Truth, Truthfulness, and Psychoanalysis: The Reception of Freud in Wilhelmine Germany

Abstract

The reception of Freud in Wilhelmine Germany was the encounter with controversial ideas on sexuality, the unconscious, and personal identity. This essay examines the reactions to psychoanalysis amongst three groups: the professional world of psychiatry and psychology; Hans Blüher and the youth movement; and Otto Gross as part of the expressionist-anarchist milieu. These groups represent the ideal-typical ways of responding to Freud at this time: the first embodied the ‘bourgeois’ (bürgerlich) norms of moderation, Bildung, and self-control; the second the value of communal authenticity within the context of life reform; and the third the principle of transgressive subjectivity in the name of individual liberation. As much as these encounters disclose the diversity and complexity of Wilhelmine society, they also allow us to locate the status of psychoanalysis at the time. The article argues that while different groups did embrace certain aspects of Freudian thinking, the peculiarity of psychoanalysis meant that its search for truth did not satisfy most scientists and its fight for truthfulness did not go far enough for most ‘liberationists’.