Sex and Religion: Two Texts of Early Feminist Psychoanalysis

Lou Andreas-Salome

nov 2015 · Transaction Publishers

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As a psychoanalyst and author, Lou Andreas-Salomé traverses the mystery of sexuality in much of her work. This book, comprised of two texts originally written for adolescents, uniquely explores sexual education and the collision of sexuality and religion across the lifespan. The first piece, “Three Letters to a Young Boy" (1917), is a psychoanalytic fairy tale. The letters offer an interesting version of the evolution of sexual knowledge from childhood through adolescence. The second piece, “The Devil & His Grandmother" (1922), merges sexuality with religion, encapsulating three ages of woman—child, to a lost soul and the Devil’s bride, to the Devil’s Grandmother. Written in charmingly convoluted dialogue, this work has a cinematic, fanciful feel. Both pieces dispense with academic formality and point to a relaxed new phase in Salomé’s writing life. Interestingly, this tone can also be detected in her blossoming correspondence with Sigmund Freud, which contrasts starkly with her somber letters to Rainer Maria Rilke. It is with the spirit of free thinking demonstrated in these two selections, perhaps informed by Salomé’s experimentation with free association, that the reader is transported to a new theatre of Salomé’s imagination.

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Lou Andreas-Salomé (1861–1937) was a Russian-born writer and psychoanalyst. Throughout her life, she developed friendships with Friedrich Nietzsche, Richard Wagner, Sigmund Freud, and Rainer Maria Rilke. Some of her numerous works include Ibsen’s Heroines, The Human Family, Friedrich Nietzsche in His Work, My Thanks to Freud, and Looking Back. Matthew Del Nevo is a philosopher at the Catholic Institute of Sydney and author of The Valley Way of Soul, The Work of Enchantment (Transaction, 2011), and The Continental Community of Inquiry. His articles have appeared in Literature and Theology, Critical and Creative Thinking, and Australasian Pentecostal Studies. Gary Winship is associate professor in the School of Education, University of Nottingham and senior fellow at the Institute of Mental Health.