Reviews of A Dream of Undying Fame
“[A] detailed and lucid account… Breger’s knowledgeable retelling of the birth of psychoanalysis as a poignant family feud is openly partisan but no less persuasive for wearing its Breuerite heart on its sleeve.” – Boston Globe
“This volume should interest people with a toe in the history of psychology, or those seeking to better understand the history of their own diagnosis.” - Publisher's Weekly
“This well-balanced presentation of a nearly mythic man discusses both Freud's failings and his extraordinary contributions in an engagingly readable style. Anyone interested in psychology, particularly the many ideas promoted by Freud that have continued to shaped our current understanding of human nature, will find this worthwhile.” – Library Journal
“Louis Breger’s compassionate, brilliant and spellbinding retelling of the origins of psychoanalysis, seen through the lens of Freud’s trauma history, intense longings, and profound ambition, should be required reading for anyone interested in the foundations of one of the most influential theories of the 20thcentury. By telling the story of Freud and his relationships, Breger both challenges the dogmas that have stymied so many psychoanalytic historians, and illuminates the dynamics and entanglements at the heart of psychoanalysis’ marvelous breadth and inherent limitations.”—
“A masterful, extremely readable account of the early origins of psychoanalysis, illuminating Freud’s driving need to establish his own singular fame, even as it depicts with respect the revolutionary changes his work wrought in our understanding of what it means to be human.”—George E. Atwood, Professor of Psychology,
“Louis Breger has followed up his splendid biography of Freud with an expanded account of Freud’s early cases and the dynamics of his troubled relationships with Josef Breuer and Wilhelm Fliess. He brilliantly shows that the evidence on which psychoanalysis is based has much more to do with trauma, loss, and superego problems than with sexual conflicts.”—Bernard J. Paris, Professor of English,
“A Dream of Undying Fame brilliantly illuminates the tensions in play at the very conception of psychoanalysis. Anyone who has participated in psychoanalytic treatment or studies modern intellectual history will find this story unforgettable.”—Leslie Brothers, MD; author of Friday’s Footprint and Mistaken Identity
“A thoughtful and incisive assessment of psychoanalytic theory and practice, its permanent contributions, and its serious flaws. In highly accessible language and style, Louis Breger leads us through Freud’s early experiences, which were to influence his later theories, and his dreams of martial glory, giving due credit to Joseph Breuer, the first practitioner of the talking cure. He sets us straight on the often distorted history of Anna O. and Freud’s infatuation with his male friends while appraising the validity of his theories as they developed along the way. Readers who appreciate a serious scientific book that reads like a detective thriller will be totally captured by A Dream of Undying Fame.”—Sophie Freud, MSW, Ph.D. Professor Emerita of the Simmons College School of Social Work, author of Living in the Shadow of the Freud Family
“Fascinating and persuasive….Writing with both clinical and scholarly authority, Louis Breger shows that Josef Breuer deserves more credit for his contribution to psychoanalysis. A Dream of Undying Fame casts much light on many crucial issues in contemporary psychoanalysis, and it will be of great interest to anyone who wishes to learn more about the talking cure and Studies on Hysteria.”—Jeffrey Berman, Ph. D., Distinguished Teaching Professor, SUNY at
“This beautifully written book provides a persuasive account of the origins of psychoanalysis, from its promising beginnings through its wrong turns to its current potential. In lucid prose, Breger achieves remarkable balance, portraying Freud’s genius as well as his profound limitations. This masterful work is a guide for the future of psychological theory and psychotherapy.”—L. Alan Sroufe, William Harris Professor of Child Psychology, University of
“This wonderfully intelligent and lively account of Freud’s early analytic work and theory-building is packed with information and shrewd insights, giving us a rich portrait of the brilliant, flawed, ferociously ambitious man who transformed the way we look at the world.”—Judith Viorst, Author of Necessary Losses
“A Dream of Undying Fame is a probing, elegant and balanced book. Louis Breger shows how Freud’s traumatic childhood shaped his ambitious, detached and authoritarian personality, and led to the betrayal of his mentor, Josef Breuer. Breger’s analysis exposes a fascinating paradox: Freud both invented psychoanalysis and impoverished its development. A must-read for everyone interested in how ideas can change the world.”—Brenda Webster, author of The Last Good Freudian and
Reviews of the L.A. Times bestseller Freud: Darkness in the Midst of Vision (Wiley, 2000)
“…the best biography of Sigmund Freud.” —E. James Lieberman, M.D. Bulletin of the History of Medicine
“Breger’s sane and lucid study must henceforth count among the indispensable books on Freud.” —Ritchie Robertson,
“Groundbreaking…Freudian analysis literally at its best”—Booklist
“Highly readable…Breger maintains a judiciously skeptical distance from Freud and Freud’s own self-mythologizing yet never loses sympathy for the man himself.” —J. M. Coetzee, winner, Nobel Prize for Literature, 2003
“Masterly…this landmark work conveys a new sense of one of the great flawed men and movements of the last century.” —Library Journal
“A foray into the past that matters a great deal.” —New York Times Book Review
“Louis Breger’s Freud is the most thoughtful, balanced and comprehensive biography to date, a book that will appeal to scholars, clinicians, and the general public…he writes with the imaginative sympathy of a novelist, the acute insight of a clinician and the skeptical questioning of a research psychologist.” —Jeffrey Berman, Ph.D. , American Journal of Psychotherapy
"Breger’s book surpasses all the competition in its balance and insightfulness into the character of its hero, and is easily the equal of any in its lively readability…this biography of Freud remains the best one available.” —Robert R. Holt, Ph.D., American Imago
"Breger has come close to providing, for the first time,an evenhanded biography that aims, wherever possible, to separate doctrine from knowledge and received opinion from accumulating wisdom.” —Donald P. Spence, Ph.D. Psychoanalytic Psychology
“Breger has laid out the pattern (of Freud’s attacks on those who disagreed with him) better than any biographer to date and has done so without manifest grievance against his subject …masterful…clear, even luminous…splendid…” —John Kerr, Psychoanalytic Dialogues
"…Breger traces the long, intricate and secretive course of his (Freud’s) campaign…he is no apologist for Freud, but neither is he a ferocious unmasker…This is a balanced, judicious portrait, and all the more condemnatory for that.” —John Banville, The Irish Times