ABSTRACT

There are passages in w h i c h Freud suggested that art is a substitute gratification and science a diversion. At the end of the twenty-third introductory lecture, for example, Freud offered a b r ie f psychology of art. "The artist," he said, "wants to attain honor, power, wealth, and the love of women; but he lacks the means to reach these satisfactions." He therefore turns his back on reality, but in the end the public may derive great pleasure from his fantasies. When that happens, "he has attained by means of his fantasy what in i t ia l ly he had attained only in his fantasy: honor, power, and the love of women."