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May 24, 1984. FURTHER REFLECTIONS ON FREUD AND HIS WRITING. Patrick J. Mahony, Ph.D.
Dr. Mahony noted Freud's historic stature and his unique influence on twentieth century culture. The concomitant mystification and overidealization of Freud has, however, stultified scholarship and left a great deal of research undone, including research on Freud as a writer. Dr. Mahony began his discussion of Freud the writer with a commentary on Strachey's translation of the Standard Edition, including its Victorian prose style, its silent embellishments and corrections, and its editorializing. In the case of the Wolf Man, there is a passage which should read: "In his usual way he passed it off on me, and by this projection tried to make it trustworthy." Instead, Strachey uses the words: "…by this projection tried to make it seem more trustworthy," which obscures the patient's deficient self-esteem and massive transferential dependence. Elsewhere in the Wolf Man case a passage which should state that a discussion of the primal scene in the Introductory Lectures was "no longer with a controversial aim" was translated by Strachey as, "with no controversial aim in view," obscuring a self-contradiction in Freud who also asserted his "objective estimation" of the analytic material in the case.
Strachey's Standard Edition contains a variety of bibliographic deficiencies, including failure, with few exceptions, to consult Freud's available manuscripts and