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[A few months after the publication of Freud's essay on Dostoevsky, a discussion of it by Theodor Reik appeared in Imago (in the second issue for 1929, 15, 232-42). Though Reik's comments were on the whole appreciative, he argued at considerable length that Freud's judgement on Dostoevsky's morals was unjustifiably severe and disagreed too with what Freud wrote about morality in the third paragraph of the essay. He also, incidentally, criticized the form of the essay, with its apparently disconnected tail-end. After reading these criticisms1 Freud sent Reik a letter in reply; and when, not long afterwards, Reik reprinted his article in a book of collected papers (1930), Freud agreed that his letter should also be included. An English translation of the criticism and of the reply to it were published later in Reik's From Thirty Years with Freud (New York, 1940 and London, 1942). It is with Dr. Theodor Reik's kind permission that we publish Freud's letter to him in a revised translation.]
April 14, 1929
… I have read your critical review of my Dostoevsky study with great pleasure. All your objections deserve consideration and must be recognized as in a sense apt. I can bring forward a little in my defence. But of course it will not be a question of who is right or who is wrong.
I think you are applying too high a standard to this triviality. It was written as a favour to someone2 and written reluctantly. I always write reluctantly nowadays. No doubt you noticed this about it. This is not meant, of course, to excuse hasty or false judgements, but merely the careless architecture of the essay as a whole. I cannot dispute the unharmonious effect produced by the addition of the Zweig analysis; but deeper examination will perhaps show some justification for it. If I had not been hampered by considerations of the place where my essay was to