Freud and Man's Soul

The main theme of this book is that the ideas of Sigmund Freud have been widely misunderstood. To justify these assertions, Bettelheim lists many errors in the translation of Freud's works from German to English. German pronouns are not nearly as simple to use as the English "equivalents" and Freud's intention when using them is quite different from what his translators concluded. Since the individual's thoughts concerning themselves are so critical to Freudian thought, the difference is nontrivial. Bettelheim cites many other errors in translation, in general where the English word denotes a much stronger interpretation than Freud intended. This is puzzling, as in some cases, the translator did not use the direct English equivalent. Bettelheim also deals in depth with the story of Oedipus, as the Oedipus complex is such an important feature of "popular" Freudian thought. The real story of Oedipus is not one about the love of one's mother, but about attempted infanticide, mistaken identity, the misinterpretation of predictions and great remorse over deadly deeds. Bettelheim argues, with a great deal of justification that Freud was not speaking about a desire to love one's mother when he describes the story. In only a few pages, Bettelheim successfully argues that Freud is deeply misunderstood, largely due to poor translations and misunderstandings. His arguments are convincing, so if you really want to understand Freud, this is a book you must read.

Bettelheim, despite some of his other problems(with autism for example), writes exquisitely on Freud. He refines the translations of Freud's work so eloquently that I actually understand it!Everything the other reviewers said PLUS... the Oedipus Complex for example, is not an obscure every boy wants to delete his father thing. Read the book and see... it has more to do with the day a son surpasses his father, and what that does to the triad of Dad, Mom, son.The American psychiatric community perverted Freud. I cannot believe the watered down, mistranslated, haha way I was taught "Freudian psychology". Bettelheim reinterprets Freud through better translation AND correlation to his time and place in history. This book left me agahst. I have never encountered such a profound redirection of a tenent so basic to my understanding of anything.Barbara

This book might have been subtitled, "Retranslating Freud," because that's just what the author does with some of Freud's key terms.I was gratified to see that "cathexis" could actually be rendered "charge" or "investment": much more consistent with how Freud uses the term. Freud was certainly a reductionist, but mistranslations of his work make him seem absolutely bloodless.This is one of the best books on Freud I've ever read.

I have read many of Freud's works for years and only recently believed that I gained significant understanding. This came initially from reading Richard Wollheim's book _Sigmund Freud_. Then with both new perspective and renewed interest, I checked this book out from the library.The first thing one notices when reading it is how articulately it is written, and the ease of understanding by which Bettelheim's prose is understood. The clarity and simplicity is wonderful and adds further support for, and credibility to, his claims.There is no question of his passion to express his explicit concerns regarding the mistranslation of Freud's corpus. However, further benefit are his explanations of the various myths Freud drew on, how Freud constructed his vocabulary, and how Freud was motivated by love and concern for others in an eternal sense.This is wonderful book that anyone with even the slightest interest in Freud would do well in reading. I wish I had read it first. However, now it is a valuable resource as Bettelheim's understanding of Freud is so thorough, elegant, poignant, and full of respect for this great man and thinker.

The review by D. Smitherman is dead accurate. I would add only that Bettelheim touches on how American physicians and clinicians "inserted" (to use Bettleheim's term) notions of psychoanalysis to be used as a tool for social conformity. Freud thought American culture sick and narcissistic, and didn't believe that social conformity or adaptation was an appropriate use of psychoanalysis. He also didn't believe in any requirement that professionals should be sole practitioners of psychoanalysis. In fact, he wished for an army of trained lay-people to do this work of the soul. As a consumer/survivor, that was all a revelation to me, and redemptive of Freud.