Superb Scholarship

Freud, Adler, and Jung: Discovering the Mind (Discovering the Mind, Volume 3)
by Walter Kaufmann

Walter A. Kaufmann has produced an outstanding text. His research is meticulous and his prose style highly readable. Freud, Adler and Jung are presented accurately, and the reader is given fresh insights into tested psychoanalytical theory. This is a scholarly work of international significance, made even more profound by the incident detailed in Chapter 4. During his research at the Smithsonian Institution, Kaufmann discovered some hitherto unpublished correspondence relating to the sensational rift between Adler and Freud in 1912. The initial letter, dated May 12 of that year, read:

`Freud,

I have discovered the secret of the Unconscious. It does not repose in your Libido Theory. Resulting from Birth Trauma, all actions, reactions, thoughts and motivations derive from a desire for strudel - strudel with and without cinnamon, lightly dusted strudel with a piquant cheese platter to follow and strudel from Room Service. Our association is henceforth terminated.

Yours, Adler.'

Freud replied by return post:

`My Dear Addled (Oops! Pardon the Slip),

After analyzing your letter, I am of the firm belief that you are quite a few granny smiths short of the full bushel. And one more thing - may I act as your agent regarding the paperback rights to any future cookbook?

Yours,

for only 10% of net receipts,

Siggie.'

There is no record of Adler replying, but his book, `The Psychodynamics of Desserts', was released for the 1913 Christmas rush. It was dedicated to Freud, with the defiantly insulting inscription, `To Fraud: Jung accepted 5%.''

Kaufmann is as brilliant as his subjects, and rarely has a singular work exercised such plethoric influence.