Freud: The Mind of the Moralist
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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Freud: The Mind of the Moralist (1959; second edition 1961) is a book about Sigmund Freud, the founder of psychoanalysis, by the sociologist Philip Rieff, who described his motive in writing it as being to "show the mind of Freud, not the man or the movement he founded, as it derives lessons on the right conduct of life from the misery of living it." Rieff places Freud and psychoanalysis in historical context. The writer Susan Sontag contributed to the work to such an extent that she has been considered an unofficial co-author.
One of Rieff's most influential writings, Freud: The Mind of the Moralist has been called "brilliant" and a "great book". It established Rieff's reputation, together with other books helped place Freud at the center of moral and philosophical inquiry, and has been compared to works such as the philosopher Paul Ricœur's Freud and Philosophy (1965).
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Summary
Rieff described the "motive and main point" of his book as being to "show the mind of Freud, not the man or the movement he founded, as it derives lessons on the right conduct of life from the misery of living it."
Publication history
Freud: The Mind of the Moralist was first published in 1959. In 1961, it was published by Anchor Books.
Reception
Mainstream media
Freud: The Mind of the Moralist was discussed by M. D. Aeschliman in National Review, Elisabeth Lasch-Quinn in The New Republic, and the book critic George Scialabba in Boston Review.
Aeschliman compared the book to the cultural anthropologist Ernest Becker's The Denial of Death (1973) and the psychologist Paul Vitz's Sigmund Freud's Christian Unconscious (1988), describing them all as "great books treating of or inspired by Freud."
