Contributions to the Theory of the Anal Character

The wide field which is open to the science of psycho-analysis at the present time offers an abundance of separate examples leading to the rapid increase of psychological knowledge along the lines of purely inductive investigation. The development of the theory of the anal character is perhaps the most remarkable and instructive of these. In 1908, about fifteen years after the appearance of his first contributions to the psychology of the neuroses, Freud published a short paper entitled Charakter und Analerotik. It occupied only three pages of a journal, and was an example of compressed representation of cautious and clear statements. The gradually increasing body of his co-workers, among whom may be mentioned Sadger, Ferenczi and Jones, has helped to extend the range of knowledge already established. The theory concerning the products of a transformation of anal erotism gained unsuspected significance when in 1913, following on Jones' important investigation on Hate and Anal Erotism in the Obsessional Neurosis, Freud formulated an early 'pregenital' organization of the libido. He considered that the symptoms of the obsessional neurosis were the result of a regression of libido to this stage of development, which is characterized by a preponderance of the anal and sadistic instinct-components. A new light was thus thrown both on the symptomatology of the obsessional neurosis and one of the characterological peculiarities of the person suffering from it, i.e., on the so-called 'obsessive character'. I might add, anticipating a future publication, that very similar anomalies of character are found in those people who tend to exhibit melancholic