On the Couch: Writers Analyze Sigmund Freud

Siri Hustvedt · Andre Aciman · Jennifer Finney Boylan · Alex Pheby · Colm Toibin

May 2024 · Highbridge Audio · Narrated by Dina Pearlman and Perry Daniels

About this audiobook

The controversial father of psychiatry and psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud charted the human unconscious, brought us the talking cure, and wrote books that now rank among the classics of world literature. In On the Couch, the great analyst is analyzed by some of today's great writers and thinkers, who help us understand the man who has helped us understand ourselves as much, if not more, than anyone else, ever. The result is a fresh, multifaceted reassessment of Freud's continuing relevance and influence on ideas, literature, culture, science, and more. Colm Toibin writes about Freud, World War I, Henry James, and Thomas Mann; Adam Gopnik explores Freud's Civilization and Its Discontents; Susie Orbach considers Freud's "ordinary unhappiness" and D. W. Winnicott's "good enough"; Jennifer Finney Boylan reflects on penis envy and gender identity; Peter Kramer describes how new science and drugs have revolutionized psychology since Freud; Susie Boyt, one of Freud's great-granddaughters, spends the night at the Freud Museum in London; Siri Hustvedt examines Freud's divided reception today; and there's much more. Filled with insights, provocation, and humor, On the Couch offers an original and nuanced portrait of Freud as a complex figure who, for all his flaws, forever changed how we see ourselves and the world.

About the author

Siri Hustvedt is the author of a book of poetry, three collections of essays, a work of nonfiction, and six novels, including the international bestsellers What I Loved and The Summer Without Men. She has a PhD in English from Columbia University and is a lecturer at Weil Cornell Medical College in New York.

Andre Aciman is the author of the critically acclaimed novel Call Me by Your Name, a New York Times Notable Book of the Year; the memoir Out of Egypt; and False Papers: Essays on Exile and Memory.

Jennifer Finney Boylan is a professor of English at Colby College and the author of the bestseller She's Not There.

Alex Pheby is a British author and academic. He is currently a professor at Newcastle University and lives in Scotland. He studied at Manchester University, Manchester Metropolitan University, Goldsmiths, and UEA.

Colm Toibin is an Irish novelist, short story writer, essayist, journalist, critic, playwright, and poet. His first novel, The South, was published in 1990. The Blackwater Lightship was shortlisted for the Booker Prize.

Dina Pearlman was raised in Teaneck, New Jersey, and went on to attend Carnegie Mellon University. Based in New York City, she is an actress, stand-up comic, and the Audie Award-nominated narrator of over 300 audiobooks.

Perry Daniels is an award-winning, classically trained actor from Atlanta, Georgia, with over a decade of experience on stage, screen, and lurking mysteriously behind the microphone of his home studio. An audiobook junkie, Perry strives to bring sincerity, energy, depth, and a focus on performance to his narration.

Andrew Blauner is a literary agent and the editor of eight previous anthologies, including Now Comes Good Sailing, Coach, and The Peanuts Papers. He is a member of PEN America and he and his work have appeared in the New York Times and on NPR, among other media outlets.