Reflections on War and Death

Freud, Sigmund, 1856-1939Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

4.1

Word count: 57K words
Chapters: 6

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Reflections on War and Death by Sigmund FreudAuthor: Freud, Sigmund, 1856-1939,Language: English, Class: BF: Philosophy, Psychology, Religion: Psychology, Philosophy, Psychoanalysis, Release Date: Apr 15, 2011

Editor's review

This is a collection of two short essays Freud wrote against the backdrop of World War I. Brief in length, they nonetheless offer a concentrated view of his psychoanalytic perspective on war, violence, and the fear of death. The book discusses the tension between civilized norms and destructive impulses, as well as the conscious avoidance and unconscious complexity in attitudes toward death. As a public-domain ebook, it works well as supplementary reading for understanding the trajectory of Freud's thought, and as further reading for those interested in the psychology of war and conceptions of death. The text is primarily expository and conceptually dense, requiring some background in psychology. It is best placed within a reading sequence of Freud's other social and cultural works—not as an introductory book, but as primary material for understanding his concerns of the era and his application of theory. The electronic edition makes keyword searching easy and is suitable for repeated reference alongside notes.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Psychology readers with a basic familiarity with Freud's thought who wish to broaden their reading
Researchers or advanced students concerned with the psychological mechanisms of war and violence
Philosophy enthusiasts who want to understand conceptions of death from a psychoanalytic angle
Readers who need public-domain foreign-language material for textual analysis or translation practice

Not a good fit for

Readers with no psychology background who want a light introductory read
Those expecting a systematic textbook-style exposition or a clinical work rich in case studies
Readers who only want narrative plots and have limited patience for theoretical argument

Reading tips

Read the introduction or learn about the historical context before starting the main text, so as not to read it out of context.
After each section, summarize the core argument in your own words to check whether you have grasped the line of reasoning.
Read alongside Freud's other short social and cultural essays to observe the consistency of his concepts.
The English original is conceptually dense; when encountering key terms, verify the standard translation and annotate it.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

Do I need to read any of Freud's other works first?

Not strictly, but having read a social and cultural work such as Civilization and Its Discontents will make it easier to understand the discussion of civilizational restraint and aggressive impulses. It is readable with no background at all, though you will need to slow down and first grasp the basic concepts.

Can I read this ebook if my English is not good?

This is a public-domain English edition, and the expository prose is conceptually dense. If English reading is difficult, it is advisable to consult a reliable Chinese translation alongside it, or start with chapters you are familiar with, rather than grinding through it word by word from the beginning.

Is it long? Is it suitable to read in one sitting?

It consists of two short essays and is not long overall, but the argument is tightly packed. Reading it in two or three sessions, leaving time to organize key points after each, is more effective than reading it all at once.

Comments

Find this book

This site is an index: you start “Search all sources” in your browser, and the entries it lists all point to third-party sites; please judge their availability yourself.

About the author

Freud, Sigmund, 1856-1939 Author

Sigmund Freud (1856–1939) was the founder of psychoanalysis, and his writings have had a profound influence on modern psychology and on cultural and intellectual history. The library holds 29 of his works, covering the interpretation of dreams, introductory lectures on psychoanalysis, theories of sexuality, the psychopathology of everyday life, and themes such as beyond the pleasure principle, the uncanny, group psychology, and the analysis of the ego, as well as a beginner's reader on dream psychology. These works generally combine clinical observation with theoretical reasoning; their style is clear and speculative, and they often begin from everyday slips, dreams, and neurotic phenomena to reveal the mechanisms of unconscious activity. Freud's writing spans both the professional and the popular, establishing a new framework of questions for psychology and deeply influencing literature, art, and the humanities. Because public information is limited, his specific biography and academic career are not elaborated here.