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Even though Freud abandoned the use of hypnosis as a therapeutic tool, he never lost interest in achieving a satisfactory theoretical understanding of the phenomenon.1 In this paper we shall review Freud's continuing theoretical confrontations with hypnosis, from his prepsychoanalytic days to his final major statement on the subject. In addition, we shall explore the complementary influence of Freud's attempts to answer questions concerning hypnosis and his development of psychoanalytic concepts.
Freud's first major experience with hypnosis was in 1886 when he studied with Charcot at the Salpêtriére in Paris. This began a period of several years of combined theoretical and clinical interest in hypnotism. For example, soon after he returned to Vienna in 1886, Freud gave two lectures on the subject, one before the Vienna Physiological Club and one before the Psychiatric Society (Jones, 1953, p. 229). Freud's first publication on hypnosis came early in 1888, a brief favorable review of Obersteiner's 1887 monograph, Der Hypnotismus mit besonderer Berücksichtig ung Seiner Klinischen und Forensischen Bedeutung (Hypnotism with special consideration of its clinical and forensic significance). A few months