Federn's Annotation of Freud's Theory of Anxiety

DURING THE last few years of his life, Federn conducted a seminar on Freud's works. While almost the entire time was devoted to the exposition of Freud's ideas, Federn would on occasion refer to and explain some of his own observations and concepts of ego psychology. The last book discussed was Hemmung, Symptom und Angst, or The Problem of Anxiety as it is called in the Bunker translation (2). Federn left me this book. In its margins he wrote a liberal number of annotations, 1 done presumably when he was reviewing the material in preparation for the seminar. It seemed a fitting way to honor the memory of Federn on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of his death to present herewith these distinctive and challenging marginalia. Many annotations are quoted fully; some are summarized. The organization of the material falls naturally into two related domains: Federn's distinctive views on the nature and functioning of the ego on the one hand, and those on anxiety on the other. For the sake of greater clarity it was decided to include only the marginalia dealing with these subjects in so far as they interrelate. Fortunately, these constitute the largest number.2