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$4 '_se/f-development. Marx underlines this kernel of hisIn fact, throughout his life Trotsky was the victim of amethod in the opening paragraphs of The German large number of illnesses of a purely psychosomaticIdeology. genesis. From early adolescence he suffered frequentfainting attacks as well as ulcerative colitis, both ofThe implications of this lapse on Trotsky's part are which are almost always psychosomatic in origin, a factlegion. Most important, however, is the immediate recognized by any competent physician or psychoanalyst.psychological point to be made. It is not insignificant Such psychosomatic symptoms are rather easily cured inthat this type of antinomy, or even crude mechanism, most cases even within the early stages of analysis.arises most frequently when Trotsky is consideringquestions most directly relevant to the sense of revolu- The presence of such symptoms in an individual intionaryidentity. His ego connives to preserve a finite dicates significant areasofthe person's psychology whichrealm for itself, are neurotically preserved as unconscious mental ac-In effect, Trotsky rationalizes his failure of the 1923- tivity, i.e., psychic activity. These areas are deliberately1928 period by saying, significantly, that he will be the repressed so as not to be controlled by the conscious selffirstservant of history, but he refuses to its master. By knowing faculties associated with the "will," processesasserting that ultimarely there is something un- correctly associated with the father by Freud. Suchcannot be submitted to human will, he is justifying the repressed features of the individual's mental lifeexistence of a part of himself which refuses to submit to represent important areas of unresolved conflict. In suchhis own self-conscious will. Trotsky's world is not the states of anxiety-ridden irresolution, the unconsciousabsolutely infinite world of reality, but is more like an conflict may issue in a surrogate neurotic act (symptom)admittedly far-flung galaxy, which nonetheless continues in place of self-conscious action in reality. In the case ofto revolve about a fixed, mother-centered axis. psychosomatic symptoms, the repressed conflict resultsin a surrogate act directed against the person's ownThis fear of total potency before history, is strikingly body.summarized by the fainting attack which Trotsky sufferedupon learning that the October insurrection, under That this was in fact the case with Trotsky, thathis immediate direction, was a success. At least as significant parts of his mental life stayed neuroticallysignificant as the event itself is the sequence of unconscious in just this fashion, is strictly demonstratedstatements he uses to describe the attack: by his well known "cryptogenic" (psychosomatic) feverwhich began in the early stages of his fight with theStalin faction. The fever is clearly purposeful. Its"Give me a cigarette," I say to Kamenev. (In those years secondary purpose is tojustify Trotsky's.failure to act inI still smoked, but only spasmodically.) I take one or two a critical situation. Primarily though, it is a surrogate forpuffs, but suddenly, with the words, "Only this waslacking!" I faint. (I inherit from my mother a certain the political acts which the situation demanded of himsusceptibility to fainting spells when suffering physical and which he refused to carry out. The mysterious feverpain or illness. That was why some American physician intens_fies at precisely those crucial moments whendescribed me as an epileptic.) As I come to, I see history demands that Lev Davidovitch act decisively andKamenev's frightened face bending over me. (My Life)on his own. In MyLife he takes four pages (!) to explainthe genesis of his world-historical fever. He concludes hisThis might appear to be reasonably explained by themedical apology with the words:physically and emotionally exhausting period immediatelypreceding the insurrection. Such merely• After the influenza, some cryptogenic temperature setplausible explanations are belied by Trotsky's general in. The doctors ordered me to stay in bed, and thus Ipsychology, as well as by the internal features of his own spent the rest of the autumn and winter. This means thataccount of the matter. It goes without saying that the all through the discussion of"Trotskyism" in 1923, I wasstatement that he inherited his susceptibility to fainting ill. One can foresee a revolution or a war, but it is impossibleto foresee the consequences of an autumn.from his mother is without basis in medical fact. It does shooting-trip for wild ducks.however, have a significant basis in psychological fact,and Trotsky's acute, if intuitive, comprehension of At the next intensification of factional activity hepsychology renders such statements all the more signifi- remarks:cant. Furthermore, he has already in the course of hisautobiography referred to his frequent fainting spells,yet it is only here, while discussing the moment of the In the autumn of 1924, my temperature again began tomount. By that time, another discussion had blazed up,seizure of power, that he mentions his curious supersti- brought about this time from above in accordance withtion that they are a genetic inheritance from his mother, some prearranged plan./