History becomes alive and vibrant as this book details the intimate, day-to-day relationships that unfolded between Freud and his closest colleagues. Freud and the members of the secret Committee become flesh and blood people, instead of remaining icons of their ideology. The book humanizes and adds another dimension to the historical movement that created psychoanalysis. Based on original material that is unpublished in English, Phyllis Grosskurth provides us with a scholarly and exciting perspective of the early turbulent years of psychoanalysis.

The book starts with a chronology listing the significant events from 1887 to 1957 that will be covered. The chronology commences with Freud's first meeting