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IN THE DISCUSSION OF ANIMAL PHOBIAS in "Inhibitions, Symptoms and Anxiety," besides the well-known cases of Little Hans and the Wolf Man, Freud (1926) briefly mentions a third patient, a young American. The American as a child "had been sexually excited by a fantastic children's story … about an Arab chief who pursued a 'ginger-bread man' so as to eat him up. He identified himself with this edible person, and the Arab chief was easily recognizable as a father substitute" (p. 105). The book is not referenced.
L. Frank Baum, the author of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz(1900) and the popular Oz sequels, wrote a lesser known American fairy tale John Dough and the Cherub in 1906. John Dough is the vulnerable gingerbread man who eluded the voracious Arab. Not only does the unusual plot make it clear that this is the story that impressed the young American, but its publication in America antidated Freud's book by twenty years. This would be time enough for the child to mature and enter into treatment with Freud.
The Arab is indeed the father to the gingerbread man; his most precious possession, the Great Elixir, is inadvertently mixed with gingerbread batter and produces life in John Dough. To regain this Essence of Vitality, the Arab vows to