Letter from Ludwig Binswanger to Freud, January 3, 1924

Kreuzlingen, 3 January 1924

141B

Dear Professor Freud,

I do not normally send New Year letters but I cannot refrain from putting in an appearance this year, so crucial for your convalescence, in order to send you my best wishes. At the same time I want to express my cordial thanks for your reply to the letter I sent to your daughter. Although it offered me no prospect of seeing you in the near future, it nevertheless gave me great pleasure because you so frankly testified not only to what has kept us apart in recent times but also to the personal bonds between us. It was one of the greatest pleasures I had towards the end of the year. I need hardly say, after everything we have already gone through together in this respect,1 how much I wish you a complete recovery. And should it really be granted to me to see you in the spring, I should be a happy man, though of course even then my visit should be in no way a burden to you. You know me well enough to realise that I should be not in the least offended if you had to put me off even longer. I shall be going to Rome2 with my wife from the middle of March to the middle of April, and an opportunity will probably not arise before that. But should we meet once again, I would hope to make it clearer to you what precisely I intended with my book and to what extent it was essential groundwork for me. I feel that although I have had a great deal of appreciation, with few exceptions my intentions have been more or less misunderstood; above all, nothing was further from my mind than a ‘philosophical neutralisation’ of psychoanalysis.

Please do not take up your time and energy in replying to these lines; I am sustained by the sentiments you expressed in your last letter and that is enough for me. My wife, who also wishes you a speedy full recovery, sends you her kindest regards. I myself remain, in old affection and friendship,

Yours, [L. Binswanger]