹ Cf. Beyond the Pleasure Principle (1920g).2

For our conception of the unconscious, however, the consequences of our discovery are even more important. Dynamic considerations caused us to make our first correction; our insight into the structure of the mind leads to the second. We recognize that the Ucs. does not coincide with the repressed; it is still true that all that is repressed is Ucs., but not all that is Ucs. is repressed. A part of the ego, too - and Heaven knows how important a part - may be Ucs., undoubtedly is Ucs. And this Ucs. belonging to the ego is not latent like the Pcs.; for if it were, it could not be activated without becoming Cs., and the process of making it conscious would not encounter such great difficulties. When we find ourselves thus confronted by the necessity of postulating a third Ucs., which is not repressed, we must admit that the characteristic of being unconscious begins to lose significance for us. It becomes a quality which can have many meanings, a quality which we are unable to make, as we should have hoped to do, the basis of far-reaching and inevitable conclusions. Nevertheless we must beware of ignoring this characteristic, for the property of being conscious or not is in the last resort our one beacon-light in the darkness of depth-psychology.

II THE EGO AND THE ID

Pathological research has directed our interest too exclusively to the repressed. We should like to learn more about the ego, now that we know that it, too, can be unconscious in the proper sense of the word. Hitherto the only guide we have had during our investigations has been the distinguishing mark of being conscious or unconscious; we have finally come to see how ambiguous this can be. Now all our knowledge is invariably bound up with consciousness. We can come to know even the Ucs, only by making it conscious. But stop, how is that possible? What does it mean when we say ‘making something conscious’? How can that come about?

We already know the point from which we have to start in this connection. We have said that consciousness is the surface of the mental apparatus; that is, we have ascribed it as a function to a system which is spatially the first one reached from the external world - and spatially not only in the functional sense but, on this occasion, also in the sense of anatomical dissection.¹ Our investigations too must take this perceiving surface as a starting-point.

All perceptions which are received from without (sense-perceptions) and from within - what we call sensations and feelings - are Cs. from the start. But what about those internal processes which we may - roughly and inexactly - sum up under the name of thought-processes? They represent displacements of mental energy which are effected somewhere in the interior of the apparatus as this energy proceeds on its way towards action. Do they advance to the surface, which causes consciousness to be generated? Or does consciousness make its way to them? This is clearly one of the difficulties that arise when one begins to take the spatial or ‘topographical’ idea of mental life seriously. Both these possibilities are equally unimaginable, there must be a third alternative.

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