The Work of Erich Fromm:—Summing and Evaluation1

ERICH FROMM WAS BORN IN Frankfurt a.m. Germany on March 23, 1900. On the father's side, there has been a long rabbinical tradition and Fromm had an opportunity to familiarize himself with the teachings of the Talmud since his childhood.

The concepts of the Old Testament, the radical humanism of Karl Marx, and the pessimistically tinged psychoanalytic discoveries of Freud represent cornerstones in Fromm's concept of man. His academic background was in the field of psychology, sociology and philosophy. Fromm obtained his Ph.D. at the University of Heidelberg at the age of twenty-two. He went for further studies to the University of Munich, and later on, moved to Berlin where he became a member of the Berlin Psychoanalytic Institute. His training analysis was with Hans Sachs and he was graduated from the Berlin Psychoanalytic Institute in 1931. The Psychoanalytic Institute in Frankfurt, Germany was co-founded by Fromm and Frieda Fromm-Reichmann.

Fromm received an invitation from Franz Alexander to join the Chicago Psychoanalytic Institute and came to the United States in 1933. About a year later he moved to New York City where he assumed an active role as a teacher, practicing analyst and writer. He was among a small group of psychoanalysts who founded the William Alanson White Institute in New York whose director was Clara Thompson. Later Fromm moved to Bennington where he taught and practiced while maintaining his association with the William Alanson White Institute. In 1949 he moved to Mexico where he received a professorship in psychiatry at the University of