Abstract

A sympathetic and knowledgeable discussion of Freud in relation to literature and the present state of our culture. The crisis to which the title refers concerns the "progressive deterioration of accurate knowledge of the self and of the right relation between the self and the culture." Freud's contribution to our understanding of the self in culture is deftly outlined, and it is suggested that his theories of culture are not so fantastic as has often been supposed.--D. R.