The Psycho-Analytic View of Psychogenic Disturbance of Vision

Editor's Note

(a) German Editions:

1910 Die Psychogene Sehstörung in Psychoanalytischer Auffassung Ärztliche Fortbildung, supplement to  Ärztliche Standes-zeitung,  9 (9),  42-4 (May 1).

1913 Die Psychogene Sehstörung in Psychoanalytischer Auffassung S.K.S.N.,  3,  314-21. (2nd ed. 1921.)

1924 Die Psychogene Sehstörung in Psychoanalytischer Auffassung G.S.,  5,  301-9.

1943 Die Psychogene Sehstörung in Psychoanalytischer Auffassung G.W.,  8,  94-102.↗

(b) English Translation:

‘Psychogenic Visual Disturbance according to Psycho-Analytical Conceptions’ 1924 C.P.,  2,  105-12. (Tr. E. Colburn Mayne.)

The present translation, with a different title, ‘The Psycho-Analytic View of Psychogenic Disturbance of Vision’ is a new one by James and Alix Strachey.

This was written as a contribution to a Festschrift in honour of Leopold Känigstein, a well-known Viennese ophthalmologist, who was one of Freud's oldest friends. He described it in a letter to Ferenczi, written on April 12, 1910, as being a mere piàce d'occasion and of no value (Jones, 1955, 274). It contains one passage at least, however, of very special interest. For it was here that for the first time he made use of the term ‘ego-instincts’ explicitly identified them with the self-preservative instincts and ascribed to them a vital part in the function of repression. Some account of the development of Freud's views on the instincts will be found in the Editor's Note to ‘Instincts and their Vicissitudes’ (1915c) in Volume XIV of the Standard Edition. It is also worth remarking that in the later paragraphs of this paper (p. 217 f.) Freud expresses with particular definiteness his belief that mental phenomena are ultimately based on physical ones.