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SOCIETY--"A GANG OF MURDERERS": Freud on Hostility and War

SOCIETY--"A GANG OF MURDERERS": Freud on Hostility and War Tom Like primeval men, we are a gang of murderers.     igmund Freud, “Reflections on War and Death” —S However much Freud regretted the anxieties with which society burdens its members, he also believed that presocial humans were guilt-free homicidal maniacs and that therefore a guilt-ridden social order is preferable to no social order at all. The overview of Freud’s social psychology given in the preceding sentence is based largely on standard readings of Civilization and Its Discontents (1930), and it is worth testing them against a less famous and even less hopeful essay of his, “Reflections on War and Death.”1 Writing in 1915 during World War I, Freud The author wishes to thank Bettine Menke, Holt Meyer, and the Literaturwissenschaft Colloquium at Erfurt University, Germany, where an earlier version of this essay was presented. 1. Sigmund Freud, “Zeitgemässes über Tod und Krieg” (1915), in Fragen der Gesellschaft, Ursprünge der Religion, vol. 9 of Studienausgabe (Vienna: Siebte Auflage, 1994). References in English are to Freud, “Reflections on War and Death,” trans. Ethel Colburn Mayne, in Character and  Culture (New York: Collier, 1963). A related statement on war is contained in Freud’s letter exchange of 1932 with Albert Einstein. (For Freud’s answer to Einstein, see Studienausgabe, 9:275–86.) Of this http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Common Knowledge Duke University Press

SOCIETY--"A GANG OF MURDERERS": Freud on Hostility and War

McCall, Tom
Common Knowledge , Volume 12 (2) – Apr 1, 2006
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Publisher
Duke University Press
Copyright
Copyright 2006 by Duke University Press
ISSN
0961-754X
eISSN
1538-4578
DOI
10.1215/0961754X-2005-006
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Abstract

Tom Like primeval men, we are a gang of murderers.     igmund Freud, “Reflections on War and Death” —S However much Freud regretted the anxieties with which society burdens its members, he also believed that presocial humans were guilt-free homicidal maniacs and that therefore a guilt-ridden social order is preferable to no social order at all. The overview of Freud’s social psychology given in the preceding sentence is based largely on standard readings of Civilization and Its Discontents (1930), and it is worth testing them against a less famous and even less hopeful essay of his, “Reflections on War and Death.”1 Writing in 1915 during World War I, Freud The author wishes to thank Bettine Menke, Holt Meyer, and the Literaturwissenschaft Colloquium at Erfurt University, Germany, where an earlier version of this essay was presented. 1. Sigmund Freud, “Zeitgemässes über Tod und Krieg” (1915), in Fragen der Gesellschaft, Ursprünge der Religion, vol. 9 of Studienausgabe (Vienna: Siebte Auflage, 1994). References in English are to Freud, “Reflections on War and Death,” trans. Ethel Colburn Mayne, in Character and  Culture (New York: Collier, 1963). A related statement on war is contained in Freud’s letter exchange of 1932 with Albert Einstein. (For Freud’s answer to Einstein, see Studienausgabe, 9:275–86.) Of this

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Common Knowledge – Duke University Press

Published: Apr 1, 2006

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