The discovery of the unconscious

by Henry F. Ellenberger Allen Lane The Penguin Press, 130s

The sub-title 'The history and

evolution of dynamic psychiatry' is

more appropriate to the contents of this book than the main title and the trouble with history is that there is so much of it! Ellenberger pre- sents such a scholarly and com- pressed account that from this fat book there are half-a-dozen even

fatter books trying to get out. The book can be compared in many

respects with Frazer's 'Golden

Bough' in that, although it contains so much information, one is left

with no doubt that the author has had to select fragments from the

greater amount of information that he has readily at hand. A short introductory chapter

traces the ancestry of dynamic psychiatry on a world-wide basis, but his main theme concentrates on its emergence within the scientific,

literary, and socio-political back-

ground of European culture. He

leads up to and goes beyond Freud and, in the beginning, there was Mesmer. A description is given of

the mystical-magical development of psychotherapy through hypno- tism. The current use of the word

'suggestion' does not take us a

great deal further than the pseudo- scientific explanations of the period. The author's special gift is to be

able to relate the progress of

dynamic psychiatry to the cultural

trends. He has, therefore, to give the reader some understanding of

the historical progress of the

Renaissance, following it with an

account of the Baroque movement, and then he traces the third great cultural movement, the Enlighten- ment. According to Kant, this is

'the leaving behind by man of his self-caused minority'. To have the maturity and the courage to make use of one's own reason became

the motto of the Enlightenment.

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Schools of psychiatry in particu- lar, and of medicine in general, were influenced in the mid 19th

Century by crises initiated by the

industrial revolution, technical and commercial developments associa- ted with urbanisation, and there

was the new philosophy of posi- tivism. A universal belief in science took on the shape of a religious faith, and the new psychology shared the determinism of Darwin and Marx.

Ellenberger convincingly traces

these elements in the new era in

which the background philosophy was dominated by Nietzsche. It is

here that the author clearly relates doctrine with personality, and he

refers to the mental illness of

Nietzsche which was thought by some to be 'fate's vengeance

against a human being who pre- tended to rise above his fellow

beings'. Nietzsche conceived the idea of 'an unconscious which was an area of confused thoughts, emotions and instincts and at the

same time an area of re-enactment

of past stages of the individual and of the species'. Here there are

ideas which received further

development in the thinking of both Freud and Jung. A valuable chapter records the

19th Century scene in organic psychiatry, and it is noteworthy that dynamic psychology emerged from medical practice and not from

academic psychology. Personal historical data is given

with regard to Pierre Janet, Freud, Adler and Jung; and there are many details which are derived from the author's own personal research and recollections. It is rare for such

equal justice to be given to the

different pioneers in the contentious years of the development of

psychoanalysis and of the new

dynamic psychiatry. Factors in Freud's personality

included first an identification with

Goethe, on whom he modelled his literary style; secondly, a gift of

intellectual curiosity and, thirdly, neurotic traits amongst which was a fanaticism for truth. Alongside these qualities was a credulousness in many worldly matters.

Freud's self-analysis, which nas been described as a heroic feat

without precedence, was linked

with a strange malady, which Ellen- berger describes as 'creative illness'. Each creative illness

succeeds a period of intense pre-

occupation with an idea and search for a certain truth. It is a poly- morphous condition that can take

the shape of depression, neurosis, psychosomatic ailments or even

psychosis'. Examples of this kind of illness are also given in the life of Fechner and Jung.

At times the style reads heavily, but the richness of the presentation carries the reader along. If one

were to apply the author's own

recipe of relating creative ideas to cultural trends, his writing has all

the variety of detail, and some of

the repetitional themes, of the

Baroque. It makes a good collec- tor's piece.

J. H. Kahn