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The ‘analyst’ to whom I had gone for ‘cure’ said it would require about twelve sessions to dispel the anxiety from which I was suffering after my scholastic and athletic failures at Oxford. As I could muster the requisite fee for twelve sessions by using the remainder of my army gratuity, I took the plunge. In due course I exhausted my resources for the twelve sessions so I borrowed from a colleague (as he now was but who before the war had been my history master) and, since he was a kindly man, my ‘analyst’, who allowed me to accumulate a debt. It was in the course of being ‘analysed’ that I had been sacked from my job, sacked by my extremely beautiful fiancée, and was well on the way to failing to get medically qualified also. The debts amounted to about £70 to my analyst and £30 to my colleague. The sum of £100 was truly terrifying to me in my parlous state; in contrast to my finances, the acquisition of a fund of failure seemed to be inexhaustible. So I stopped my attempts to be cured.
In this context it was very comforting to be offered a chance of curing an adolescent boy, the son of an army General, by using the same methods as had been – so far – unable to achieve the anticipated cure.
Who anticipated it – you or your analyst?
I don't know how much I believed it. I had half believed the surgeon's story that my torn cartilage would be fit for the Varsity Match. But I didn't consider that a half-belief, or even a half-cure, warranted my risking Oxford's chance to beat Cambridge, and accordingly told a disappointed Moresby-White that I could not be included in the team. I did not, however, tell the Dean of the Medical School that I was no good as a prospect for the UCH cup final team. After all, having a torn cartilage was not likely to stop me being a doctor so I do
not consider myself at fault in being accepted as a medical student on the strength of my non-existent capacity as a rugger player.
My ‘Feel it in the Past’ analyst –
You have not explained this phras