Apprehending the Inaccessible: Freudian Psychoanalysis and Existential Phenomenology

The authors, both of whom have extensive backgrounds in philosophy and psychology, present balanced critical analyses of crucial developments in, for example, the evolution of the Freudian notion of the unconscious, the engagement of existential phenomenology with Freudian psychoanalysis, and the impact of Eastern philosophy on Freud. Askay and Farquhar then consider - often for the first time - individual thinkers’ reflections on and interpretations of Freud, ranging from the primary figures in existential phenomenology to the most prominent figures in the existential psychoanalytic movement. Even as their work offers a new approach to Freudian thought, it reasserts the importance of alternative views found in Eastern philosophy and existential phenomenology as those views pertain to psychoanalysis and the question of apprehending the inaccessible.