How translations of Freud’s writings have influenced French psychoanalytic thinking

Abstract

Translations of Freud ’s writings have had a lasting influence on psychoanalytic thinking in France. They have, all the same, given rise to some conceptual distortions as regards the ego and the id, the ideal ego and the ego ideal, and splitting. Lacan’s ‘return to Freud ’ certainly reawakened interest in Freud ’s writings; however, by focusing mainly on Freud ’s early work, Lacan’s personal reading played down the importance of the texts Freud wrote after his metapsychological papers of 1915. The fact that there is no French edition of Freud ’s complete works makes it difficult for French psychoanalysts to put them in a proper context with respect to his developments as a whole. The Oeuvres Complètes [Complete Works] edition may well turn out to be the equivalent of the Standard Edition, but it is as yet far from complete – and, since the vocabulary employed is far removed from everyday language, those volumes already in print tend to make the general public less likely to read Freud. In this paper, the author evokes certain questions that go beyond the French example, such as the impact that translations have within other psychoanalytic contexts. Now that English has become more or less the lingua franca for communication between psychoanalysts, we have to face up to new challenges if we are to avoid a twofold risk: that of mere standardization, as well as that of a ‘Babelization’ of psychoanalysis.

Key words:

• French language
• historical dimension
• International Journal of Psychoanalysis
• L’Année Psychanalytique Internationale
• Œuvres Complètes de Freud
• psychanalyse
• translating Freud
• translations

1. Translated by David Alcorn.

1. Translated by David Alcorn.

Notes

1. Translated by David Alcorn.

2. The French‐language societies involved are the Paris Psychoanalytical Society [Société Psychanalytique de Paris, SPP], the French Psychoanalytical Association [Association Psychanalytique de France, APF], and the Belgian, Canadian and Swiss Psychoanalytical Societies [Société Suisse de Psychanalyse, SSPsa].

3. In 1913, an Italian periodical, Scientia, had published a French translation of The claims of psycho‐analysis to scientific interest [1913j], which seems to have gone unnoticed at the time (Assoun, 1980).

4. As of 1 January 2010, Freud’s writings will no longer be subject to copyright restrictions. J.‐B. Pontalis informed me that he intends to go on publishing new translations of Freud’s papers after that date (letter, 28 April 2008). In the same vein, M. Prigent, the head of the Presses Universitaires de France, replied to a similar question that I had asked of him: “We are at present envisaging various editorial hypotheses, without in any way jeopardizing the intellectual option of translating the Oeuvres Complètes” (letter, 23 April 2008).

5. The titles of these annual volumes are as follows: Livro Anual de Psicanálise and Libro Anual de Psicoanálisis, in Portuguese and Spanish respectively, published in Sao Paulo since 1985; L’Année Psychanalytique Internationale (2003–2006, Geneva: Editions Médecine et Hygiène; since 2007 Paris: InPress); L’Annata Psicoanalitica Internazionale (since 2004, Rome: Edizione Borla); Verkehrte Liebe and Schweigen (2006 and 2007, Tübingen: Edition diskord). The Russian edition is due to appear for the first time in 2008 (Moscow: New Literary Observer Publishing House). [See http://www.annualsofpsychoanalysis.com]