Exploring Melanie Klein’s Archive at the Wellcome Library — A centenary and a mystery: Klein’s psychoanalytic…
8th November 2018
This month I am posting a couple of wartime letters, which I thought appropriate on the 100th anniversary of Armistice Day, 11th November 1918.
Folder C.96 in Melanie Klein’s archive consists of ten pages, including a two-page letter written by Joan Riviere to Klein on 3rd June 1940. In this letter Riviere asks Klein to lay out some of her thoughts on the ongoing war, and the psychological ‘causes’ behind such destructive conflict. This exchange – saturated with anxiety about the worsening situation – took place at a moment when the UK was under real threat of Nazi invasion and when, as Riviere says, ‘the possibility of our work all coming to an end seems so near’.
Riviere‘s letter is handwritten, while Klein’s response (undated, presumably written not long after Riviere‘s) is typed. No record remains of the list of questions suggested by Riviere to Klein. I have given Riviere‘s letter in full, but in the case of Klein’s notes I have done some minor editing for clarity’s sake. Her text was clearly not meant to be read out exactly as it was written down. Rather, it resembles a series of notes, a kind of aide-memoire for her talk, to which Riviere refers in her letter. It is unclear as to whether this talk was ever given, as Klein left London for Pitlochry at the end of June 1940; like many of her colleagues, she temporarily relocated to avoid the heavy bombing of London.
The majority of this fragment from the Klein archive has, in fact, previously been published by Claudia Frank (2003), but only in German. An English translation of Frank’s paper will appear as part of a collection of materials from the Klein archive, to be published by Routledge in 2019 (Jane Milton, in preparation). Meanwhile, Michal Shapira (2013) has written about Klein’s concept of ‘the Hitler inside us’ during the Second World War, and is currently preparing another book about Klein, based on archival material from this period (to be published by Cambridge University Press). The letter from Joan Riviere appears in a new biography by Marion Bower (2018).
Below is the letter from Joan Riviere:
Harefield (4 Stanhope Terrace, W.2)
June 3. 1940
My dear Melanie
When the first official mention of invasion began, the possibility of our work all coming to an end seemed so near. I felt we should all have to keep it in our hearts, perhaps, as the only way to save it for the future. Also of course I was constantly thinking of the psychological causes of such terrible loss and destruction as may happen to mankind. So I had the idea of your telling me (and then a group of us) everything you think about these causes, so that all of us who can understand these things at all should share and know as much as possible, to help to preserve it.
My idea is that you should tell us first what you believe to be the causes 1) of the German psychological situation, and 2) Secondly of that of the rest of Europe and mainly the Allies, since the last war. To me the apathy and denial of danger in the Allies especially England is not clear (I never shared it). 3) How is it connected with what I call the ‘Munich’ complex – the son’s incapacity to fight for mother and country, and his homosexual leanings.
These are the sort of questions I wanted you to speak of. I thought we would have no discussion – the only questions should be to get your meaning clear. I asked people to send in questions beforehand, which I can probably arrange in some order and bring up at a moment when you are dealing with that kind of point. If there is time I would send you the points before. Do you go to 9 Manchester Square on Saturday before the meeting? Or where will you be?
I shall be in the country till some time in the afternoon, then at home until about 6.45.
Thank you very much for your letter of 24th May. It is a good thing you have sent your papers abroad. But I believe we shall pull through, all of us, including you!
I am so looking forward to Saturday – psa [psychoanalysis] is a great anodyne in all this anxiety!
With much love
Yours ever
Joan.
In the margin is written an additional question:
4) One great question is why is it so important to be able to be brave and to be able to bear whatever happens? Everything in reality depends on this. I see a lot of answers but I don’t feel I see all it implies.
The reply from Klein:
What does death represent to the individual?
The increasing danger of a terrifying death brings out in individuals both the deeper reasons of their fear of death as well as their methods of combating this fear. Instances A. patient of very religious upbringing in whom the fear of Hell had played a great part in childhood, a fear which had intellectually been entirely overcome is revived in the present situation. The internal hell which could not be overcome by love as demanded by religion because devil and helpful God were so very much the same in his unconscious mind. In this case and others it became clear that terror of own destructiveness and murderousness, fear of having arranged for Hitler to destroy the world, and especially the incapacity to dissociate the evil father and parents from the good ones, to dissociate love from hate, and therefore to turn hatred against the evil thing – love and protection towards the loved and good people – that all this has a paralysing effect in the relation to external dangers.
One conclusion a) An important step in development is the capacity to allow oneself to split the imagos into good and bad ones which goes with the capacity to trust one’s constructive tendencies and love feelings. Only thus is it possible to hate with full strength what is felt to be evil in the external world – to attack and destroy at the same time protecting oneself with one’s good internal objects as well as external loved objects, country etc, against the bad things. To be able to achieve this is also dependent on b) The relative strength of internalized relations versus external ones – or rather the balance between internal situations and relations on the one hand and externals on the other.
If the feeling that external war is really going on inside – if the feeling that an internal Hitler is fought inside by a Hitler-like subject – predominates, then despair results. It is impossible to fight this war, because in the internal situation catastrophe is bound to be the end of it. This depends also on the ways and means in which the subject is carrying out the internal war. If he feels to out-Hitler Hitler, then it will all end in complete destruction inside. If there is a better balance between internal happenings and external happenings and the war inside is not predominating, then one can turn with strength and determination against the external enemy. There are many other factors at work which all work towards greater trust in one’s own capacity to love and construct as well in the good object and determining the balance between internal and external.
I see fully confirmed former experiences that death is terrifying to the utmost, if trust in internal relationships is weak. The danger may then be denied (very important in the general attitude towards the Hitler danger – Chamberlain’s remark of war as a nightmare) or the individual becomes paralysed – which may amount to suicidal incapacity to deal with external dangers, and ultimately (paralysis of) the means of destroying the dangerous Hitler inside. I have seen in this present situation patients’ courage grow, depression diminish, and their capacity to make decisions etc increase when hatred and guilt connected with early phantasies had been further analysed. Present situation provides a very strong stimulus to revive the guilt and fears connected with these phantasies, and I have been struck with the effect analysis can have in such conditions. Pressure of anxiety helped to throw light on former material and was able to remove much anxiety and despair.
One very typical thing was the guilt about the attraction towards this, to the destructive and dangerous penis which Hitler’s murderous weapons represent. In men it appeared that quite hidden passive homosexual phantasies, plotting and scheming with the destructive father, came to the fore. a) They had instigated Hitler to this destructive intercourse and enjoyed it sadistically. b) Terror of being destroyed and identification with the threatened mother reinforced the tendencies to scheme and plot with the dangerous father. To this is added the anxiety of the internal destruction by this dangerous father who becomes more and more internal the more external reality proves his dangerousness. The guilt about the sadistic alliance with the dangerous father is one important reason for denial: but I see the most various methods used against it; for instance, very rational sounding views that we should continuously concentrate on the offensive expressed the drive towards active and dangerous homosexuality as a reaction against the desire and fear of being anally penetrated.
This feeling of a continuous thrust on the enemy to prevent him from invasion, in contradiction to that, that we should preserve through our thrust France’s destruction and rather allow him the invasion of England. (The mother was to be saved, England, representing more the patient himself, should be more allowed to be invaded). But here the jealous attitude of mother also found expression. There was also the wish to be anally penetrated by this impressive father as well as the desire to test in reality the dangerous threatening experience. With women too, the attraction towards the dangerous father, conspiracy against mother, guilt and punishment, were very much revived. Fifth column tendencies/phantasies and guilt. But it is interesting to find the connection between these sexual phantasies, the sadistic pleasure as experience in masturbation, and inner relations. Interaction between distrust and guilt relating to brothers, sisters and parents because of these sadistic conspiracies and relations to internal objects. In the (reduced) capacity to trust in the preservation of internal loved objects because of these sadistic phantasies in relation to external ones.
Striking how the analysis of these secret plotting sadistic phantasies improved internal relationships and relieved anxiety of danger of present situation. In one instance, much former material became so much clearer and illuminating that peace of mind steadily increased, in spite of the worsening of the external situation. Balance between love and hatred increased, parents become in retrospect much more trustworthy, worthwhile preserving, and accordingly also present relatives. Fear of death decreased when trust in me, in analysis, and more generally in the survival of goodness in spite of all dangers to values, increased. The feeling that goodness cannot ultimately be exterminated, which may be a denial of danger in external relations, was based on a better balance between facing danger and yet relying more on internal goodness and trust in some good object.
The question of balance so often stressed appears as the ultimate decisive factor. Optimum between external and internal, love and hate, and the methods used against anxiety. Certain amount of temporary denial obviously unavoidable and necessary. We look at nature, we read a book, we play with a child, we enjoy food, etc, and we have to remind ourselves that our life and country is at stake. In between the good experience has helped us to deny the danger. If the denial predominates in the attitude it may lead to complacency, flight to the good inner objects, etc. If the help provided by the fact that such good things we just enjoy exist, the belief in the good object and in goodness ultimately, is not too much denial of the bad things, it may help us to take steps to preserve goodness externally, and may internally help us to remain calm in the face of danger.
After giving some fragmentary examples, which are in note form and not fully coherent, Klein turns to ‘technique’:
TECHNIQUE
The satisfaction we must all derive from the fact that analysis can be so helpful in these circumstances. There is confirmation about the main principles of our work; even now reassurance does not seem to be of great value (certain exceptions and rather limited). But an undisturbed keeping or holding fast to analyse aggression, guilt, which disturbs the belief in constructive and reparative tendencies, seems most helpful. We must however remain aware of the interplay, present and external situations, with internal and with the past, as well as past experiences. The strength with which certain experiences are re experienced, the details of phantasies coming up under this pressure, indicates also the great wish of the patient to cooperate with the analyst, and thus also to help the parent to improve the relationship with him, and to establish internally and externally, harmony. This strength of experiencing and bringing forward material has also to do with the stimulus which the nearness of death provides in experiencing life. Instances for taking in much more strongly beauty of nature, love in relations, etc, even lessening of certain inhibitions as seen in several cases. It is filling oneself with life, as well as sharing love with external people, and thus reviving, restoring internal situations. Also proof for goodness remaining; because ultimately in the future there will be objects to experience this and thus death as utter destruction cannot be true.
References
Bower, Marion (2018). The Life and Work of Joan Riviere: Freud, Klein and Female Sexuality. London: Routledge.
Frank, Claudia (2003) Zu Melanie Kleins zeitgenössischer Bezugnahme auf Hitler und den Zweiten Weltkrieg in ihren Behandlungen. [On Melanie Klein’s contemporary references to Hitler and the second world war in her treatment] Psyche – Z Psychoanal., 57:708-728.
Milton, Jane (in preparation) working title: From the Klein Archive; Essential Readings. London: Routledge. To be published in 2019/20.
Shapira, Michal (2013) The War Inside: Psychoanalysis, Total War, and the Making of the Democratic Self in Postwar Britain. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
