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Playing with fire (or with Freud).
Mad, mad...
Mad, mad...
Wilhelm Reich was one of Freud's most talented disciples who, over time, after fourteen years of cooperation -- their first meeting took place in 1919 - became one of Freud's critics. Allegedly, from the start, Freud considered him, the best head in the Association. (1)
However, due to Reich's challenging the master's ideas, he lost Freud's favour. When in 193O, Relch visited Freud, "They had a very sharp discussion. As Reich recalled, He was very sharp, and I was very sharp, too. (2) That was their last meeting. With me, he was oh, mad, mad, later — in the late thirties, Reich added (3)
Taking into account his murderous nature, making Freud "mad" was not a good idea. Notably, in this context, Reich mentioned two other talented of Freud's disciples who both, like him, became critics of Freud's, and who, allegedly, committed suicide. Oh, Silberer. You know that Silberer committed suicide? Reich asked the interviewer adding, After meeting Freud, Tausk, I think, went this way, too.
Apparently, meeting Freud, when you fell out of favour, could be lethal. And again, Reich alluded to the fact that he had something in common with Tausk stating, My activity ... has earned me the reputation of being aggressive. I share this fate with Tausk. (4) He may have been aggressive like Tausk, but he didn't share Tausk's fate, who died a terrible death.
Having known Freud for years, Reich made an interesting observation. I always had the feeling he smoked - not nervousness, not nervousness - but because he wanted to say something which never came over his lips. ... As if he had “to bite something down.” ... Bite - a biting-down impulse, swallow something down, never to express it. (5)
What was it that Freud wanted to say but couldn't? No doubt, Freud kept secrets. The best you know, you may not tell to boys, as he wrote to Fliess, on December 3, 1897. A pity that one always keeps one's mouth shut about the most intimate things, Freud explained. (6) True, for the most part, Freud kept his mouth shut, but not always, not only about the intimate things but also, in the first place, about the perverted and illicit ones.
For years, Freud and Reich exchanged letters. Notably, In 1952, when Reich was rereading Freud’s letters to him, he commented that, for the first time, he felt a certain fear on the part of Freud toward him. (7)
Now, why would Reich, thirteen years after Freud's death, feel a fear when rereading Freud's letters? Apparently, though it had taken him that long, it was first then that he realised that Freud's letters contained veiled death threats directed towards him.
This wouldn't be the first time Freud threatened someone with death. Also, his dream book contains likewise veiled death threats against his former lover, no turned enemy, Wilhelm Fliess.
There's little doubt, that in Freud's sick mind, Reich, bearing the same name as Fliess, was a "revenant", someone who was a carbon copy of his dead former friend, and who was likewise a threat against Freud. A threat that had to be taken care of. Luckily for Reich, he moved to Berlin in 1930, thus putting a reasonable distance between himself and his former master which, may have, saved his life.
(1) Reich, Wilhelm, Reich speaks of Freud: Wilhelm Reich discusses his work and his relation, (1967, p. 42),
(2) Reich, (1967, p. 51).
(3) Reich, (1967, p. 96.
(4) Reich, (1967, p. 150).
(5) Reich, (1967, pp. 20-21).
(6) Freud, Sigmund, The Complete Letters of Sigmund Freud to Wilhelm Fliess, 1887-1904, (1985, p. 285),
(7) Reich, (1967, pp. 96-97).
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