At once a biography and a tense account of Freud’s escape from Vienna in the nick of time after the Anschluss, this is an illuminating, entertaining and informative book, well-written, painstakingly researched and one which I very much enjoyed.

When Freud was over 80, incredibly ill, and very settled in his beloved Vienna, he was helped to escape from the Nazis by several diverse people from many different nationalities. They included Ernest Jones, a rather scandal-ridden Welsh physician, Princess Marie Bonaparte, a princess psychotherapist, Anna, his daughter, and William Bullitt, the American ambassador. Andrew Nigorski tells Freud's story, and their stories in this fascinating book.

I didn't know that much about pre-war Vienna, so I enjoyed reading about Freud's life there, and I also thought that Nigorski restores Austria's reputation somewhat in this book. I also found the members of the team that helped Freud wonderfully interesting characters, especially Princess Marie.

EDITION Hardcover
ISBN 9781785788765
PRICE £20.00 (GBP)

Saving Freud is an interesting and indepth exploration of Freud's final years.

It's a novel way of approaching biography: not just telling the story of your subject, but also those of several other people whose lives intersected with his. While I was expecting a very focused account of how Freud escaped Vienna, this is a book filled with tangents (some more interesting than others) that builds a wider picture of psychoanalysis, 20th century Jewish experience and European culture more generally. I found it particularly interesting to see a focus on the interwar period in Austria, and I felt not only that I learned a lot, but also that I got a real sense of what Freud's life in Vienna was actually like.