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Early in 1936, Sigmund Freud wrote an open letter to French author Romain Rolland in anticipation of Rolland's 70th birthday. Among Freud scholars, the letter has been placed on a shelf above those containing most of the missives that Freud wrote. This elevation is owing, in part, to the theory and explication the letter contains. Not a paean to Rolland, the letter instead is a psychoanalytic essay, an exercise in self-analysis.
Although the letter is untitled, Freud inserted a heading after two paragraphs of salutations: “Eine Erinnerungsstörung auf der Akropolis” (1936). Both James Strachey, the most imminent of Freud translators, who first translated the letter in 1941, and Shaun Whiteside, who translated the letter approximately a decade ago, have the phrase the same: “A Disturbance of Memory on the Acropolis,” and this is how the letter has come to be known in the English-speaking world.
Erinnerungsstörung is a compound word that gives a sense of disorder or frustration, as well as remembrance. It might make us think of a generally dependable process malfunctioning. Freud wanted Rolland to know there is something to be distrusted in this particular memory.
In the letter, Freud recalled a short vacation in the Mediterranean taken thirty-two years prior. An acquaintance had suggested that Freud go to Athens instead of Corfu. After expressing