...Freud has long outlived psychoanalysis. For many years, even as
writers were discarding the more patently absurd elements of his
theory—penis envy, or the death drive—they continued to pay homage
to Freud's unblinking insight into the human condition. That persona
helped Freud to evolve, in the popular imagination, from a scientist
into a kind of poet of the mind. And the thing about poets is that they
cannot be refuted. No one asks of "Paradise Lost": But is it true? Freud
and his concepts, now converted into metaphors, joined the legion of the
undead.
-- Louis
Menand.
Why
Freud Survives (published in print as "The Stone Guest:
Can Sigmund Freud ever be killed")
New Yorker (August 28, 2017 Issue)
[a review of the book
Freud: The Making of an Illusion by
Frederick Crews.]