The Psychopathology of Everyday Life

by Sigmund Freud

Unknown Binding

Published July 1, 2002

About the author

Dr. Sigismund Freud, M.D. (University of Vienna)—later changed to Sigmund—was a neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, who created an entirely new approach to the understanding of the human personality. He is regarded as one of the most influential—and controversial—minds of the 20th century.

In 1873, Freud began to study medicine at the University of Vienna. After graduating, he worked at the Vienna General Hospital. He collaborated with Josef Breuer in treating hysteria by the recall of painful experiences under hypnosis. In 1885, Freud went to Paris as a student of the neurologist Jean Charcot. On his return to Vienna the following year, Freud set up in private practice, specialising in nervous and brain disorders. The same year he married Martha Bernays, with whom he had six children.

Freud developed the theory that humans have an unconscious in which sexual and aggressive impulses are in perpetual conflict for supremacy with the defences against them. In 1897, he began an intensive analysis of himself. In 1900, his major work The Interpretation of Dreams was published in which Freud analysed dreams in terms of unconscious desires and experiences.

In 1902, Freud was appointed Professor of Neuropathology at the University of Vienna, a post he held until 1938. Although the medical establishment disagreed with many of his theories, a group of pupils and followers began to gather around Freud. In 1910, the International Psychoanalytic Association was founded with Carl Jung, a close associate of Freud's, as the president. Jung later broke with Freud and developed his own theories.

After World War One, Freud spent less time in clinical observation and concentrated on the application of his theories to history, art, literature and anthropology. In 1923, he published The Ego and the Id, which suggested a new structural model of the mind, divided into the 'id, the 'ego' and the 'superego'.

In 1933, the Nazis publicly burnt a number of Freud's books. In 1938, shortly after the Nazis annexed Austria, Freud left Vienna for London with his wife and daughter Anna.

Freud had been diagnosed with cancer of the jaw in 1923, and underwent more than 30 operations. He died of cancer on 23 September 1939.

Reviews

[Uilliam Clarke · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading Sigmund Freud has been a great interest of mine, especially his work on slips of the mind, tongue, and pen. It all makes sense to me as someone who’s recovering from a brain injury — it explains why I have these slips, mostly with my tongue.

I say things I don’t mean to. My brain is processing the right word, but when I talk the wrong word comes out. Then I get frustrated and annoyed with myself because I know that wasn’t the word I wanted to say. My mind gets overwhelmed that people will think I’m stupid.

I had a slip of the pen typing this message. 🙈 I wanted to say "right," but I spelt "write" because my brain told me what I first typed was the correct word. I knew it wasn’t, so I had to proofread and correct myself. Hahaha.

Does anyone else have wee doses of slips of the mind, pen, or tongue? It’s a common thing. Sometimes we don’t even notice we’re doing it.

Also, Sigmund Freud was superstitious. His fear of death always haunted him, and he wrote to Carl Jung in 1909 about the phenomenal experiences he was having around it.

Then there’s his view of _déjà vu_ — where we experience this sensation and feeling that we’ve been here before. Freud’s analysis for this was that a "hook" of a repressed memory was triggered for this sensation to happen, or that it was a dream that was forgotten and you just suddenly remembered it.

Then there’s _déjà raconté_, a psychological phenomenon closely linked to déjà vu, where a person experiences the uncanny, mistaken conviction that they have already told a specific story or shared a piece of information before. I’ve experienced this, I just didn’t know the name.

Also, passages in this book were written in German, and because I’m studying German it was an amazing feeling to read German and understand it. 😊

Thank you, Freud, for answering some questions I did not know the answer to and for teaching me new things like...

[Ellie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting ideas about the unconscious and how it affects us in our everyday lives. Is very dense and may take a while to absorb the information.