Art Criticism - The State University of New York

Breuer attributed the presence of Anna O's hysteria to amnesia, that
is repression of past events. These highly traumatic events were tied directly
to specific hysterical symptoms. It was only through hypnotism that Anna 0
would discuss the past traumas. When she was able to "remember" their details,
Each individual hysterical symptom immediately and permanently
disappeared when [I] had succeeded in bringing clearly to light the
memory ofthe event by which it was provoked and in arousing its
accompanying affect, and when the patient had described that
event in the greatest possible detail and had put the affect into
words. 26
Working from Breuer's therapeutic model, Freud attempted to treat his patients
exhibiting hysterical symptoms with a similar hypnotic method. He was not as
successful primarily because he had difficulty using hypnotism and his patients
were less responsive to it.27
This led Freud to explore other means of treatment, primarily a more·
cathartic mode, namely the "talking cure."28 Freud first employed this type of
psychoanalytic treatment in the case of Frau Emmy von N, and later in his more
famous case, Dora. In these cases, and others, Freud allowed the patients, via
free association to arrive at the basis of their neurosis. Freud and Breuer
arguethat their psychotherapeutic method works because
It brings to an end the operative force of the idea which was not
abreacted in the first instance, by allowing its strangulated affect to
find a way out through speech; and it subjects it to associative
correction by introducing it into normal consciousness (under light
hypnosis) orby removing it through the physician's suggestion, as
is done is somnambulism accompanied by amnesia.29
Frustrations involving sexuality, gender identifications, gender roles, and traumatic
events, that could not be released or voiced (abreacted) because of
societal or psychical constraints, manifested themselves internally and surfaced
once again in the form of neurosis (hysteria, in this case). Freud understood
what was psychologically occurring but he did not take into account the
influence of gender roles and societal "norms" on the external production of
hysteria. 30
This is particularly evident in Dora's case, Freud's most complex clinical
report on hysteria. Dora, an eighteen-year-old woman, began to exhibit
hysterical symptoms when she realized she was playing a token role in a dramatic
and twisted affair involving her father and close family friends, Herr K
and Frau K. Dora relayed to Freud her dreams, traumas, and family conflicts
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