Erich Fromm
author profile
born
December 13, 1901
died
March 18, 1980
gender
male
place of birth
Frankfurt am Main, Germany
genre
Health, Mind & Body
influences
Spinoza, Eckhart, Kierkegaard, Marx, Freud, Alfred Weber
about this author
Correct date of birth - March 23, 1900
Fromm's theory is a rather unique blend of Freud and Marx. Freud, of course, emphasized the unconscious, biological drives, repression, and so on. In other words, Freud postulated that our characters were determined by biology. Marx, on the other hand, saw people as determined by their society, and most especially by their economic systems.
He added to this mix of two deterministic systems something quite foreign to them: The idea of freedom. He allows people to transcend the determinisms that Freud and Marx attribute to them. In fact, Fromm makes freedom the central characteristic of human nature!
There are, Fromm points out, examples where determinism alone operates. ...more
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avg rating: 4.01
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More books by Erich Fromm…
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The Art of Loving: An Enquiry into the Nature of Love by Erich Fromm avg rating 3.96 — 1,017 ratings — published 1956 40 editions |
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Escape from Freedom by Erich Fromm avg rating 4.04 — 347 ratings — published 1941 19 editions |
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To Have or to Be? The Nature of the Psyche by Erich Fromm avg rating 4.04 — 205 ratings — published 1976 25 editions |
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The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness by Erich Fromm avg rating 4.13 — 93 ratings — published 1973 11 editions |
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The Sane Society by Erich Fromm avg rating 4.26 — 89 ratings — published 1956 8 editions |
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The Art of Being by Erich Fromm avg rating 3.98 — 87 ratings — published 1992 4 editions |
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Man for Himself: An Inquiry into the Psychology of Ethics by Erich Fromm avg rating 4.00 — 61 ratings — published 1947 4 editions |
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Marx's Concept of Man by Erich Fromm avg rating 3.93 — 61 ratings — published 1961 5 editions |
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Psychoanalysis and Religion: The Terry Lectures Series by Erich Fromm avg rating 3.90 — 41 ratings — published 1950 3 editions |
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The Forgotten Language: An Introduction to the Understanding of Dreams, Fairy Tales & Myths by Erich Fromm avg rating 3.92 — 37 ratings — published 1951 4 editions |
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"Love is a decision, it is a judgment, it is a promise. If love were only a feeling, there would be no basis for the promise to love each other forever. A feeling comes and it may go. How can I judge that it will stay forever, when my act does not involve judgment and decision."
— Erich Fromm (The Art of Loving)
— Erich Fromm (The Art of Loving)
"A person who has not been completely alienated, who has remained sensitive and able to feel, who has not lost the sense of dignity, who is not yet "for sale", who can still suffer over the suffering of others, who has not acquired fully the having mode of existence - briefly, a person who has remained a person and not become a thing - cannot help feeling lonely, powerless, isolated in present-day society. He cannot help doubting himself and his own convictions, if not his sanity. He cannot help suffering, even though he can experience moments of joy and clarity that are absent in the life of his "normal" contemporaries. Not rarely will he suffer from neurosis that results from the situation of a sane man living in an insane society, rather than that of the more conventional neurosis of a sick man trying to adapt himself to a sick society. In the process of going further in his analysis, i.e. of growing to greater independence and productivity,his neurotic symptoms will cure themselves. "
— Erich Fromm
— Erich Fromm
"Immature love says: 'I love you because I need you.' Mature love says 'I need you because I love you.'"
— Erich Fromm
— Erich Fromm
