FREUD'S VOICE

This 40 second excerpt of Freud speaking in English is from a 7-inch, 33 1/3 RPM record first offered for sale as "A Rare Christmas Gift for Colleagues and Collectors" by The Psychoanalytic Review in 1964. The recording was made in London in December 1938, less than a year before his death. His slow speech is due to a prosthetic device he wore in his mouth as a result of multiple surgeries for cancer of the jaw. A transcript of the excerpt is presented below. You may need to listen to it several times to catch all the words.

Click on the text below to hear (341 K .wav file)





The script for this recording, in Freud's own hand, is in the Library of Congress Freud Exhibition. It reads: Dec. 7, 1938

I started my professional activity as a neurologist trying to bring relief to my neurotic patients. Under the influence of an older friend and by my own efforts I discovered some new and important facts about the unconscious in psychic life, the role of instinctual urges and so on. Out of these findings grew a new science, Psycho-Analysis, a part of psychology and a new method of treatment of the neuroses.

I had to pay heavily for this bit of good luck. People did not believe in my facts and thought my theories unsavoury. Resistance was strong and unrelenting. In the end I suceeded in acquiring pupils and building up an International Psycho-Analytic Association. But this struggle is not yet over.

A short sentence in German. Sgm. Freud



