© 1990 by Society for the Social History of Medicine
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The Early Discovery of Freud by the British General Educated Public, 1912–1919
SUMMARY Based upon a survey of ninety general interest, religious and educational periodicals, this paper argues that the popularization of Freud by the British lay press began as early as 1912, so that by 1919 a large quantity of material about psychoanalysis had been written by and for the educated lay public. The expositors who wrote this early material were more receptive to Freud than was the majority of the medicopsychological community, which was largely hostile. Indeed, these expositors were selectively favourable to him: while strongly disapproving of his sexual theories, they were attracted to his theory of the unconscious, although often denying its ubiquitous, deterministic influence, and they were fully convinced of its usefulness in attaining self-knowledge During World War I they also began explaining and championing the benefits of psychoanalytic therapy. Meanwhile, from 1916 onwards, Jung‘s British disciples began promoting his views in the press, arguing that his more optimistic and less sexually oriented conception of the unconscious was preferable to that of Freud. Simultaneously, certain doctors, having been convinced by their treatment of soldiers suffering from shell-shock during the war that some aspects of Freud’s theory were helpful in explaining it, began promoting to the lay public an eclectic depth psychology that embraced some aspects of his theory of the unconscious while rejecting others, especially his emphasis on sexuality in the aetiology of nervous disorders. The compatibility of these eclectic and Jungian views with the selectively favourable exposition of psychoanalysis already being promoted in the press, facilitated the emergence of an eclectic, diluted interpretation of Freudianism that was quite popular with the lay public, including the educational and religious communities, where some applied certain psychoanalytic concepts to these disciplines, while usually rejecting its theory of sexuality
Keywords: British press; dream theory; eclectic psychology; Freud; history of psychoanalysis; Jung; popularization; sexuality; unconscious
*Department of History, Wheaton College, Wheaton, Illinois 60187-5593