Repressed Fear of Being Inconsistent. Some Notes on Karl Stern’s Biography

Preview: /Review of Daniel Burston’s, A Forgotten Freudian: The Passion of Karl Stern (London: Karnac Books 2017), 256 pages./ When the chief editor of Eidos kindly asked me to write a review of Daniel Burston’s new book devoted to Karl Stern, I kept a straight face and gritted my teeth. I did not want to reveal the fact that I had never heard of this Canadian psychiatrist and intellectual, who was probably one of the most influential figures in the development of psychoanalysis and in criticizing brain-reductionism in psychiatry. With a nervous smile I accepted the offer. When I was back home, I double-checked my library for any signs of Karl Stern’s presence. There was nothing. I had to admit that the subtitle of the book – A Forgotten Freudian – is not just an advertisement catch phrase for newbies to the field, but expresses the very state of affairs: there is a completely repressed Freudian researcher called Karl Stern.