Introduction to Psychoanalysis

Originally a set of lectures given by Sigmund Freud 1915-1917, Introduction to Psychoanalysis is now not only widely translated and popular, but also culturally significant. The 28 lectures offer Freud's views of the unconscious and the basis of psychoanalysis as we know it today. These conversational-style lectures are broken into three parts, beginning with Freudian slips, moving to dream theory, and then neuroses, and in them Freud successfully presents his ideas as firmly grounded in the everyday experience. SIGMUND FREUD was born in Moravia (now Czech Republic) in 1856. From ages four to eighty-two he lived in Vienna, where he received his medical degree (1881). As a young medical student and researcher, his focus was neurobiology. After graduating, Freud began treating various psychological disorders through a private practice he started. Influenced by his colleague Josef Breuer, Freud began studying talk therapy more intently, with specific focus on the traumatic experiences and sexual origins of a patient's neuroses. He is well-known for the creation of psychoanalysis as well as for his work with the id, ego, and superego; psychic energy; Oedipus complex; dream analysis; and the fundamental discovery of the unconscious forces that influence our everyday thoughts and actions. Freud had six children with Martha Bernays, the youngest of whom (Anna Freud) continued her father's work. In 1938 Freud fled to England to escape the Nazis. He died in 1939.