countenance today, but that was then; was he a wild brute by the standards of his times? I don't know, but it seems unlikely. His critics smirk at his cocaine use as if that drug wasn't in Mariani wine or Coca Cola then, and it seems that none of them can mention the unconscious without both noting that it wasn't his discovery *and* that there's no such thing. Last but not least, isn't contemporary psychotherapy a much different thing from the psychoanalysis he taught--and this includes therapy done by those who still call themselves psychoanalysts?
Anecdotal Evidence Time: the man who might as well be my father-in-law is a retired English prof. who will inveigh against Freud and Freudianism whenever he's gets in his cups, which is just about everytime I've seen him. Finally I asked him: why does this bother you so much? His reply: that *EVERYONE* in his generation of scholars (no overgeneralization there, nope) including his revered Lionel Trilling (huh? I thought he was a second-rater, if that) had swallowed Freudianism hook, line, and sinker-- and now they have to come to grips with the fact that Freudianism explains nothing, is not and never was a science, etc,., etc....I didn't press it past that. But it seemed to me yet another case of someone regretting and repudiating what they regard as the enthusiasm of their youth so strenuously that they end up duplicating their real error, which is to cling to something absolutely. Freud explained everything for him; now the fallacy of Freudianism explains everything.
Somebody remember to toss this back in my face when I'm his age. I'm sure I'll be doing the same thing.
Curtiss