Jones Robert W

Total Page:16

File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb

Jones Robert W ‘Lain Beside Gold’ Narrative, Metaphor, and Energy in Freud and Conan Doyle Robert W. Jones PhD Candidate Aberystwyth University Contents Chapter 1 Introduction and Methodology ............................................................................. 3 1.1 Overview .......................................................................................................................... 3 1.2 Secondary Material: Literature Review ........................................................................... 8 1.2.1 Critiques of Freud’s Narrativity ................................................................................ 8 1.2.2 Other Critiques ........................................................................................................ 11 1.2.3 Royle and the Uncanny Text ................................................................................... 14 1.2.4 Holland and the Practical Text ................................................................................ 17 1.3 Approaches ..................................................................................................................... 20 1.3.1 Metaphor .................................................................................................................. 23 1.3.2 The Text World ....................................................................................................... 30 1.3.3 Text as Performative Space ..................................................................................... 36 Chapter 2 Freud, Narrative, and the Problem of Immersion ............................................... 41 2.1 Altered States ................................................................................................................. 41 2.2 Narrative Fact ................................................................................................................. 50 2.3 Analyst-Freud and Patient-Freud ................................................................................... 63 2.4 Freud and Implied Authors ............................................................................................ 72 2.5 ‘Lain Beside Gold’: Freud and Architecture, Archaeology and Film ............................ 81 2.6 Analysis 1: The ‘Emma’ case study of Project for a Scientific Psychology .................. 95 2.7 Analysis: Freud and Counter-Freud in the ‘Dream of Irma’s Injection’, The Interpretation of Dreams ........................................................................................................................... 102 Chapter 3 Freud, Energy and Metaphor ............................................................................ 112 3.1 Freud and Energy ......................................................................................................... 112 3.2 Energy as Metaphor ..................................................................................................... 117 3.3 Helmholtz ..................................................................................................................... 120 3.4 Means & Ends of Metaphor ......................................................................................... 130 1 3.5 The Development of the Energy Metaphor .................................................................. 143 Chapter 4 Freud and Arthur Conan Doyle ........................................................................ 153 4.1 The Paradox of Rationality in the Study of the Irrational ............................................ 153 4.2 Rationality and the ‘Other World’ ............................................................................... 157 4.3 Doyle’s ‘The Great Keinplatz Experiment’ (1894)...................................................... 174 4.4 ‘The Horror of the Heights’ (1913) .............................................................................. 181 4.5 ‘The Captain of the Polestar’ (1883) ........................................................................... 193 Chapter 5 Freud and Sherlock Holmes ............................................................................. 217 5.1 Detectives, Doubles and Duality .................................................................................. 217 5.2 ‘The Science of Deduction’.......................................................................................... 232 5.3 The Two Freuds as Holmes and Watson ...................................................................... 242 5.4 Polarity, Recursion, and Control .................................................................................. 251 5.5 Analysis of three examples from The Interpretation of Dreams ................................. 267 Dream 1: The ‘Clever Woman Patient’ .......................................................................... 267 Dream 2: Freud’s Father and the Magyars ..................................................................... 274 Dream 3: Non Vixit ......................................................................................................... 281 Chapter 6 Conclusion ........................................................................................................ 286 Bibliography 294 Primary Material: ............................................................................................................... 294 Works by Sigmund Freud: .............................................................................................. 294 Works by Arthur Conan Doyle: ...................................................................................... 296 Secondary Material: ........................................................................................................... 296 2 Chapter 1 Introduction and Methodology 1.1 Overview The ‘fictive’ dimensions of Freud’s work have often been the cause of controversy, and the paradoxical relationship between art and science within his work has drawn both the admiration and the ire of his critics. The polarised extremes are to represent Freud as either a promethean visionary, transgressing boundaries in order to provide us with a deeper insight into the human psyche than the positivistic approaches of many of his contemporaries could provide; or, as a charlatan, a deceiver whose narratives stretch the reader’s credulity. Even if more nuanced opinions fall somewhere in-between the extremes of this axis, it is difficult to develop an informed overview opinion of Freud without encountering that implicit value judgement. It would seem that Freud is a polarising figure first, a physician second, and an author third. Yet the shifts between concentration upon ‘scientific’ and ‘narrativistic’ elements of Freud’s work, are arguably what has maintained his influence and applicability across many genres of intellectual enquiry. In Freud’s use of concepts such as ‘drive’ and ‘energy’, we encounter the potential paradoxes which grant the texts a metaphorical motor force, as terms from physics are drawn to represent the intangible. We access Freud’s ability to construct himself in two polarised roles, creative author and physician. Analysing Freud’s texts as works of literature, rather than as manuals detailing the development and use of psychoanalysis is not a new discipline. That is the point of Freud’s psychoanalytical endeavour to begin with: it is a system of analysis whereby nothing is exempt from the analytical process. However, there are under-represented alternative methods for analysing his texts, which may shed light on the operations of the text beyond both scientific and narrative concerns. For example, a cognitivist critique of Freud would come from a competing discipline based – largely – on observational data rather than in-depth analysis focussing on a model of developmental phases in the psyche. 3 In the main, the cognitivist approach used in parts of this thesis explores the relationship between the abstract and the physical in Freud’s work. Using the relationships between metaphor, narrative, and Freud’s ability to ‘perform’ within his work the various relationships which are endemic to psychoanalysis, we shall examine how language may evoke constructions beyond the printed page. Freud had us explore the mind in depth, drawing complex and overlapping models to explain its inner workings, so we may now use theoretical models largely located closer to the ‘surface’ of psychology in order to analyse the depths of Freud’s work. In doing so, the hope is that this thesis will shed light on how the practical, performative, scientific and narrative techniques which characterise Freud’s work overlap and interact to create texts which demonstrate that abstracted physicality. Thus, we shall unpack the idea of Freud’s textual dynamism, and the seemingly paradoxical notion of a ‘motor’ component to the metaphorical composition of both Freud’s writing and theories. Psychoanalysis is, disputably, a school of dialogue.1 The analysand must uncritically relay information to the analyst, who is tasked with constructing an interpretation of that information and relaying it back to the analysand, so that the analysand may come to understand their symptom. Freud’s development of psychoanalysis stems largely from his contributions to 1 Disputably, in that criticism of the method is largely divided between those who praise Freud’s ability to understand his subject, versus those who describe his psychoanalyses as theoretical impositions upon patients, e.g., the polarising effect of Freud’s ‘Dora’ case (Fragments of
Recommended publications
  • Sigmund Freud Papers
    Sigmund Freud Papers A Finding Aid to the Papers in the Sigmund Freud Collection in the Library of Congress Digitization made possible by The Polonsky Foundation Manuscript Division, Library of Congress Washington, D.C. 2015 Revised 2016 December Contact information: http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.mss/mss.contact Additional search options available at: http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.mss/eadmss.ms004017 LC Online Catalog record: http://lccn.loc.gov/mm80039990 Prepared by Allan Teichroew and Fred Bauman with the assistance of Patrick Holyfield and Brian McGuire Revised and expanded by Margaret McAleer, Tracey Barton, Thomas Bigley, Kimberly Owens, and Tammi Taylor Collection Summary Title: Sigmund Freud Papers Span Dates: circa 6th century B.C.E.-1998 Bulk Dates: (bulk 1871-1939) ID No.: MSS39990 Creator: Freud, Sigmund, 1856-1939 Extent: 48,600 items ; 141 containers plus 20 oversize and 3 artifacts ; 70.4 linear feet ; 23 microfilm reels Language: Collection material in German, with English and French Location: Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. Summary: Founder of psychoanalysis. Correspondence, holograph and typewritten drafts of writings by Freud and others, family papers, patient case files, legal documents, estate records, receipts, military and school records, certificates, notebooks, a pocket watch, a Greek statue, an oil portrait painting, genealogical data, interviews, research files, exhibit material, bibliographies, lists, photographs and drawings, newspaper and magazine clippings, and other printed matter. The collection documents many facets of Freud's life and writings; his associations with family, friends, mentors, colleagues, students, and patients; and the evolution of psychoanalytic theory and technique. Selected Search Terms The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in the Library's online catalog.
    [Show full text]
  • Staircase, Berggasse 19, Vienna 2017
    Staircase, Berggasse 19, Vienna 2017 344 The Dream— an Imaging Process Monika Pessler As Sigmund Freud observes in The Interpretation of Dreams, «dreams think 345 essentially in images,» and while noises and sounds can at times make their ways into our imaginations, our dream-lives generally favor the visual.1 According to Freud, visual hallucinations replace the expression of thoughts in the form of language because dreams are characterized by «only those elements of their content which behave like images.»2 Another characteristic the psychoanalyst attributes to dreams, and one which is equally inherent to the arts, is an ability to «construct,» to represent an event that is «actually happening,» or to «dramatize an idea.»3 As such, Freud’s characterizations equally apply to artistic modes of rep- resentation: in particular conceptual art, which above all serves to visualize an idea. Greater significance is generally attached to the concept than to its rep- resentation—similar to psychoanalysis, which regards latent thoughts in the unconscious important components which manifest themselves dream images. Just consider Freud’s dictum that subjectively perceived «psychical reality» is more important than «material reality,» in other words, that psychically com- municated realities generally appear more factual than those regarded by the environment as given.4 Freud’s rejection of the «seduction theory» strengthened his awareness that mental ideas, fantasies, outstrip the factual, and are responsible for producing psychosomatic symptoms,5 and thus the formation of the dream itself is like- wise driven by «wish[es] from the unconscious.»6 In an effort to support its associative potential, art is conditioned on con- scious action.
    [Show full text]
  • Heinz Hartmann and Dora Hartmann Papers
    Heinz Hartmann and Dora Hartmann Papers A Finding Aid to the Papers in the Sigmund Freud Collection in the Library of Congress Manuscript Division, Library of Congress Washington, D.C. 2002 Contact information: http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.mss/mss.contact Additional search options available at: http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.mss/eadmss.ms010213 LC Online Catalog record: http://lccn.loc.gov/mm83061523 Prepared by David Mathisen Revised and expanded by Margaret McAleer and Brian McGuire Collection Summary Title: Heinz Hartmann and Dora Hartmann Papers Span Dates: 1928-1974 Bulk Dates: (bulk 1944-1974) ID No.: MSS61523 Creator: Hartmann, Heinz, 1894-1970 Creator: Hartmann, Dora, 1902-1974 Extent: 2,500 items ; 10 containers ; 4 linear feet Language: Collection material in English, German, French, and shorthand Location: Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. Summary: Psychoanalysts. Correspondence, memoranda, writings, subject file, and other papers relating primarily to the Hartmanns’ work with the New York Psychoanalytic Institute and to Heinz Hartmann’s writing and editorial projects. Selected Search Terms The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in the Library's online catalog. They are grouped by name of person or organization, by subject or location, and by occupation and listed alphabetically therein. People Bonaparte, Marie, Princess, 1882-1962--Correspondence. Fenichel, Otto--Correspondence. Freud, Anna, 1895-1982--Correspondence. Hartmann, Dora, 1902-1974. Heinz Hartmann and Dora Hartmann papers. 1928-1974. Hartmann, Heinz, 1894-1970, ed. Psychoanalytic study of the child. Hartmann, Heinz, 1894-1970. Kris, Ernst, 1900-1957--Correspondence. Kubie, Lawrence S. (Lawrence Schlesinger), 1896-1973--Correspondence.
    [Show full text]
  • Chapter 9: the Psychology of the Unconscious
    24/10/2014 Chapter 9: The Psychology of the Unconscious Katie Collins, Michelle Guinchard, & Raven Warren Overview • Introduction • Freud and Scientific Psychology • The Formation of Psychoanalysis: 1884-1899 • Classical Psychoanalysis (1900-1919) • Revising and Extending Psychoanalysis: 1920- 1939 • The Fate of Psychoanalysis 1 24/10/2014 Sigmund Freud (1856-1939) Introduction Psychology of Consciousness Psychology of the Unconscious • Studied normal, adult mind • Freud studied abnormal through introspection. minds through therapeutic • Wanted to make an talk sessions. experimental science out of • Thought consciousness was philosophers’ traditional “a self-deceiving puppet of questions and theories. disgusting, primal impulses it dared not acknowledge”. 2 24/10/2014 Introduction • Freud did not perform experiments. • He used patients’ symptoms, dreams, and therapeutic talk to look for unconscious childhood and evolutionary experiences. • Called himself a conquistador, aka. adventurer. • Curious, daring, tenacious. • Thought adventurers would only be admired if they were successful or discovered something. Freud and Scientific Psychology • Three great blows to human self-esteem: 1. Copernicus’ demonstration that humans are not at the center of the universe. 2. Darwin’s demonstration that humans are part of nature, just like any other animal. 3. Freud’s demonstration that the human ego is not master in its own house. 3 24/10/2014 Freud and Academic Psychology • Academic psychology has mostly ignored or rejected psychoanalysis. • Psychology of consciousness rejected existence of unconscious. • Behaviourists rejected existence of mind. • Psychoanalysis developed as a branch of medicine, and only psychiatrists could be trained in psychoanalysis. Freud and Experimental Method • Considered psychoanalysis a science like any other, but did not try to study the unconscious experimentally.
    [Show full text]
  • Julius Von Schlosser: Aesthetics, Art History and the Book
    Julius von Schlosser: Aesthetics, Art History and the Book Report on the 150th Anniversary Conference on Julius von Schlosser, 6th and 7th October 2016: Julius von Schlosser (1866–1938) Internationale Tagung zum 150. Geburtstag, gemeinsam veranstaltet vom Kunsthistorischen Museum Wien und dem Institut für Kunstgeschichte der Universität Wien Aus Anlass des150. Geburtstag erinnert die Tagung an diesen großen Wiener Gelehrten und beleuchtet seine einflussreiche Rolle als Museumsmann und Universitätslehrer. Die Vorträge thematisieren sein Verhältnis zu großen Zeitgenossen wie Bode, Riegl, Warburg, Wölfflin oder Croce ebenso wie seine wegweisenden, bis heute stark rezipierten Publikationen, seine wichtigsten Schüler und seine Aktualität innerhalb des kunsthistorischen Methodendiskurses. Julius von Schlosser (1866-1938) is perhaps the least known of the major art historians of his generation. The contemporary of Aby Warburg, Max Dvořák and Josef Strzygowski, his writings are more often mentioned in passing than actually read. Only recently has his work begun to be explored in depth. Of this the most notable has been his 1910 history of wax portraiture, which was republished in German in the 1990s, and which has since been translated into English. With the exception of the translations and essays published on him in the pages of this journal, he has been the subject of very little interpretative and critical commentary. The conference jointly staged by the Kunsthistorisches Museum and the Institute of Art History of the University of Vienna to celebrate the 150th anniversary of his birth was thus a welcome event. Schlosser, the curator of weapons and arts and crafts at the Kunsthistorisches Museum, who only became a full professor late in his career after the death of his younger colleague Dvořák, is now known primarily for Die Kunstliteratur (1924), the wide-ranging survey of art writing from late antiquity to the eighteenth century, as well as his studies of collecting, musical instruments and the history of the Vienna School.
    [Show full text]
  • Freud and Castration Carlo Bonomi
    Propriety of the Erich Fromm Document Center. For personal use only. Citation or publication of mate- rial prohibited without express written permission of the copyright holder. Eigentum des Erich Fromm Dokumentationszentrums. Nutzung nur für persönliche Zwecke. Veröffentli- chungen – auch von Teilen – bedürfen der schriftlichen Erlaubnis des Rechteinhabers. Freud and Castration Carlo Bonomi Paper presented at the Conference Psychoanalysis in the 20th Century Cultural Life, Reichenau, June 17-18, 1995 Copyright © 1995 and 2011 by Dr. Carlo Bonomi, Borgo Pinti 87, I-50121 Firenze, E-Mail: mail[at- symbol]carlobonomi.it. Introduction entities created by triangular speculations in which everybody takes the place of someone The topic of castration represents one of the else. Anatomy is ambiguous and the clitoris pro- most important links between the clinical and vides the illusion of power: thus only through the philosophical side of Freud's work. Freud's castration girls realize the expected passive sub- view of the human being is constantly associated mission, permitting the reality to be what it is. to castration. Primeval barbarism is represented Like in the ancient mystery cults and neo- by the image of the father who castrates the platonic philosophies (see Burkert 1987), also in sons, while civilization is represented by the Freud's vision of the world, the Being is con- ambivalent attenuation and substitution of cas- stantly risking to degenerate in Chaos and only tration by circumcision. In modern society, the castration permits to preserve stability. In circumcised penis, both sacred and damaged, Freud's view castration is, therefore, both the characterizes the essence of the Jew, represent- original trauma and the posthumous ing the mirror for the gentile fear of feminiza- (nachtr’glich) order of the world.
    [Show full text]
  • 9789461664174.Pdf
    A DARK TRACE SIGMUND FREUD ON THE SENSE OF GUILT FIGURES OF THE UNCONSCIOUS 8 Editorial Board PHILIPPE VAN HAUTE (Radboud University Nijmegen, The Netherlands) TOMAS GEYSKENS (Catholic University Leuven, Belgium) PAUL MOYAERT (Catholic University Leuven, Belgium) MONIQUE DAVID-MÉNARD (Université Paris VII – Diderot, France) VLADIMIR SAFATLE (University of Sao Paolo, Brazil) CHARLES SHEPHERDSON (State University of New York at Albany, USA) A Dark Trace Sigmund Freud on the Sense of Guilt Herman Westerink The translation was funded by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO). Original title: Het schuldgevoel bij Freud. Een duister spoor. Authorized translation from the Dutch language edition published by Uitgeverij Boom, Amsterdam. © 2005 Dutch language edition by Uitgeverij Boom, Amsterdam (The Netherlands). © 2009/2013 English language edition by Leuven University Press / Universitaire Pers Leuven / Presses Universitaires de Louvain. Minderbroedersstraat 4, B-3000 Leuven (Belgium) ePDF published in 2021 by Leuven University Press / Presses Universitaires de Louvain / Universitaire Pers Leuven. Minderbroedersstraat 4, B-3000 Leuven (Belgium). © 2021 Herman Westerink This ePDF is published under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Non-Derivative 4.0 Licence. Further details about Creative Commons licences are available at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ Attribution should include the following information: Herman Westerink. A Dark Trace: Sigmund Freud on the Sense of Guilt. Leuven: Leuven University Press,
    [Show full text]
  • Effectiveness and Safety of Autologous Fat Transfer in Various Treatment Protocols
    Effectiveness and Safety of Autologous Fat Transfer in Various Treatment Protocols Citation for published version (APA): Groen, J-W. (2018). Effectiveness and Safety of Autologous Fat Transfer in Various Treatment Protocols. Datawyse / Universitaire Pers Maastricht. https://doi.org/10.26481/dis.20180412jg Document status and date: Published: 01/01/2018 DOI: 10.26481/dis.20180412jg Document Version: Publisher's PDF, also known as Version of record Please check the document version of this publication: • A submitted manuscript is the version of the article upon submission and before peer-review. There can be important differences between the submitted version and the official published version of record. People interested in the research are advised to contact the author for the final version of the publication, or visit the DOI to the publisher's website. • The final author version and the galley proof are versions of the publication after peer review. • The final published version features the final layout of the paper including the volume, issue and page numbers. Link to publication General rights Copyright and moral rights for the publications made accessible in the public portal are retained by the authors and/or other copyright owners and it is a condition of accessing publications that users recognise and abide by the legal requirements associated with these rights. • Users may download and print one copy of any publication from the public portal for the purpose of private study or research. • You may not further distribute the material or use it for any profit-making activity or commercial gain • You may freely distribute the URL identifying the publication in the public portal.
    [Show full text]
  • Freud, Censorship and the Re-Territorialization of Mind
    BJHS 45(2): 235–266, June 2012. © The Author(s) (2012) Published by The British Society for the History of Science and Cambridge University Press doi:10.1017/S000708741200009X Blacked-out spaces: Freud, censorship and the re-territorialization of mind PETER GALISON* Abstract. Freud’s analogies were legion: hydraulic pipes, military recruitment, magic writing pads. These and some three hundred others took features of the mind and bound them to far-off scenes – the id only very partially resembles an uncontrollable horse, as Freud took pains to note. But there was one relation between psychic and public act that Freud did not delimit in this way: censorship, the process that checked memories and dreams on their way to the conscious. (Freud dubbed the relation between internal and external censorship a ‘parallel’ rather than a limited analogy.) At first, Freud likened this suppression to the blacking out of texts at the Russian frontier. During the First World War, he suffered, and spoke of suffering under, Viennese postal and newspaper censorship – Freud was forced to leave his envelopes unsealed, and to recode or delete content. Over and over, he registered the power of both internal and public censorship in shared form: distortion, anticipatory deletion, softenings, even revision to hide suppression. Political censorship left its mark as the conflict reshaped his view of the psyche into a society on a war footing, with homunculus-like border guards sifting messages as they made their way – or did not – across a topography of mind. Caviar, sex and death Censorship came early and often to Vienna.
    [Show full text]
  • Volume 43, No. 2, 2009
    the SPRING/SUMMER 2009 AMERICAN Volume 43, No. 2 PSYCHOANALYST Quarterly Magazine of The American Psychoanalytic Association The Long Haul: INSIDE TAP... Healing the Wounds of War AMICA . 8–9 Jonathan Shay Freud in America Jonathan Shay is internationally renowned for rather sweet story—I hope you’re moved in 1909 . 10 his groundbreaking work on the psychological that sense—of how these two Homeric books sequellae of war. His two books, Achilles in Viet- on war and returning from war came to be. I’ve Bear Market Blues. 12 nam and Odysseus in America, have created also discovered that there’s a “man bites dog” new and deep insights into the nature of these newsworthiness to my improbable career. APsaA Impacts injuries. Shay has compared his work with Vietnam I went to work for the VA in 1987 expect- veterans to the descriptions of battle trauma in ing to do something utterly, utterly different. I Stimulus Package. 14 the works of Homer, providing new perspectives was expecting to re-open the experimental Special Section on on issues related to the traumatic effects of neuropathology laboratory that I had had at combat that are as old as mankind itself. In Mass General Hospital, and the veterans kid- Outreach to High recognition of his work, Shay was honored with a napped me. They saw something in me that School Students . 20–23 MacArthur Fellowship. Shay was the keynote I for sure didn’t see in myself, and they redi- speaker at the Presidential Symposium of APsaA’s rected my life by at least 90 degrees.
    [Show full text]
  • 9781782206521.Pdf
    Ferenczi’s Influence on Contemporary Psychoanalytic Traditions This collection covers the great variety topics relevant for understanding the importance of Sándor Ferenczi and his influence on contemporary psychoanalysis. Pre-eminent Ferenczi scholars were solicited to contribute succinct reviews of their fields of expertise. The book is divided in five sections. ‘The historico-biographical’ describes Ferenczi’s childhood and student days, his marriage, brief analyses with Freud, his correspondences and contributions to the daily press in Budapest, exploration of his patients’ true identities, and a paper about his untimely death. ‘The development of Ferenczi’s ideas’ reviews his ideas before his first encounter with psychoanalysis, his relationship with peers, friendship with Groddeck, emancipation from Freud, and review of the importance of his Clinical Diary. The third section reviews Ferenczi’s clinical concepts and work: trauma, unwelcome child, wise baby, identification with aggressor, mutual analysis, and many others. In ‘Echoes’, we follow traces of Ferenczi’s influence on virtually all traditions in contemporary psychoanalysis: interpersonal, independent, Kleinian, Lacanian, relational, etc. Finally, there are seven ‘application’ chapters about Ferenczi’s ideas and the issues of politics, gender and development. Aleksandar Dimitrijević, PhD, is interim professor of psychoanalysis and clinical psychology at the International Psychoanalytic University, Berlin, Germany. He is a member of the Belgrade Psychoanalytical Society (IPA) and Faculty at the Serbian Association of Psychoanalytic Psychotherapists (EFPP), and the editor or co-editor of ten books or special journal issues, as well as author of many conceptual and empirical papers, about attachment theory and research, psychoanalytic education, psychoanalysis and the arts. Gabriele Cassullo is a psychologist, psychotherapist, doctor in research in human sciences and interim professor in psychology at the Department of Psychology, University of Turin.
    [Show full text]
  • A Genital Problem: Infections Caused by Self-Inflicted Penile Augmentations
    Research Article Clinics in Surgery Published: 27 May, 2021 A Genital Problem: Infections Caused by Self-Inflicted Penile Augmentations Olivia Aschacher*, Christine Radtke and Wolfgang Happak Department of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, Medical University of Vienna, Austria Abstract Introduction: Social pressure and dissatisfaction leads to dubious penile augmentation with paraffin, Vaseline, silicone and other foreign materials. Unhygienic conditions cease in painful infections and long-lasting medical treatment. Aim: Aim of this study was to identify the epidemiology and morbidity throughout the Austrian population and to present the cases treated at our department. Methods: The incidence was evaluated from 2001 till 2019 of the Austrian provinces by the Austrian Registry and distributed by age for these years. A retrospective analysis of patients treated at our department was performed to detect penile infections caused by foreign materials. Results: From 2001 till 2019 an overall of 502 male patients were discharged in Austria with a mean value of 27. The incidence rate by age rises from the age group 20 to 29 (n=42) and reaches a peak in the age group 60 to 69 (n=92) and then flattens out again continuously. Three men aged between 20 and 34 years old were presented at our department in 2014. All presented deformed, painful, swollen symptoms of the penis. The overlaying skin was intact and no perforation of the deep fascia was detected. Conclusion: Self-experimental penile augmentation persists to be a consistent trend in Austria. We observed the formation of granulomas and local abscesses which, if expanded, can lead to disseminating lymphogranulomas and a rupture of the erectile tissue, which can result in life- OPEN ACCESS threatening conditions.
    [Show full text]