Daughter of Sigmund Freud (1895–1982) and pioneer in the psychoanalysis of children. Collection of 13 ALSs, both in letter and postcard form, all in German, ranging in date from November 20, 1951, through 1 April 1971. Altogether 30 pages in various formats, and including 10 hand-addressed envelopes. All are written to Rosita Grünberg, an acquaintance from her Viennese days. The correspondence begins with the death of Anna Freud’s mother.November 20, 1951: “I know you felt at home with her, and she loved you and Michael [Rosita’s son] most dearly. She died very quickly, only 2 1/2 days in bed, after a severe heart attack, without consciousness. Up until then she was as you knew her, active as always, somewhat weaker perhaps. She was greatly pained by the lessening of her eyesight, which greatly hampered reading and writing.”
In the following years, in a letter dated August 29, 1958, Anna focuses on the development of the clinic: “The weeks before summer vacation are always the hardest at our clinic, for this is the time when American colleagues come visiting, reports must be sent out, etc…Right now we are building a new school hut in the garden of no. 21 for our kindergarten group of blind children. Sometimes I am dizzied by all these individual undertakings, and I wonder from where I draw the courage.”
Another letter dated November 28, 1960. Freud reflects upon her old age: “Both my elder siblings, Mathilde and Martin, are now over seventy. A very strange feeling, that our generation is now the ‘old’ one, in place of our parents.”
In another letter from January of 1963. Rosita has been complaining of emotional sufferings: “I am terribly sorry that you are so dissatisfied with yourself. For a beholder from afar, such as me, it would not seem so at all. Quite the contrary, you have achieved so much for yourself, training, profession, interests, in a way you yourself probably never expected. But still, the feeling is there, and I should like to help you to counter it. You ought not to help yourself with pills; that is not the right way. I truly believe one cannot help oneself in such a case, and you will hardly have the opportunity to undergo an analysis…What you say does not sound all that abnormal at all, but it all shows signs of dissatisfaction, yearning for something. If one can consciously understand them and by some roundabout way lead them to satisfaction, everything will become much better.”
Yet another letter from 1963 states: “I think it excellent news that you have taken a course in Psychiatric Nursing and passed so brilliantly. Psychiatric Nursing is, after all, a relatively new concept, and I believe it has a great future. Without trained nurses even the psychiatrists at the hospital or any psychiatrist dealing with a severe case cannot do, no matter how well trained they may be themselves.”
The correspondence is continued in almost yearly intervals, with a gap between 1965 and 1971. Archive also includes: five photographs of Rosita Grünberg and her relatives, as well as a letter concerning family matters. RRAuction COA.
