December 13th,
1926

Dear Friends:

Just as Professor Freud said in his last letter,
the great engine, America, took me into its power and allows
me not one minute’s time to have a pleasurable talk with my
European friends. Today exceptionally I am passing the week-
end in the country-house of two old former patients and that gives
me the opportunity to give you at least a very short account
of my sojourn here and of my observations.

The general interest in Psycho-analysis in public
as well as in scientific circles is much stronger than in
Europe. I have had the opportunity to meet all leading psychia-
trists of New York and Albany, privately and officially;
can assert that they nearly without exception acknowledge the
high theoretical and practical value of Psycho-analysis and have
a great consideration for Professor Freud and his work. I have
not remarked the tendency, so universal in Europe, to camou-
flage the psycho-analytic work in scientific publications. On the
other hand, the theoretical and practical knowledge of Psycho-analysis
and training in it, is deplorably superficial.

Dr. Salmon, Professor at Columbia University, with
whom I have had long talks, uses Psycho-analysis with great under-
standing in his psychiatric practice. He told me he would
prefer to give up all that he learned in medicine than what he
learned from Freud. On the other hand, he declared that he does
not wish to be analyzed. His “American sense of liberty and
independence” prevents his doing so. I told him that by this, his
knowledge must remain very superficial and his judgement about Psy-
cho-analysis incompetent. He is one of the medical advisors
of many great financial foundations. I hope to have the oppor-
tunity to bring him into closer contact with us.

I had a talk with one of the chief lay advisors of
the Rockefeller Foundation, Mr. Raymond Fosdick, a lawyer. He,
too, is personally interested, although he knows very little
about our work, and told me that his colleagues are too conserva-
tive now, but in the future it may be possible to win them.

I was invited to meet with the National Research
Council (another big organisation), the Department for Sex Re-
search, and spent the evening in showing them their lack of know-
ledge about our method. I think that I impressed them in the
right way. The Dean of the Medical Faculty of Chicago University;
the Director of the Museum of Natural History, New York City; the
former chief of the Women’s and Children’s Police (a lady); a
well-known psychologist, Professor Hamilton; Dr. Salmon; a younger
 

man, Zimmer (?), the secretary; Professor Ogburn, professor of
Sociology at Columbia University; and some others were present.

The Child Study Association of America, an or-
ganization of about 5,000 members, mostly women, invited me to
give a lecture. This I did, before an audience of about 600
people at the Hotel Waldorf-Astoria, talking about the relation
of Pedagogy with Psycho-analysis. The evening was satisfactory.

The New York Society for Clinical Psychiatry
invited me to give the address at their annual meeting. I
spoke on “The Gulliver Phantasies and Hallucinations”, a paper
which I wish to publish in the Zeitschrift and the Journal.
I think that this paper explains, at least partly, the mistakes
of Rank about the Birth Trauma. I openly told the audience
(about 150 psychiatrists) that Freud and his followers reject
Rank’s theory as well as his technique.

Nearly every day I receive invitations from
different institutions (Department of Psychology at Columbia
University; the St. Elizabeth Hospital in Washington; a
scientific Club in Boston; a medical Association in Chicago,
etc.) to give them lectures. Americans seem to be insatiable
in devouring lectures. Most of these invitations I have been
obliged to defer until I finish my course of lectures at the
New School for Social Research, which will last until the end
of February. This School is a sort of free university – the
audience, very mixed (professors of universities and of other
schools, medical doctors, teachers, social workers, and lay
people) but very intelligent and showing great interest.

I have tried to give a more systematic rather
than the usual historical, presentation, beginning with the
Metapsychology and telling the psychoanalytic views about the
Id, Ego, Superego, their individual and phylogenetic develop-
ment. After ten lectures I am only now reaching the Psycho-
pathology of Everyday Life, Dreams, and Neuroses, which will
occupy the second half of my Course. I am told that my lectures
are very well received. I seem to have found the right milieu
between dry theory and the diluted popular presentations, to which
the people in America are accustomed; so that scientists and lay
people are fairly well contented. The interest in the content
of my lectures seems to overcome the difficulties caused by my
rather insufficient English vocabulary and pronunciation; so that
the number of listeners, about 300, is not decreasing.

The situation in the two Psycho-analytic
Societies is shortly this: The New York Society is under the
overwhelming influence of Brill, Oberndorf, Jelliffe, and Stern,
who all have a large practise which makes it difficult for
them to do much scientific work. The Society meets once a month,
but I have not been invited to attend, the excuse being, perhaps,
that they have their meetings on Tuesdays, the date of my lectures
at the New School. In reality, they could have changed the date
of their lectures. Neither did they invite me to give papers or
lectures before their Society. Brill invited me to meet the chief
members of the New York Society at his home, expressis verbis
 

in order to discuss the question of lay analysis, which seems to be
the most important problem in this Society. The discussion was
absolutely futile. They repeated constantly their complaint a-
gainst American analytical quacks, which is absolutely justified;
but they were incapable of seeing the difference between quacks
and trained lay analysts. They also repeat constantly the dis-
asters caused by lay analysts who neglect the organic aspect.
Not being in touch with the New York Society, I accepted the in-
vitation of a group of non-medical analysts, most of them having
been analyzed formerly by me, to give them a weekly seminar,
which I had expected to end in February. Two members of the
New York Society, Feigenbaum and Blumgart, invited me privately
to give to some of the members a seminar; and yesterday, after
two months delay, Oberndorf came to see me and asked me to give
this seminar under the auspices of the New York Psycho-Analytical
Society. This offer I have accepted.

The personal attitude of Brill towards me is
very friendly, but in this question of lay analysis he is immo-
vable. And, besides this, he seems to be very much hurt by some
derogatory remarks of the Professor about American Psycho-analysis.
I do not yet know how far my being here will help to overcome the
difficulties. I very often hear from my colleagues here that their
attitude in the question of lay analysis is supported by London,
Berlin, and Vienna, which may be partly true.

The American Psycho-Analytical Society meets
only twice a year. They have asked me to give the opening address
at their annual meeting, December 26th. I have accepted and in-
tend to talk about the current problems of Psycho-analysis (Meta-
psychology, Analysis of the Ego, Activity, Birth Trauma, and Lay
Analysis). It seems to me that there are a number of capable
scientists in this Society, one of whom, Dr. Kempf, is now having
analysis with me.

Besides all this propaganda work and the inevit-
able social dinners and luncheons in New York, I am giving eight
analytical hours daily. This menu may explain to you my difficulty
in answering letters and in being punctual with the Rundbrief.
As a whole I really think that my being here is not only personally
advantageous but will do some good, if not immediate, at least,
in later results for the cause of Psycho-analysis. Of course, I
am a little tired but I hope it will go without a break-down until
May or June, when I intend to go home via London, Berlin, and
Vienna.

Heartly greetings from yours always,  
Ferenczi

P.S. I agree with Eitingon about Stuttgart being the place of the
next Congress. Switzerland seems to me to be impossible as long
as we haven’t got there a better organization.