A letter handwritten and signed by Sigmund Freud, to his friend and patient, the philanthropist Margaret Stonborough-Wittgenstein, who was of Jewish descent. Sent several weeks after his arrival in England, several months after the annexation of Austria into Nazi Germany. London, June 21, 1938. German.
Sigmund Freud was one of the most slandered thinkers in Nazi Germany, and by 1933 his books were publicly burned. Several days after the annexation of Austria in 1938, Freud's house was looted and his daughter Anna was arrested by the Gestapo. Fortunately, Anton Sauerwald, a senior Nazi officer in charge of Jewish property in Austria, was a big fan of his writings, and helped him and his family escape from Austria. On June 4, 1938, Freud, his wife Martha and his daughter Anna crossed the border to France, proceeding to England where they were greeted with open arms.
The letter is written on official stationery with Freud's new address in London, 39 Elsworthy St., and documents his first days in the city.
The letter starts with a reference to a souvenir presumably given to Freud by Stonborough-Wittgenstein before he left – a new amulet to his collection of antiques: " The amulet has so far proven its worth. The journey was easy, the reception in England was flatteringly pleasant, the weather is surprisingly nice and the house my architect son has chosen for us as a temporary home is comfortable" (Freud was an avid collector of antiques from the Ancient East and from Asia, and before escaping from Vienna took care of transferring the collection to England; an important part of the collection was dedicated to amulets). Later, Freud addresses the personal tragedy the befell Stonborough-Wittgenstein shortly before the writing of the letter – the suicide of her ex-husband. Freud writes with a note of sympathy and concern, and even offers her a short "diagnosis": "It was long on my mind to write to you […] the black-margined letter [obituary] made me act on my intention. Nothing you ever said prepared me for this. I am thinking about melancholy […] I can well imagine in what painful and conflicted mental state the event placed you. Are your circumstances now going to change? Will you remain in Vienna? I would like to ask you much more".
Although throughout the letter Freud avoided explicitly mentioning the situation in Vienna, in one of the lines there is an implicit, venomous and humorous reference to the change that occurred in his country: " The garden and the view in Primrose Hill Park are an ample replacement for Grinzing, where Gauleiter Bürckel would have now become the next-door neighbor" (Freud used to spend his summer vacations in Grinzing, the pastoral suburb of Vienna, alongside many other contemporary German intellectuals; after the annexation of Austria into Nazi Germany, the new governor and the person in charge of carrying out the Anschluss, Josef Bürckel, moved to live in Grinzing). ?The letter ends with the words: "I hope to hear from you soon, with my deepest sympathy, Freud".
Sigmund Freud (1856-1939), the founder of psychoanalysis, one of the leading intellectuals and most influential figures of the 20th century. At the age of 17 he was accepted to study medicine at the Vienna University and in the following years published several medical studies in different fields. In 1895, he co-published with his teacher Josef Breuer the book "Studies on Hysteria", in which he described for the first time a method of therapy by means of conversation with the patient, with the patient relating his distress while lying on a couch. Following this book, Freud published a series of groundbreaking studies about humankind's mental life: "Totem and Taboo", "The Interpretation of Dreams", "Beyond the Pleasure Principle" and many other works, which revolutionized the western perception of mind. Freud died in September 1939 after a prolonged struggle with cancer. Due to the intense pain the illness caused him, he asked his personal physician to put an end to his misery, receiving a large dose of Morphine and dying shortly afterwards.
The addressee of this letter, Margaret Stonborough-Wittgenstein (1882-1958) was the sister of the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein and the pianist Paul Wittgenstein. In 1905, she married the art collector Gerome Stonborough. She was the subject of portrait painted for her wedding by the artist Gustav Klimt.
After World War I, Stonborough-Wittgenstein was appointed the special representative of the American Relief Program for Austria and served as an advisor in youth institutions. In this capacity she met Freud for the first time. She was analyzed by him over the course of two years and they remained in contact until Freud's death. Her marriage to her husband ended with divorce in 1938. A short time later, only six days before Freud sent this letter, her ex-husband committed suicide.
[1] leaf (two written pages), 23.5 cm. Good condition. Horizontal fold line. Some stains and blemishes, mostly to margins.