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Dear Sirs,
In Free Associations (1993, Vol. 3, Part 4, pp. 500-502) Ms. Evelyn Heintges reports on the recent conflict (now settled) in connection with the journal Psyche. Perhaps I may be allowed to make a number of remarks serving to correct and supplement the impression given in the article.
As Ms. Heintges herself concedes, it is “hard to distinguish objective arguments from polemic derived from bitterness”. Nevertheless, it does need to be said that some of the assertions made in the article are objectively false and could easily have been avoided if Ms. Heintges had approached Margarete Mitscherlich as well as Helmut Dahmer for her information.
Ms. Heintges' assertion that “the renowned Frankfurt psychoanalytic journal Psyche does not exist anymore” is not true. The journal is alive and well and appears monthly under its original title, Psyche. The misunderstanding probably derives from the fact that there was a brief period when, due to the controversies about the future of the journal, it was necessary to choose a temporary alternative title, Psychoanalyse—Klinik und Kulturkritik (Vol. 46, 1992, Parts 2 and 3). Since the settlement of the differences, however, (since April 1992) Psyche has been appearing under its original name. The “enigmatic change of the title” thus lasted only two months.
Ms. Heintges's article strongly suggests that the blame for the conflict between the former editors is to be sought exclusively with Margarete Mitscherlich. The truth of the matter is that prior to the outbreak of open dispute there had been disagreements about the quality of the work being done by the editorial panel (“essential technical—professional disagreements”) and it was this that prompted Margarete Mitscherlich to attempt an improvement in this respect by means of a “reshuffle” within the panel of editors itself, a measure which despite their initial agreement, Helmut
Dahmer and Lutz Rosenkötter finally resisted. This then led to open conflict, with publisher Mi