Passion of Youth: An Autobiography, 1897-1922

by Wilhelm Reich, Mary Boyd Higgins

Product Details 177 pages Farrar Straus & Giroux (T); 1st edition (August 1988) English 0374229953 978-0374229955 Product 8.3 x 5.5 x 0.9 inches Shipping 13.6 ounces Average Customer 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review) Amazon Best Sellers #3,849,591

177 pages, Hardcover

First published August 1, 1988

About the author

Wilhelm Reich (24 March 1897 – 3 November 1957) was a Jewish Austrian-American doctor of medicine, psychiatrist/psychoanalyst and a member of the second generation of analysts after Sigmund Freud. Author of several influential books, he became one of the most radical figures in the history of psychiatry.

Reich was a respected analyst for much of his life, focusing on character structure, rather than on individual neurotic symptoms. He promoted adolescent sexuality, the availability of contraceptives and abortion, and the importance for women of economic independence. Synthesizing material from psychoanalysis, cultural anthropology, economics, sociology, and ethics, his work influenced writers such as Alexander Lowen, Fritz Perls, Paul Goodman, Saul Bellow, Norman Mailer, A. S. Neill, and William Burroughs.

He was also a controversial figure, who came to be viewed by the psychoanalytic establishment as having gone astray or as having succumbed to mental illness. His work on the link between human sexuality and neuroses emphasized "orgastic potency" as the foremost criterion for psycho-physical health. He said he had discovered a form of energy, which he called "orgone," that permeated the atmosphere and all living matter, and he built "orgone accumulators," which his patients sat inside to harness the energy for its reputed health benefits. It was this work, in particular, that cemented the rift between Reich and the psychoanalytic establishment.

Reich, of Jewish descent and a communist, was living in Germany when Adolf Hitler came to power. He fled to Scandinavia in 1933 and subsequently to the United States in 1939. In 1947, following a series of critical articles about orgone and his political views in The New Republic and Harper's, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) began an investigation into his claims, winning an injunction against the interstate sale of orgone accumulators. Charged with contempt of court for violating the injunction, Reich conducted his own defense, which involved sending the judge all his books to read, and arguing that a court was no place to decide matters of science. He was sentenced to two years in prison, and in August 1956, several tons of his publications were burned by the FDA. He died of heart failure in jail just over a year later, days before he was due to apply for parole.

Reviews

[Theo Austin-Evans · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's really quite a surprise to me that a character as infamous as Wilhelm Reich would have an autobiography that is, or at least appears to me, so little read. There's such a high level of self-criticism and patheticness and pettiness to Reich in the journal section of the book that it can at times be rather too much to handle (and that goes double for the shameful admissions of voyeuristic bestiality and infantile sexuality in his own analysis of his childhood - shoving the handle of a whip up multiple mares vaginas and arses is never a good look, don't let anyone try to convince you otherwise, no matter how hard they try!).

Reich isn't a particularly pleasant guy, he'd be the first to admit that, with all of his stormy depressive spells and manic sexuality ("that woman who rebuffed me? WHORE !!! She isn't enough like my mother, but her body's pretty tight" - admittedly I'm paraphrasing a tad) means you wouldn't exactly want to share a beer with him. But his irreverence, sheer drive, and perseverance through poverty and adversity (the whole Lore family affair/scandal seems almost too dramatic to have happened in real life, the journal at that point pole-vaulting into the absurdity, paranoia and ridiculousness that one would pray would only occur in fiction) is all fairly striking, and he has such a passionate individual voice which is unlike anybody else I've read. It's like he made petulance into a high art form, which is a quality which made Listen, Little Man! such a difficult and obnoxious read for me as I was unfamiliar with his invective flair.

Passion of Youth also gives a great snapshot into interwar Viennese society, which seems to be wholly populated by hypocritical socialists and cunning passive aggressive socialites, all talking a whole lot of vacuous drivel without acting upon it. I mean it's bewildering how caught up Reich was with little turns of phrase and innocuous gestures, the way he'd be thrown into an envious rage as soon as a man slipped their arm through a woman's, it's just incredible. The only respite Reich finds seems to be either when hiking or when laying against a woman's breasts, and you know what, that may be one of his few contributions able to survive modern criticism.

But beyond mere social faux pas and trifling jealousies there is in the young Reich a pretty refreshing belief in egotism and individualism. Psychoanalysis has always tended to strike me, above the chatter of polymorphous sexuality and Marcuse etc., as an essentially conservative movement, and it's nice to see that be given expression in such a liberal way. Of course Reich would later go on to be one of the most radically left-leaning figures in psychoanalysis, causing quite a stir in multiple Communist Parties as he grew older, but the Reich we meet here is a great admirer of Stirner and Strindberg, and more than happy to disavow the follies of those around him whilst weeping at home. What an interesting life this angry little man had.

[Steven H · Rating 5 out of 5]

A COLLECTION OF REICH'S EARLY AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL WRITINGS

Wilhelm Reich (1897-1957) was an Austrian psychoanalyst, who wrote such books as' Character Analysis,' 'The Mass Psychology of Fascism,' 'The Function of the Orgasm: Sex-Economic Problems of Biological Energy,' etc. He died in prison, when the FDA objected to his sale of "orgone accumulators" and burned his writings.

This book was published in 1988; Trustee Mary Boyd Higgins wrote in the Preface, "In 1919, as a twenty-two-year-old medical student, Reich began to keep diaries and, during that same year, he wrote a recollection of his childhood and youth. Later, in 1937, he recalled his experiences in the Great War and his medical studies... These writings are now made available in order to dispel the myths given currency by the various biographies that have appeared since his death."

He recounts that when he was 4½ years old he listened to a coachman have sexual relations with his girlfriend, which "produced in me erotic sensations of enormous intensity." The next day he climbed into bed with his brother's nurse; "I did not receive a beating but was no longer allowed to sleep with the maid." (Pg. 6) He recalls, "The first time I went to a brothel, at age fifteen, I submitted to it like a test... Later I often thought back to the staggering intensity of this affect and could never explain how it had been possible that I, who had been having intercourse for three years, and quite regularly, could lose myself so completely..." (Pg. 42) He adds, "I worked like an ox during the day and lay around brothels at night... I realized that I could no longer live without a brothel." (Pg. 46)

Of the First World War, he observed, "We were simply prepared from childhood for subjugation to the ideology of the war machine. There was nothing fundamentally new about war; it was simply the test of the strength of the old authority... Only a few gave voice to their highly unpatriotic fear." (Pg. 60)

He notes, "Now that I have begun to think, I discover that another person might have arrived at essentially different results. 'Is there an unconscious?' I asked Otto. His reply: 'In a psychoanalytic sense, yes; in a philosophical sense, no!'" (Pg. 155)

He states, "my own experiences, my observations of myself and others, have led me to the conclusion that sexuality is the core around which all social life, as well as the inner spiritual life of the individual, revolves---whether the relationship to that core be direct or indirect." (Pg. 80) He notes in a diary entry, "What a role women play in my life!" (Pg. 116) He laments, "It is neurotic that I should want a woman, a woman of my own, for I cannot and will not be alone! To hell with my activities, analytic, scientific, medical, and otherwise---if the irretrievable hours of youth are to slip by without a woman! I will start writing books when my mental and physical potency has evaporated in the arid wastelands of science!" (Pg. 164)

This compilation of Reich's early writings provides very illuminating glimpses into his life and later thought.