ABSTRACT
My introduction to hypnosis was as a pre-clinical student in Cambridge in 1945. A lecture, given in the physiology laboratory by Dr Bannister of the Cambridge Department of Psychology on the subject of ‘suggestion’, ended by his giving a demonstration of hypnosis on a volunteer from the student audience. I think the majority of those present enjoyed the lecture in the sense that it was entertaining and certainly different from the usual run of the mill, but to me it was more than impressive. By an extraordinary coincidence I had been bludgeoned into reading a biography of Sigmund Freud at the insistence of a fellow student in my digs. In this book it was stated that Freud’s discovery of the unconscious mind came about after he had questioned a patient of Dr Liébault’s in the latter’s clinic in Nancy. Under hypnosis this patient had been given a post-hypnotic suggestion that in the waking state she would perform a certain task but would have no knowledge as to why she had performed this task. Freud was able to question her afterwards and was satisfied that she indeed had no knowledge of why she had carried out this task. From this Freud deduced that there was part of her mind which was inaccessible to her in her waking state and therefore unconscious.
