Sigmund
Freud was born in Austria
in 1856.
He studied medicine in Vienna and joined the staff of the Vienna General
Hospital in 1882. Over the next few years he carried out research
with Joseph Breuer into the treatment of hysteria by the recall of
painful experience under hypnosis. He later published a book on the
subject, Studies in Hysteria (1895).
During
this period Freud developed the theory and practice of psychoanalysis.
Freud believed that everyday actions are determined by motives which
are far more numerous and complex than people realize. He claimed
that the most basic and constant motives which influence our actions
are unconscious and therefore are difficult to know or acknowledge.
In 1895
Freud published his controversial book, The
Interpretation of Dreams. In the book Freud argued that
dreams are disguised manifestations of repressed sexual desires. This
was followed by The Psychopathology of Everyday
Life (1904) and Three Essays on
the Theory of Sexuality (1905).
These books
influenced the work of other people working in this field including
Alfred Adler, Erich
Fromm, Karen Horney and Carl
Jung. In 1908 Freud and his followers established the International
Psychoanalytical Association.
Other books
by Freud included Totem and Tabu
(1913), Beyond the Pleasure Principle
(1919), Ego and Id (1923) and
a book on religion, The Future of an Illusion
(1937).
Shocked
by the slaughter of the First World War Freud
became increasingly interested in political solutions to world problems
and in 1926 joined the Pan-European
Union. Other people who joined included Albert
Einstein,
Thomas Mann, Rainer
Maria Rilke, Ortega y Gasset and Konrad
Adenauer. In
1933 Freud and Einstein wrote Why War?
On 13th March,
Arthur Seyss-Inquart, the leader of the Austrian Nazi Party invited
the German Army to occupy Austria
and proclaimed union with
Germany. Freud, a strong opponent of Adolf
Hitler, moved to London where he died of a cancer in 1939.
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