SIGMUND FREUD

Although it is hard to imagine, this book attempts to present Freud without any of his vocabulary. It never uses the words psychiatry, psychoanalysis or (heaven forfond!) sex. Nor are the words mad, crazy, insane or mentally ill to be found here. The word is ""sick"" and the state is ""nervous condition."" The suspicion arises that the master of concept does not lend himself to juvenile conceptualization. In no sense a complete report of dates and places, it ends in 1900 Vienna. The Freuds, en famille, are supplied with truly banal conversation, i.e.: Mrs. Freud asks her bridegroom"" 'Sigmund, what are you thinking about! He would reply, 'Oh nothing. I was just eating my dinner!"" Until the night, all in a rush, he poured out, over the strudel, that his patients were sick because they were unhappy due to shame, or anger at somebody, or covetous of something and so refused to talk about what was really bothering them. The interpretation of dreams is mentioned, but the happy illustrations of smiling dream animals subdues their significance.