The Lure of Dreams: Sigmund Freud and the Psychology of Modern Life

From literary theory to social anthropology, the influence of Freud runs through every part of the human and social sciences. In The Lure of Dreams, Harvie Ferguson shows how Freud's writing and particularly The Interpretation of Dreams contribute both in their content and in the baroque and dream-like forms in which they are cast to our understanding of the character of modernity.

Ferguson argues that the recent tendency to view Freud's theories as a product of nineteenth century developments in biology and medicine have missed what is most important and suggestive in his work. Instead, Ferguson discusses it in the context of Vienna's fin de siecle culture in which Freud wrote, with its breakdown of classical forms of rationalism in the sciences, the arts and in the broader context of the rehabilitation of dreams in late modernity. This novel and stimulating approach to Freud and to the dilemmas of modernity and postmodernity will fascinate everyone with an interest in the development of the modern consciousness.