‘”The poets and philosophers before me discovered the unconscious. What I discovered was the scientific method by which the unconscious can be studied.” –Sigmund Freud
The Freud Museum in London is unsure of the accuracy of this quote, but they say it is consistent with the groundbreaking psychiatrist’s love of literature (after all one of his most famous ideas, the Oedipal complex, is derived from a play). While many contemporary psychiatrists seem to have discredited Freud, he still exerts enormous influence on literary analysis through scholars like Harold Bloom and Mark Edmundson. I cited Freud in my book regarding comical malapropisms in the work of Frances Sheridan and her son R.B. Sheridan.
Freud said it is probable verbal slips always have unintentional meaning and claimed “it would not be surprising if more were to be learned from poets about slips of the tongue than from philologists and psychiatrists.” Declan Kiberd adds, “the fact that Ireland had functioned for well over two centuries as a zone of dark unconsciousness to England’s day-lit world may explain [R.B. Sheridan’s] glee in pulling away the social covers.”
Update: “So he’s talking about that guttersnipe Dr. Sigmund Freud. Well, isn’t that special?” –Church Lady from SNL.