Monroe Meyer

    assepsi@virgilio.it  

Wilhelm Stekel

Paul Federn introduced by his son Ernst

(source: " About King Laius and Oedipus: Reminiscences from a Childhood Under the Spell of Freud", chapter - pages 19-27 - of  Herbert S. Strean (Ed.), <<Growing Up Observed: Tales from Alalysts Children>>, in "Current Issues in Psychoanalytic Practice", Volume 4, Numbers 1/2, Haworth Press, 1987)

Excerpt:

<<There are but a few sons of psychoanalysts who followed their fathers in the choice of their profession and became psychoanalysts (1). Among daughters we find more who did so. As to myself, I took quite a detour before I became a successor to my father’s (Paul Federn, MD) work. In fact he bequeathed it to me before he took his own life to avoid the agonies of dying from cancer. For those readers who do not know about this distinguished follower of Freud, a few remarks shall serve as an orientation.

Paul Federn (1871-1950) became in 1903 the fifth member of the so-called Psychological Wednesday Society which was formed around Freud in 1902 (2). He was already a well-known physician, the son of the eminent Salomon Federn, one of Vienna’s most distinguished family doctors. In 1914 my father was invited to lecture and practice in the USA where he had some influence on the beginning of psychoanalysis, by analysing Dr. Clarence Oberndorf and Dr. S. E. Jelliffe (3). When Freud fell ill with cancer of the jaw in 1923 he appointed Federn as personal deputy in all his professional affairs and the Vienna Psychoanalytic Society elected him acting vicepresident until its factual dissolution in 1938 (4). In this double position Federn played a role in psychoanalysis that must be considered equal to that of Abraham, Ferenczi, Rank, Jones and second only, as concerned closeness with Freud, to Anna Freud.

In spite of Federn’s never wavering loyalty to Freud he developed his own ideas and theories which, although based on Freud’s work, went into different directions. The most important were a concept of the ego leading to a new method of treating mental illness and ideas about applying psychoanalysis to social problems, which went beyond Freud’s own initial thoughts. This is of very special importance because Federn was, and through his work remains, the living proof against the never dying opinion that Freud did not tolerate any other ideas and theories than his own. In present terminology it may be said that Federn expressed more than fifty years ago in Freudian terminology what has become the psychology of the Self. Federn’s historical role does not need to be elaborated further here since this was done by Dr. Edoardo Weiss, myself and others.

Photo: Edoardo Weiss

Paul Federn has called himself modestly “the non-commissioned officer in the psychoanalytic army”. He was in fact, however, a man of great influence on the psychoanalytic world, not only in Vienna. His suicide was reported by all news agencies but did not reach the obituary column of The New York Times, with the consequences that it took some time until his name appeared again in public. This was also due to the attitude of the New York Psychoanalytic Society which considered Federn as a “devisionist” and not as a true Freudian analyst. This has some bearing on the following discourse because in order to establish Federn’s true role in the history of Freudian psychoanalysis, a task fell on me to which I have been devoting the rest of my life.

Being a son of such a powerful and important person could be generally regarded as at least very difficult. Subjectively speaking it was not. Consciously I was always very attached to my father and it is reported that this was so from early infancy. This is not surprising because in spite of a rather awesome look, a big black, later greying beard, piercing eyes under big eyebrows, a thundering voice and a well built body, he was the kindest man, fond of children of all ages, in whom he never could find any fault even if they behaved like devils. He loved all mankind and walking through the streets of Vienna wearing a broad black hat, he engaged the people on the streets in conversation just from a curiosity to meet them. This brought him the sobriquet “Harun al Raschid”, the legendary caliph of Bagdad. In fact, a photo from his youth showed him in the costume of an Arabian sheik. His good looks and the above-mentioned qualities make it easily understandable that one of his patients, Wilma Bauer, ailing since her childhood from rheumatic fever, decided at the early age of eleven to marry him. They became, indeed, husband and wife in 1905 and contrary to what Wilhelm Reich claimed (5) I remember them only as deeply, even romantically in love until the end of their lives, which was painful for both due to the severe illness from which they had to suffer.

In fact I had much more difficulty with my mother than my father. She dominated him as she dominated everyone who wanted to come close. Since she was a gifted and charming woman who wrote poetry and numerous plays, many did want to be close. She was actively engaged in the psychoanalytic movement and even read a paper on the  psychoanalysis of serving maids before the psychoanalytic society on November 14, 1917 (6). Freud held my mother and her writings in great esteem which is attested to by several letters to  her. She read all my father’s papers before he published them. The relationship was once described by Harmut Meng, the eldest son of Heinrich Meng (7), after several weeks of staying with our family. Asked about his impressions he replied: “Mrs. Federn is Mussolini and Dr. Federn is  King Victor Emanuel”. At those times it was general knowledge that the latter was just a puppet under the reign of the dictator. After that my mother was called Mussolina, which she bore with a certain amount of satisfaction. Another eminent psychoanalyst, Dr. Istvan Hollos (8) said on another occasion that no one would ever dare to contradict Mrs. Federn. The issue was a second helping from a delicious dish and Hollos said: “No one would ever contradict you, Mrs. Federn except one person”. To the irate response of my mother, “Who ever could that be?” Dr. Hollos replied, “Your son Ernst”.

That  brings me to the topic of this paper which is the inverted Oedipus which I discovered through my analysis with Herman Nunberg who, against every classical rule, was also a close friend of both my parents. My detractors will immediately consider this a sufficient reason why I never became a member of the International Psychoanalytic Association. Nevertheless, I have great gratitude and admiration for the way Dr. Nunberg conducted my analysis. Since then I know that I fought my mother and loved my father, which did not exclude a great attachment to my mother as a child. But this did not keep me from defending my father against the onslaught of her feminine dominance which, for myself, I never would tolerate. Indeed, in my profession as a social worker where women traditionally play a dominant role, I succeeded in my work reasonably well and was on the best terms with some of the prominent members of this particular female profession>>.

<<In the early thirties a relative prosperity permitted my father to give dinner parties for members of the Psychoanalytic Society. We always had a good cook and the food on these occasions was particularly delicious. For me, psychoanalysis thus has only the most pleasant oral cathexes. Freud’s authority I considered without fault, as was that of his daughter Anna, who visited often; psychoanalysis became part of my life. Though I never met Freud in person, his spirit and work was ever present (15).

In conclusion I don’t think that my few remarks have more than biographical significance. If they permit the drawing of any general conclusions I would formulate them as follows: Psychoanalysis as a field of knowledge cannot and should not be presented to children before they have reached adolescence. How to help people by talking to them may however be explained and made acceptable at any age. We owe it to Anna Freud that giving due recognition to the developmental stages of a child is the precondition of reaching his mind in a meaningful way.

How a psychoanalyst behaves as a parent will depend to a great measure not on his or her professional competence but on his or her quality as a person. Psychoanalysis can never be a guarantee for becoming a good parent. It has been described as an impossible profession. Whether this is a fair statement can be disputed. It is certainly very difficult and demanding work. Whether parents who undertake it day in and day out may be able to contain its stress sufficiently to prevent its spilling over in their children’s life must be questioned. By identifying these problems some steps may already be taken towards the mental hygiene of the psychoanalyst himself. This was a field of interest that occupied Paul Federn’s last years and to which he contributed a few papers on the “Mental Hygiene of the Ego” (16). Much still has to be done in this direction>>.

NOTES

(1)            Of those analysts who are listed as members of the Vienna Psychoanalytic Society in October, 1913, in the last available record of membership before World War  only the son of Paul Federn, the author of this paper, has taken up his father’s work. Among those who joined the psychoanalytic movement later we find relatively few who did so. The sons of Herman Nunberg, Heinz Hartmann, Ernst Kris and Karl Menninger come to my mind.

(2)            Nunberg H. & Federn E. , edts: The Minutes of the Vienna Psychoanalytic Society, 1914-18. Four volumes. International Universities Press, New York, 1962-1965.

(3)            Burnham J. C.: Psychoanalysis and American Medicine: 1894-1918. International Universities Press, New York, 1967.

(4)            The Vienna Psychoanalytic Society was never formally de lege dissolved.

(5)            Higgins, M & C. M. Raphael, edts.: Reich Speaks of Freud, FSG, New York, 1969.

(6)            Protokolle der Wiener Psychoanalytischen Vereiningung. Vol. 4 not in the English edition though.

(7)            The German-Swiss psychoanalyst (1887-1972) who held the first European university chair for Mental Hygiene at Basle.

(8)            1872-1957, was second only to S. Ferenczi among Hungarian analysts. He was the first psychoanalyst who became director of a State Hospital (Budapest, 1918).

(9)            1872-1940. She was a leader of the Austrian Socialdemocratic Party and one of the first six women to be elected member of Parliament in 1919. She was also the sister of Emma Eckstein, the patient of Freud and Fliess. Their father was a wealthy Viennese industrialist whose family was befriended by the Freud family and a number of famous Austrians, among them the composer Hugo Wolf.

(10)      At that time psychoanalysts were not yet convinced that a child could become neurotic.

(11)      Paul Cranefield, MD , Professor at Rockfeller University and historian of medicine, wrote the first biographical study of Josef Breuer. Paul Klemperer, MD, (1887-1964) was professor of pathology  at Columbia University and head of the pathology department at Mount Sinai Hospital, New York City. He belonged to the Wednesday Psychological Society where he sided with Adler. After his retirement he turned his interests to the history of medicine. He was also a cousin of Paul Federn.

(12)      I had an uncle who was a well-known oto-laryngologist who absolutely wanted to have this operation performed. My adenoids still bother me but I think my father did the right thing.

(13)      Freud, A., Goldberg, J. & Solnit, A. J. (1972), Before the Best Interests of the Child, New York, Free Press.

(14)      Freud had visited my parents of course before his illness, but I was too young to distinguish him from other bearded men.

(15)      Zur seelischen Hygiene des Ich; Die Psychohygiene, grundlage und Ziele. Bern, Verlag Huber, 1949 („About the mental hygiene of  the ego“. In The Mental Hygiene, Foundation and Goals). An abstract of the paper appeared in American Journal of Psychotherapy, 1949, 290-291.

Ernst Federn, youngest son of an eminent psychoanalyst Paul Federn, originally studied Law, Economics and History at the University of Vienna. His opposition to the rise of fascism in Austria during the 1930's led to his imprisonment for one year and, subsequently, to seven years internment in the concentration camps of Dachau and Buchenwald. In 1948 he settled in the United States, studying social work at Columbia University and training in psychoanalysis. At the request of the Austrian Federal Ministry of Justice he returned to Vienna in 1972 to act as a consultant in Social Therapy attached to the correctional system. Since his retirement in 1988 he has worked as a lecturer, writer and supervisor. Ernst Federn has published in 1990 the book entitled "Witnessing Psychoanalysis: from Vienna back to Vienna via Buchenwald and the USA" (Karnac Books). The eighteen papers which form this collection by Ernst Federn, some of them previously unpublished, are grouped under four headings: (1) On social Psychology,(2) On the Psychology of Terror and Violence, (3) On Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy, and (4) On the History of Psychoanalysis. The collection also includes Federn's moving memoir of his encounter with Bruno Bettelheim in Buchenwald.

Among Ernst Federn's previous publications are 'The Minutes of Vienna Psychoanalytic Society, 1906-1918', jointly edited with Herman Nunberg, and a collection of his Paul Federn's papers, 'Ego Psychology and the Psychoses', co-edited with Eduardo Weiss

Federn, der schon 1908 Edoardo Weiss in Analyse gehabt hatte, war in der Zeit nach dem ersten Weltkrieg einer der führenden Lehranalytiker der Wiener Psychoanalytischen Vereinigung. Er war damals auch der Vorsitzende des Lehrausschusses.

1919 veröffentliche er ein Buch "Zur Psychologie der Revolution: die vaterlose Gesellschaft". Hier findet sich eine Anwendung psychoanalytischer Einsichten auf gesellschaftliche Vorgänge, die später in ähnlicher Weise nach dem Zweiten Weltkrieg vom Mitscherlich beschrieben wurden. Federn war von 1918 an Mitglied der Sozialdemokratischen Partei und bekleidete die Rolle eines Bezirksrates in seinem Wohnbezirk.

Das wesentliche wissenschaftliche Verdienst Paul Federns liegt im Bereich der Ich-Psychologie und der Psychologie, beziehungsweise Therapie der Psychosen. Mit seiner introspektiven und phänomenologischen Methode war es ihm möglich, die Bedeutung der neuen Konzepte der Ich-Psychologie für die Behandlung der Psychosen hervorzuheben. So konnte er beschreiben, dass Depersonalisationserlebnisse auf ungenügende Besetzung des Ich zurückzuführen sind und nicht auf eine ungenügende Objektbeziehung.

1933 publizierte Federn eine Arbeit "Über die Analyse der Psychosen unter spezieller Beachtung der notwendigen Technik". 1936 schrieb er "Über Gesunden und kranken Narzissmus" – ein Konzept, das erst wieder nach dem Zweiten Weltkrieg von Kohut aufgegriffen wurde.

Federn verließ im September 1938 Wien und begab sich nach New York. Erst 1946 gelang es ihm, als Arzt in Amerika anerkannt zu werden und damit erlangte er die ordentliche Mitgliedschaft in der New Yorker Psychoanalytischen Vereinigung und im Lehrinstitut dieser Gruppe.

1949 hielt Federn in Topeka einen Vortrag über "Psychische Hygiene des Ichs und des psychotischen Ichs". Nach seiner Rückkehr teilte man ihm mit, dass er ein Blasenkarzinom habe. Federn entschloss sich zu einer Operation. Im Dezember 1949 starb seine Frau – ein Verlust, den er nur schwer überwinden konnte.

Im Mai 1950 war eine neuerliche Operation geplant. Federn arrangierte unter dem Vorwand, dass er längere Zeit nicht werde arbeiten können, eine Vermittlung seiner Patienten an andere Analytiker und erschoss sich am 4.5.1950 in seinem Arbeitszimmer.

<<Another psychoanalyst who committed suicide in exile was Paul Federn. His granfather was a rabbi in Prague, and his father, Salomon Federn (1832-1920) was a distinguished Viennese physician. His mother, Ernestine Spitzer, came from a merchant family. Federn was born on October 13, 1871, in Vienna. He had two older brothers, two younger sisters, and a younger brother.

As a youth, he was prone to depressive moods that worried his friends. He did his military service in the Austrian cavalry. His father decided that he should be a physician, though he would have preferred biology. He graduated from the University of Vienna in 1895 and served for seven years at the General Hospital in Vienna. He opened a private practice in 1902.

He met his wife when she was twelve and he was courting her older sister. When Wilma Bauer was twenty-one and he was thirty-three they married and had a daughter and two sons. She came from a Protestant family, wrote poems and plays (which Federn refused to let her publish), and suffered from a heart ailment all her life.

Federn read Freud's work when he was thirty and was immediately impressed. He met Freud in 1902 and became an important early member of Freud's circle. After meeting Freud, Federn's depressions seemed less severe, but he said then that he would end his own life if he could no longer master it. Federn was loyal to Freud and never disagreed with Freud's ideas. Even though some of his own thoughts diverged from Freud's, Federn minimized these differences, at least while Freud was alive. Though Freud saw Federn as a colleague, Federn saw himself as a disciple and had a father-like transference to Freud.

During the First World war, Federn served as a doctor and strongly supported the German side. He invested all of his money in Austrian War Bonds, and after the war he never recovered his financial security(*).

Federn took stands on social issues, set up a private nonsectarian institution with his sister, was a social democrat (pro-Germany but anti-Hapsburg and anti-Catholic), and was elected to public office as a district councilman.

In 1924, after Freud was diagnosed as having cancer, Federn together with Anna Freud, became the leading figures in the psychoanalytic movement in Vienna. Federn often represented Freud, as when a plaque was erected for Freud in his birthplace (Freiberg), and he gave the radio address to commemorate Freud's seventieth birthday. However, Federn was often disappointed when his psychoanalytic colleagues failed to cite his work and acknowledge his ideas.

In 1938, his son was arrested by the Germans, and Federn came to America. In 1946 his son was released from a concentration camp in Europe, Federn was granted a physician's licence, and he was admitted as a member of the New York Psychoanalytic Society. But in November 1946, he was found to have a tumor in his bladder, and the operation failed. His wife died in December 1949, and Federn decided to commit suicide.

From January to May, 1950, Federn saw five patients a day and conducted a seminar in his home. He was scheduled for more surgery on May 4. He got his papers in order, arranged for the transfer of his patients to other psychoanalysts, and went to the bank where he kept a gun with two bullets. On May 3, he saw his patients for the last time, signed his will, and went to bed. He shot himself in the head at three in the morning in the library of his apartment. His son heard the shot and found his father>>.

Note:

(*) He was casual about collecting payment from his patients which did not help matters.

1) Fritz Lackinger, <<Paul Federn's Analyse  der österreichischen Revolution>>, in "Werkblatt - Zeitschrift für Psychoanalyse und Gesellschaftskritik", Nr. 4/5, 3/4-1985.

2) Josef Shaked, <<Der Name Federn in der Psychoanalyse>>, in "Werkblatt - Zeitschrift für Psychoanalyse und Gesellschaftskritik", Nr.33, 2/1994.

3) Edmond Marc, <<La notion de frontière: Perls/Federn>>, in "Gestalt", n.24 - 2003/1, p.103 à 111.

Resumé de l'article: La notion de « frontière », et plus précisément de « frontière contact », est centrale pour la Gestalt. C’est d’elle qu’est dérivée en partie la notion de Self. Or il semble bien que cette notion ait été empruntée au psychanalyste Paul Federn, un des premiers disciples de Freud. Les auteurs de Gestalt Therapy font d’ailleurs référence à cet auteur. Après avoir situé Paul Federn, on présentera les aspects essentiels de son élaboration conceptuelle et théorique autour de la notion de frontière ; on évoquera aussi quelques unes de ses implications dans la pratique thérapeutique, et notamment dans l’abord des psychoses.

4) Patricia Cotti, <<La chambre d'enfant, un aspect de la relation entre Freud et Paul Federn?>>, in "Cliniques méditerranéennes", n.66 - 2002/2, p.175 à 191.

Resumé de l'article: En 1919 le livre de Federn Zur Psychologie der Revolution... a apparemment repris la conception freudienne de l’histoire originaire mais comporte, en fait, le germe d’une critique de la théorie freudienne de la masse. Les suppositions de Federn sur l’histoire, son interprétation psychanalytique de la fraternité et leurs conséquences politiques ont été officiellement ignorées par Freud qui, néanmoins, leur apporta quelques réactions.
Mots-clés : , histoire originaire, révolution, chambre d’enfant, fraternité, idéal, relation père-fils.
In 1919, Paul Federn’s book Zur Psychologie der Revolution... apparently seemed to follow the freudian conception of primitive history but can actually appear like a critic of Freud’s theory of the group. Federn’s suppositions on history, his psychoanalytic interpretation of brotherhood and their political consequences have been offically ignored by Freud who nevertheless gave reactions to them.
Keywords : , primitive history, revolution, children’s bedroom, brotherhood, ideal, father-son relationship.

5) Federn E., <<The relationship between Sigmund Freud and Paul Federn: some unpublished documents>>, in "Rev. Int. Hist. Psychanal.", 1989; 2: 441-8.

Summary: The relationship between Freud and Paul Federn, which lasted over an exceptionally long period of time (35 years), has been neglected for two major reasons: the departure of the latter for the United States in 1938 and the absence of any biographer. Long considered as a dissident, he was ignored by analytic circles (including Jones, Freud's biographer), partly because of his position in favor of the training of nonmedical analysts. A pioneer in the field of mental health and the application of psychoanalysis to social problems, he strove to transform psychoanalysis into an instrument for social and political change, thus remaining faithful to his socialist convictions.

6) Weiss E., <<Paul Federn. The theory of the Psychosis>>, in Alexander F., Eisenstein S. & Grotjahn M. (Eds.), "Psychoanalytic Pioneers", Basic Books, 1966.