ABSTRACT
Sigmund Freud, characteristically, did not go gentle into the 21st century. The 1990s visited upon the man and his ideas a virulence of critique that exceeded in its range and publicity anything he encountered in his professional life. In addition to ongoing opposition to Freud's theories, there have been highly personal attacks on his ethics and basic probity. Especially since Freud's partisans have addressed these attacks frequently and cogently, we as literary critics will forego filial piety and will, instead, pose a core question: what of Freud's legacy remains viable for humanistic studies? What tools for analysis, and what truths about motivation and desire, will foster literary criticism in the new century?
