Wit and its Relation to the Unconscious

Sigmund Freud is known around the world as the “Father of Psychoanalysis,” and for good reason. If anything, Freud’s first patient was himself. A sufferer of psychosomatic symptoms, Freud diagnosed himself as having a repressed antagonism against his father. From there, Freud began to build on his now famous concepts of the unconscious, infantile sexuality and repression. And of course, there’s his famous theory on the structure of the mind, which has made Id and Ego a commonly used part of the English lexicon. In addition to all but creating a new field of science, Freud also contributed to entire industries. One of the first to try to analyze dreams, Freud’s work has led patients in search of psychological explanations for various physical and mental symptoms and phenomena. And as a practitioner for many years, Freud wrote voluminously about his theories during the early 20th century. As a result, he remains one of the most influential and famous thinkers and psychologists of the 20th century. Wit and Its Relation to the Unconscious is Sigmund Freud's analysis of how and why people find things humorous. In essence, he argues that humor satisfies our unconscious desires to free us from daily stresses and other inhibitions. Freud also dissects humor’s relationship with dreaming and certain neuroses.