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3 December 1910, Vienna, IX. Berggasse 19
Dear friend,
If it can be done, splendid. I've written to Bleuler suggesting that we meet in Munich on a Sunday. I hinted gently that I was pressed
for time and would be quite satisfied if we could get together for a few hours. Now let's hope that he creates no difficulties and suspects nothing. And you will be coming later in the day—a secret, I presume. I find the intrigue delightful. If he insists on coming Monday rather than Sunday, it will cost me a day's work; I shall sacrifice it to him unwillingly, but to you willingly if you can come. If you do, I hope you will be nicer to me than my so-called oldest supporters here, who are finally beginning to get under my skin.
It is getting really bad with Adler. You see a resemblance to Bleuler; in me he awakens the memory of Fliess, but an octave lower. The same paranoia. In the second issue of the Zentralblatt, which will also contain your charming bit of school gossip,1 you will find a review by him of your so-called Little Anna.2 Read it carefully; otherwise it's hard to see what he is driving at. His presentation suffers from paranoid vagueness. But here one can see clearly how he tries to force the wonderful diversity of psychology into the narrow bed of a single aggressive “masculine” ego-current—as if the child rejected her femininity and had no other thought than to be “on top” and play the man. To make his point he is obliged to misinterpret certain elements completely, such as the planing off of the genital organ, and to disregard others, such as her fear that her father will also get a child. The crux of the matter—and that is what really alarms me—is that he minimizes the sexual drive and our opponents will soon be able to speak of an experienced psychoanalyst whose conclusions are radically different from ours. Naturally in my attitude toward him I am torn between my conviction that all this is lopsided and harmful and my fear of being regarded as an intoleran