You do not currently have permission to view the full text for this document. Please sign in to an account with an active subscription or contact support.
Freud: The Unconscious and World Affairs, by René Major and Chantal Talagrand, is a new French biography of Freud that was recently translated into English. René Major practices psychoanalysis in Paris and has published a number of books. He was director of the Institut de psychanalyse de Paris and founded the journal Confrontation, which sought to link art, literature, philosophy, and psychoanalysis, an effort that also informs his book about Freud. Chantal Talagrand is also a psychoanalyst practicing in Paris. She teaches at the Institut des hautes etudes en psychoanalyse, “where she conducts a seminar on the relation between psychoanalysis, criminology, and law” (p. xi). Former chief editor of the magazines Cahiers, Confrontation, and Contretemps, she has also published many articles.
A considerable number of major biographies of Freud have appeared since the first, by Fritz Wittels, which has largely been forgotten, and the hagiographic three volumes written by Ernest Jones (1953-1957), which I think give a better account of its subject's life than of his theories. The book under review follows two other recent biographies: Elizabeth Roudinesco's Freud: In His Time and Ours (2016) and Joel Whitebook's Freud: An Intellectual Biography (2017). This resurgent interest in Freud's life calls for some explanation, but a persuasive one is hard to come by. Why go back to Freud? I think this trend has something to do with the failure of anyone else to offer convincing theories of pathogenesis, development, treatment, and cure, or a coherent theory of how the mind works. Neuropharmacology, neuropsychologies, relational psychology, self psychology, and CBT all were celebrated when first introduced, but none have fulfilled their early promise. Although they have offered