ABSTRACT
Despite a radically different view of human psychology than existed in Freud's day, psychoanalytic theorising continues to exercise a powerful hold over western imagination. Why should this be? There appear to be many reasons, none of which necessarily tells us of the truth or falseness of psychoanalytic formulation. First, at least on the surface, it speaks to us in a familiar language; a language of description which resonates with the personal. We may experience symptoms and desires we cannot explain. We recognise the aggressive and vengeful in ourselves and also the desires to be approved of, loved and respected. Second, it places these personal propensities at its centre, to be explained systematically, and it attempts to provide answers to the contradictory and paradoxical. Third, while it speaks in terms of mental mechanisms as fragmented wishes, desires and fears, it nevertheless offers some possibility for coherence and union. Fourth, it offers a new principle of knowing, based on free association which requires the individual to suspend moral and logical reasoning.
