The Death of Sigmund Freud: The Legacy of His Last Days (Hardcover)

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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Expanding on his 2006 New York Times Magazine article, Freud and the Fundamentalist Urge, Edmundson develops his thesis about the lure of powerful, authoritarian leaders. He begins in 1938 Vienna on the eve of Hitler's invasion and ends less than two years later, when Freud died in London. The crux of the book comes at its very end, where Edmundson, a contributing editor at Harper's, discusses Moses and Monotheism (published in 1939), arguing for Freud's profound insights into the rise of a totalitarian, paternalistic leader like Hitler. In fact, Edmundson's aim seems even grander: to revive Freud's legacy as a sage of human nature in an intellectual climate that has moved beyond many of his ideas. But the earlier parts of the volume are thin. Edmundson adds nothing in recounting the details of Freud's life, and those facts are repeated over and over. There are some moments of sharp insight when Edmundson veers away from the biographical and delves into his own critical ideas, but these would have been better served in an article rather than incorporated into a narrative of danger, escape, illness and death. (Sept.)
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From Booklist

Freud's last book—Moses and Monotheism—has counted for little with critics, inclined to dismiss it as a product of his dotage. Edmundson, however, makes large claims for the psychologist's final work. Indeed, he interprets it as central to the dying revolutionary's bold strategy for endowing his psychoanalytic movement—deeply subversive of religion and patriarchal authority—with a quasi-religious permanence that ensured his own immortality as modernity's prophetic father. Despite his antipathy to religious faith, Freud devoted his last two years to a text reappropriating his own Jewish tradition as the wellspring of higher intellectual achievements. In rejecting the social solidity of pagan spectacles, the Hebrews—in Freud's theory—opened the door to honest exploration of the elusive individual psyche. Edmundson underscores the historical significance of Freud's paradigm by identifying its antithesis in Hitler's stunningly effective use of neopagan pageantry to incite a mass hysteria that made Vienna so politically hostile that the aging therapist had to flee. An insightful gloss on a generally neglected episode of Freud's life. Christensen, Bryce

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 288 pages
• Publisher: Bloomsbury USA (September 18, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1582345376
• ISBN-13: 978-1582345376
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.6 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #628,458 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

29 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Sagery, October 1, 2007

By	Alvaro Lewis "jwatson5" (Redwood City, CA USA) - See all my reviews

How will the reading world receive a book whose star founded an unscientific science and advocated a complete atheism while often passing his days reading Milton's poetry or in contemplation of Moses? Favorably and, I hope, with a willingness to read through to the end. Edmundson brings to life some of the necessary tensions from the life of Sigmund Freud. In addition he plots the shocking rise of Hitler in an anti-Semitic Germany as Freud enters his brave decline and ghastly demise in war-weary London.

This book moved me and many of the thoughts it shakes in me will stay for the coming months. Some of the remarks on fascistic tyranny and religious fundamentalism that Freud forecasted for our era may strike the reader as obvious or heavy-handed after Edmundson's clear presentation. However, the author also makes fascinating and generous lines when discussing Freud's final work <<Moses and Monotheism>> and its relationship to Judaism and other monotheisms.

Above all, Freud comes off as a teacher who taught his patients how to be self-critical and at the same time how to debunk or subvert patriarchal authority. It seems there is no eradicating the human lust for authority but perhaps as Edmundson suggests the teaching of skeptical tools and irony will be some protection. Freud's life and work form a riddle of sorts and it is his nearly Socratic knowledge of self that grants him the awareness and vitality to live and die with dignity as he lost his sight and hearing to the disintegration of his cancerous face. In Freud's death there is a life for our time.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A very interesting book!, April 11, 2008

By	Joseph Oppenheim (San Diego, CA USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

"The Death of Sigmund Freud" is a timely look at the last days of Freud since he was facing the march of Nazism, and since after 9-11, the US has tilted quite a bit to the Right, and it is wise to weigh into possible reasons to be concerned about tilting further, and a look from Freud's perspective is certainly interesting.

Since anti-Semitism was rampant at the time, from the book, critics did say that psychoanalysis was right, just that it was a 'Jewish Science' only applying to Jews, an attempt to discredit it. Some of Freud's thoughts on the matter were:

1. Freud called the relationship crowds form with an absolute leader, erotic. Hitler, himself, in his speeches said that he made love to the German masses. Essentially, the crowds become hypnotized. Not that we are anywhere near such a situation, but one surely can notice a more 'patriotic' tone to many of the current presidential supporters and calling dissenters un-patriotic.

2. Inner conflict, between one's ego, id, and superego, is not only inevitable, but desirable to better modify behavior. Seeking some perpetual, peaceful state is dangerous because it is more likely to erupt into really bad behavior. So, public dissent is healthy and should be encouraged.

3. Freud, a Jew, recognized in monotheism, that the ability to internalize an invisible god prepares a person to think more abstractly. He saw Jews' long history with that as allowing Jews to distinguish themselves in math, sciences, law and literary arts, ways which effect some control over nature. Better to have some invisible god, than some human authoritarian one, be it political or some religious one who tries to have crowds focus on him or her. Freud felt that such thinking made Jews more likely to reject pageantry and less susceptible to elevating humans to god-like status, one reason for anti-Semitism to run rampant as Nazis knew they would meet resistance from Jews. Not that one should conclude that Judaism is superior, just that the internalizing of an invisible god is the important part of monotheism.

4. Rather than blame something about Germany, Japan or Italy for the rise of 20th century fascism, Freud felt that internally we are all fascists/fundamentalists, at least potentially. So, it is the inner conflict we need to use to overcome it. Once again, dissent is healthy.

A very interesting book!

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Great Introduction to Freud, December 14, 2007

By	Michael Craig (Scottsdale, Arizona United States) - See all my reviews

OK, who were the most influential people of the 20th century? Einstein, Churchill, Franklin Roosevelt, and Freud. You can jockey the order, probably add Hitler depending on your definition of "influential", but that's the short list.

Freud's life as a writer/thinker, like Churchill's and Einstein's, was very long. If you want to learn something about this giant, you definitely want to start slowly. THE DEATH OF SIGMUND FREUD is a great way to get a feel for both the man and what he stood for. Mark Edmundson picks up Freud, after a brief introduction about Vienna in 1909, in 1938. Freud is 81, in poor health, and about to come under Adolf Hitler's Anchluss.

Edmundson, in this short volume, gives you a great feel for how Sigmund Freud lived: how his study looked, his industriousness, his love of dogs, his relationship with his daughter Anna, his relationships with his disciples, what Freud's Vienna was like, what he collected, his (ultimately dangerous) love of cigars, etc. Even if the book did nothing more than accumulate these bits of Freud's life in 1938 and 1939, it would be wonderful, because what can an author do beyond transporting the reader to a place and time? And what a place and time! Freud, Hitler, Vienna, Anchluss.

The author also gives readers a great short course on some of Sigmund Freud's work. As certain subjects dominate the last year of Freud's life - the rise of Nazism, his relationship with his daughter, the need for conflict in his life to create brilliant work, his enjoyment and suspicion of fame, his need to shock and create controversy (to name a few) - Edmundson describes how Freud wrote about those matters, quoting from and summarizing Sigmund's most famous theories and ideas, usually from works created decades before.

Even as an introduction to Sigmund Freud, this book is incomplete (though by design). But it gives you a taste as well as a feeling you're following Freud at the end of his life, trying to make sense of it all. You may find yourself, like me, back on Amazon.com looking for a comprehensive biography of Freud and ordering translations of some of his classic works. I'd say that's a pretty high compliment for the book and author.