Sigmund Freud (6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian psychologist, psychoanalyst and philosopher. He was the founder of psychoanalysis and one of the most influential thinkers of the twentieth century, and is hailed by later generations as the ‘father of psychoanalysis’.

On 6 May 1856, Freud was born into a Jewish family living in Freiburg in Moravia, within the Austrian Empire—now known as Příbor in the Czech Republic. His father, Jacob, was a wool merchant who purchased textiles from the family workshop and other small workshops before reselling them.

However, due to the economic recession in Austria at the time, Jacob’s business began to yield less profit; consequently, the Freud family’s financial situation was precarious, even to the point of being somewhat straitened.

The family consisted of his mother, Amalia, and two half-brothers, both of whom were more than twenty years older than Freud. One of them was already married with children, so during his adolescence, Freud once believed that his father, Jacob, was actually his grandfather. 

When Freud was four years old, his father moved the family to Vienna. In the years that followed, Freud’s two younger brothers and five younger sisters were born in succession; their arrival presented considerable challenges for this modest family, though fortunately they received help from friends.

Freud displayed remarkable talent from an early age. At the age of nine, he was admitted to the highly prestigious Spörrl Gymnasium in Vienna with outstanding results. From his second year onwards, Freud consistently maintained the top position in the school until he graduated.

His teachers took note of his excellent academic performance, and the school granted him special permission to sit only the annual end-of-year examination from his third year onwards, exempting him from all other examinations. 

This saved him the time spent sitting various exams, allowing the young Freud to devote more time to broadening his knowledge. He taught himself English, French, Italian, Spanish, Ancient Greek and Latin; in some of these languages, he even spoke more fluently than the school’s teachers.

In 1873, at the age of just 17, Freud enrolled at the University of Vienna to study medicine. At the time, the University of Vienna was regarded as ‘Europe’s scientific mecca’, having produced many political figures and scientific luminaries; the physicist Doppler was among its alumni. 

After enrolling, Freud gradually developed a keen interest in biology and physiology. In late 1876, during a biology experiment, he made the unexpected discovery of the testes in a male eel.

For more than 2,000 years prior to this, people had been attempting to unravel the mystery of the eel’s reproduction, yet had consistently failed to locate any reproductive organs within the eel’s body. 

Freud’s discovery not only solved this 2,000-year-old mystery but also brought the young Freud a degree of renown within academic circles. Ernst Brücke, then Professor of Physiology at the University of Vienna, held the young man in high regard and retained him as an assistant in his physiology laboratory.

In May 1881, Freud was awarded his Doctor of Medicine degree. Astute readers will have noticed that, from his enrolment in 1873 to the award of his doctorate in 1881, Freud spent seven years at university.

For a student of such exceptional intellect, this is difficult to comprehend; the reality was that Freud simply loved university life so much that spending every day in various laboratories and never once sitting his final examinations, until his family indirectly hinted to him that his father, exhausted from having to pay his exorbitant tuition fees, hoped he would find employment to ease the family’s financial situation.

Only then did he resolve to sit the final examinations, passing all the required exams within three months. After graduating, driven by his passion for academic research, Freud chose to remain at Ernst’s laboratory, taking up the post of demonstration laboratory assistant.

The pay was pitifully low, but it was, after all, Freud’s first paid job. After a year in this role, Ernst approached him and urged him to switch to clinical medicine, advising him to start from scratch, as remaining in the laboratory would only stifle his talents. 

The medical profession in Europe was highly regimented; obtaining a medical degree was merely the first step. To become a fully-fledged doctor, one had to accumulate sufficient clinical experience and obtain the relevant certificates issued by a hospital.

In late July 1882, Freud left Ernst’s biological laboratory, where he had spent many years, and joined the Vienna General Hospital to begin his clinical practice. During that time, Freud met the love of his life: Martha Bernays.

The couple were soon engaged, but at that time, Freud was so destitute—the salary for a clinical trainee was so meagre as to be virtually non-existent—that Martha’s family vehemently opposed the marriage, even going so far as to move the entire family to Hamburg. 

The two lovers, who had fallen for one another at first sight, did not grow apart despite the geographical distance; they maintained close contact through correspondence.

In August 1885, Freud finally secured the post of lecturer in neuropathology at the University of Vienna, which enabled him to open his own practice. In October of the same year, he travelled to Paris, France, to further his studies under the tutelage of Jean-Martin Charcot, a renowned European psychiatrist.

During his studies, Freud encountered hysteria patients for the first time and discovered that the condition affected men as well as women—a finding that contradicted the prevailing academic view at the time that ‘only women suffer from hysteria’. This discovery played a pivotal role in Freud’s shift from neurology to neuropathology.

In 1886, the 30-year-old Freud married Martha, aged 25. That same year, he opened his own private practice and began independent research into neuropathology and the treatment of various clinical conditions. In 1895, his book Studies on Hysteria, co-authored with Josef Breuer, was published, marking the birth of psychoanalysis. 

However, at the time, the mainstream academic community still did not recognise or take Freud’s theories seriously; furthermore, due to his Jewish heritage, he faced considerable oppression.

In the autumn of 1902, at the suggestion of Wilhelm Stecker, the ‘Psychological Wednesday Society’ (Psychologische Mittwochs-Gesellschaft) was founded. Numerous doctors from the University of Vienna who were interested in Freud’s theories would gather at Freud’s home every Wednesday to discuss issues relating to psychology and neurology. 

At that time, in addition to Freud and Wilhelm Stäkel, the members included Alfred Adler, Max Kahane and Rudolf Reitler; all five were of Jewish descent.

Shortly afterwards, Max Graf also joined the society. By 1906, the Society had 16 members. It was at this time that Freud began corresponding with Carl Jung on academic matters. In March of the following year, Jung travelled to Vienna with Ludwig Binswanger to visit Freud and took part in the Society’s discussions. 

In 1908, the Wednesday Psychological Society was officially renamed the Vienna Psychoanalytic Society, with Freud serving as its president. In 1910, Margaret Schilte became the Society’s first female member.

In the years that followed, the Vienna Psychoanalytic Society continued to grow and flourish, and its academic theories began to spread worldwide. In 1930, Freud was awarded the Goethe Prize, named after the German writer Goethe and intended to honour those who had made contributions to German literature, though the award was not restricted to writers alone. 

Three years later, the Nazis came to power in Germany. They classified Freud’s books as banned literature and resolved to burn them. His daughter, Anna, was arrested; fortunately, with the help of friends, she was released and returned home safely.

This incident resolved Freud to leave Germany. With the assistance of Ernest Jones, he obtained permission to emigrate to Britain. On 4 June 1938, Freud travelled to London with his wife and daughter aboard the Orient Express. His four sisters were unable to leave Vienna and ultimately perished in Nazi concentration camps.

Upon arriving in London, the Freud family lived at 20 Maresfield Gardens in Hampstead, where he continued to see patients; the house is now the Freud Museum. In 1936, Freud was elected a foreign member of the Royal Society.

In his later years, Freud was plagued by ill health. He had developed a fondness for tobacco at the age of 24, believing it would help him work more efficiently, In February 1923, as a result of his long-term smoking habit, he was diagnosed with leukoplakia. 

The dermatologist advised him to give up smoking, but he did not heed this advice. When he later returned to see the doctor, the doctor discovered that the patches in his mouth had become cancerous and once again urged him to give up smoking, though he did not explain the severity of his condition to Freud.

Shortly afterwards, Freud’s condition had progressed to cancer of the lower jaw, and he was forced to undergo surgery to remove the cancerous tissue. By the time of his death on 23 September 1939, Freud had undergone more than 60 surgical procedures of varying severity; on several occasions, he suffered severe haemorrhages that nearly cost him his life.

Finally, let us discuss Freud’s main theories:

① Freud believed that humans possess a subconscious mind, which lies ‘beneath the surface’.

② He divided the human psyche into three components: the id, the ego and the superego. The id represents a person’s primal instincts and desires; it is a wholly subconscious part of the mind, not subject to conscious control. The ego refers to the conscious part of the mind, the aspect of the personality that deals with practical matters. The superego is the aspect of the personality that stands above the ego; it is governed by moral principles and drives us towards greater perfection.

③ Freud believed that ‘dreams are the fulfilment of wishes that cannot be realised in reality and are repressed’; his book The Interpretation of Dreams expounds this theory.

④ Regarding the theory of psychosexual development, he posited that human psychological development proceeds through the following stages: the oral stage (such as the pleasure an infant derives from breastfeeding), the anal stage (such as the pleasure a young child derives from controlling bowel movements), the phallic stage, the latency stage, and finally the genital stage.