No one would dare to question the fact that the exile of Freud and many of his disciples during the Third Reich was due to the persecution of Jews by the Nazi regime. Yet the same behaviour, this desire to force psychoanalysts into exile, exemplified by so many other totalitarian regimes, makes it impossible for us to say that it is only because they were Jews that they were persecuted. This in turn reminds us that psychoanalysis cannot be dissociated from the social structure on which it feeds. The necessity for stifling free thought, along with the will to abolish all traces of memory, explains the profound hostility of these regimes to the 'cultural basis' of which psychoanalysis is such a great part. Despite the effects the periods of exile punctuating the course of the development of psychoanalysis have had on the thinking behind psychoanalysis and its practical application, the notion of exile is indeed itself inherent to that of psychoanalysis. Freud's exile in London is part and parcel of a very meaningful moment in which the writer's work and his personal destiny appear inextricably entwined - Freud's own identity as being 'in exile' links him inseparably to other exiled figures that share this rare characteristic, Moses and the Jewish people, but also Oedipus, that other greatmythical figurehead of psychoanalysis.

identification Exile Identity Spiritual progression Position in exile Family history Archaic inheritance Unique Trait Demand to be torn away

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