[lit-ideas] Re: New Program in Psychoanalysis and Culture
- From: "David Wright" <wright@xxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Tue, 22 Jul 2008 18:28:39 -0500
I'll concede that Freud was a reasonably talented essayist, if one
accepts that his supportiing arguments are valid. Fundamentally though,
he tends to cite himself...hardly reasonable argumentation. And, while I
appreciate Bloom, his kabbalistic writing must, perforce, be
God-centric. I could analyse writing from an astrological perspective
with just as much authority, not that either produces reasonable
analyses...unless faerie tales compose an essential part of your mythos.
Regarding culture, I remain unconvinced, to be polite, that anyone stands
outside of culture. I have as liitle respect for the most agreeable
Humanist that merely regurgitates the ideas of his guru as I do for the
autocrat that is capable of not a whit less. Nonetheless, even if we
accept that Siggie was a decent, or divine, wordsmith, it does not
logically follow that his ideas possess much worth. I ignore, of course,
the fact that if one believes in Psychoanalysis or God, it is likely that
shamanistic practice based upon those beliefs will likely result in a
successful amelioration of any perceived problem.
Opium, Religion, Marx,
d.
Eric Yost:
David Wright wrote: Is Freud still read as anything more than an
amachronistic, literary writer exploring the human condition? Not
that literature has failed to explore the aforementioned problem,
but Freud possessed only moderate literary skills, and abandoned
logical inquiry altogether.
Harold Bloom expresses an opposing opinion in his kabbalistic
survey, _Genius_. He considers Freud the greatest contemporary
essayist after Emerson.
That people would glom Freud's theories and adapt them to their
political agendas -- as Koenigsberg does -- probably would not have
surprised him. Freud's "hermeneutics of suspicion" allows anyone to
start a cottage industry on the lecture circuit. You get to pretend
to be an outsider with superior knowledge of a culture, standing
above it, and able to supply cures to all ills.
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