INTERNATIONAL PSYCHO‑ANALYTICAL ASSOCIATION

                              2 May 1935  London W1

Dear Professor,

«IP4,0»It was a pleasure of the highest order to see you looking so well and to enjoy talking with you again.  You can imagine however that my wish for the latter is not easy to satisfy and I hope to have the privilege of indulging it further as soon as it can be managed.

The great question of whether we in England have advanced your theory further or whether we have made a rather serious mistake still remains an open one so far as I am concerned.«FN1.××A week previously, Jones had presented a paper outlining the differences between London and Vienna on various issues such as early female sexuality, the  genesis of the super‑ego, child analysis, and the death instinct, see Jones (1935).»  That I am anxious to thresh it out in a friendly discussion I have already shown.  What we need next is for some penetrating critic from Vienna to come here and criticise our work on a similar basis.  I have already spoken to Federn and Anna about this and hope it will be arranged before long.  What we most need is to study some concrete material together, for generalities do not carry one any further.  I was grateful for your friendly reception of what I had to say and am going next week to report the points in our discussion to a small circle here.«FN1.××The episode is discussed in Jones (1957a, pp. 196‑197; 1957b, p. 210).»

I was glad you liked my Instinct paper,«FN1.××Jones (1936).» but was very astonished at your thinking I had made such a mistake as to suppose you had used any of Melanie Klein's work as a starting point for any thoughts of yours.  Of course I know very well that your exposition on the matter actually preceded her writing at all.  I do not think I have ever known you to be influenced by anyone else, certainly least of all Melanie Klein.  So I turned with curiosity to my paper and think I have found the sentence that puzzled you.  It comes after an exposition of the super‑ego and its severity and runs as follows:

«IP4,0»"Detailed analytic studies, particularly those carried out on young children by Melanie Klein and others, have thrown a great deal of light on the sources of this severity and have led to the conception of a primitive aggressive instinct, non‑sexual in character."

«IP4,0»To avoid the least chance of ambiguity I will re‑write this sentence before publishing it.«FN1.××In the published version the word "particularly" is replaced with "strikingly confirmed by" and "aggressive instinct" is italicized, see Jones (1936, p. 281).»  It does, it is true, come rather as an interpolation in the argument, but I wanted to deal with all the contributions made by Psycho‑Analysis, not only your own.  When writing it I was not actually thinking of you because I should not ascribe to you the belief in a primary aggressive instinct (that is rather my own view); yours I should describe as a belief in an internal Todestrieb«MDUL»«MDNM» which is «MDUL»secondarily«MDNM» exteriorised into an aggressive impulse.

In any case there can hardly be a risk of misunderstanding, since almost the next sentence runs:

«IP4,0»"But, strangely enough, it was not by this conception and the studies I have just outlined that «MDUL»he«MDNM» arrived at this present view of the duality of mental structure."«FN1.××This sentence was left in tact, although there is no emphasis added to the "«MDUL»he«MDNM»" (Jones, 1936, p. 281).»

«IP4,0»Then I go on to your work about the Wiederholungszwang«MDUL»«MDNM», '«MDUL»Jenseits des Lustprinzips«MDNM»' etc.

Our visit to Vienna made the deepest impression on all of us from the oldest to the youngest.  Mervyn in particular will always treasure the precious gift you were so good as to give him.«FN1.××This was "an Etruscan statuette of exquisite beauty," see M. Jones (1987, p. 17).

»

With my kindest regards  affectionately yours  Ernest Jones