5o8 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



Psycho-Analysis. A Brief Account of the Freudian Theory. By Barbara 

 Low, B.A., with an Introduction by Ernest Jones, M.D. [Pp. 191.] 

 (London : George Allen & Unwin. Price 5s. net.) 

 A FLOOD of literature has of late swept over the fields of neurology and 

 psychiatry, more particularly in relation to the views of Freud, and to those 

 acquainted with English textbooks on the subject, it is clear that the un- 

 savoury compounds, the CEdipus myth and the Electra complex, are receiv- 

 ing less attention in this country than was to be found at the time of the 

 first translations of Freud's works. Also, less importance is paid to the 

 sexual origin of the neuroses in these textbooks than was formerly the 

 case, and the term libido is attaining to quite respectable interpretations ; 

 being now regarded mainly as a wish or desire, even an ambition or a dawn- 

 ing hope, but originating in the so-called conflict between unconscious 

 tendencies and the rational psychic life. 



The present writer ventured to state that Freudism was dead in England, 

 and to this he adheres ; yet psycho-analysis (denuded of its offensive asso- 

 ciations) was never more alive ; so much so that a constellation of charlatans 

 have set up to probe family relations, individual eccentricities, educational 

 systems and social problems, and unqualified persons are to be found in any 

 number practising upon " patients " in all directions. 



The author of the book under review describes herself as a teacher and 

 lecturer, and on p. 146 she states that psycho-analysis is a process necessarily 

 painful, for it involves the giving up of the inmost self and desires to the 

 analyst, the upshot of which " may cause vital changes in his whole out- 

 look and manner of life " : yet she repeatedly refers to the results of her 

 practice upon her " patients," and it may become a serious question whether 

 such a procedure as is implied in psycho-analysis, when carried out by un- 

 qualified persons, should not come within the purview of the General Medical 

 Council. 



It has been maintained by some that the application of psycho-analysis 

 is not " treatment," but only a method or technique to disclose the origin 

 of nervous and mental symptoms, but the textbook referred to devotes 

 a whole chapter to treatment, which is summarised under three heads, viz. : 

 (a) Dream Interpretation; (6) Free Association ; and (c) Transference. Dream 

 interpretation depends upon the assumption that there is during sleep a 

 kind of personified guardian preventing thoughts, ideas, and impulses rising 

 from the unconscious mind into consciousness. If they succeed in passing 

 through the " Censorship," then they appear as the dream, which can be 

 narrated, but in reality they represent latent tendencies which have been 

 repressed, and with them certain emotions ; the whole forming a complex. 

 In this way, whatever comes into consciousness is interpreted, in accordance 

 with a certain key, to be symbolic of tendencies in the unconscious mind ; 

 for instance, dreams of daggers or snakes are of phallic origin. There are 

 various mechanisms in dreams, described as condensation, dramatisation, 

 displacement, regression, and secondary elaboration, by which psychic im- 

 portance is attached to the latent content or to the unconscious mind. 

 Free association is the method of discovering the tendencies of the uncon- 

 scious mind by the comparison of irrelevancies that are expressed in speech, 

 and the " stimulus word " reaction is timed by a suitable chronoscope, 

 which latter is, however, rarely done. A " transference " is necessary 

 before psycho-analysis is complete — i.e., emotional reactions must take place 

 in connection with the analyst, and this is either positive or negative, depend- 

 ing upon the patient's "resistance." He cannot help this emotion, which 

 is stated to disclose the condition of his unconscious tendencies, and the 

 latter are deemed to be the fundamental dynamic processes that guide con- 

 duct. There are half a dozen terms that appear frequently in this text- 

 book, which, in spite of quotations on almost every page, is nevertheless 



