The Faces of Freud

Last year, representatives of British publisher Headline tipped me off that they’d secured UK rights to a pair of American authors about whose work they were excited: Scott Frost, who I’ve written about before on this page; and Jed Rubenfeld, a professor of constitutional and criminal law at Yale University whose debut novel, The Interpretation of Murder, is a historical mystery built around Viennese neurologist-psychiatrist Sigmund Freud’s only visit to America, in 1909. Following the shocking strangulation slaying of a debutante in a Manhattan penthouse, Rubenfeld posits another psychiatrist (and a Freud disciple) being called in by police to help a second intended homicide victim recover her memory and thereby expose her attacker.

As those of you who read this blog are aware, I am always captivated by thrillers featuring psychiatrists and the madmen they pursue. So I made note to watch the progress of Interpretation. It did amazingly well, at least in the UK (though it has been less of a hit in the States), climbing to the tops of bestseller charts and staying there. The novel numbered, as well, among January Magazine’s favorite books of 2006. And recently it captured the coveted Richard & Judy Best of the Year Award.

Due to this success, Headline flew author Rubenfeld over to Britain not long ago. Its people also arranged for the new novelist to meet an older relative of psychiatrist Freud’s, the broadcaster, politician, and author Sir Clement Freud. The latter writes in today’s London Times about his famous grandfather and the copious Viennese lunch he prepared for Rubenfeld. The piece begins:

Sigmund Freud died in September 1939, a few days after the outbreak of the Second World War. He was 83, had suffered from cancer of the mouth for many years, been in constant pain, chainsmoked cigars.

The headmaster of my school in Berkshire heard the news on BBC Radio and called me to his study to tell me that my grandfather had died, adding: “He was a great man.”

I told him that he had been a very nice grandfather. “Have you read any of his books?” he asked.

About a year earlier, when I had gone to the Freud house for tea and to collect my 14th birthday presents--an Egyptian relic from him and a white silk nightshirt from my grandmother--I had asked whether I should read his books and he had thrown up his hands and explained that he wrote for the medical profession, not schoolboys, I should read Robert Louis Stevenson.

This grieved me, for among the books on the shelf behind his desk was a copy of Lady Chatterley’s Lover, signed “respectfully to Sigmund Freud from D.H. Lawrence”.

In my youth “Freud” was not a household name in Britain, as it was in the United States. At prep school I was once called to the headmaster’s study to be beaten for talking during class, told to take off my trousers “and your pants, you stupid little boy”, lay across the man’s knee as he fondled my bum with his gnarled hand, whereafter he said: “I am not going to smack you because your grandfather would disapprove.”

When people ask whether being related to a famous man is a help or a hindrance, I think of that. Also I suppose that if your name is Freud, it is better to be related to Sigmund than not. It must be frustrating to have to keep denying family connection.

To read the entirety of Sir Clement’s piece, click here. An excerpt from The Interpretation of Murder can be found here. And BBC Radio 4 is serializing Rubenfeld’s novel this month as part of its “Book at Bedtime” series. The dramatic installments can be found here, but tune in soon, because episodes are available for only seven days after their original broadcast.