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Humanities and Social Sciences Library > Collections > Manuscripts > Finding Aids > Erich Fromm Papers, 1929-1980 Erich Fromm Papers, 1929-1980 Part 2Note on Provenance and RestrictionsThe Erich Fromm Papers were donated to The New York Public Library in March of 1957 by Mrs. Anya Blauner, a friend and colleague of Dr. Fromm, who acting on his behalf placed them in the Library for safekeeping with the stipulation that they would remain closed to researchers for a period of thirty years, or until March of 1987. During Dr. Fromm's lifetime the papers were made available to researchers only with his written consent. Since the expiration of the thirty year restriction, the papers continued under restriction pending the conclusion of an agreement between the Library and Dr. Fromm's literary executor Dr. Rainer Funk who had established the Erich Fromm Archives at Tübingen, Germany. Following the conclusion of the agreement in 1989 the Erich Fromm Papers housed in the Manuscripts and Archives Division have been open to all qualified scholars and researchers with the exception of certain papers described below. During the accessioning of the collection it became evident that certain papers merited a period of restriction much longer than thirty years in order to protect the privacy of those involved. These papers which involve the confidentiality of the therapist-patient relationship consist of correspondence of Dr. Fromm with his patients and also records of their dreams which they recorded for his interpretation. Having been alerted as to the existence of these sensitive papers Dr. Fromm cautioned against their being made available to the public until he had had an opportunity to examine them. However, he was unable to accomplish this before his death in 1980. The Library has therefore removed the sensitive papers from the files and placed them in separate containers which are to remain sealed until the year 2049. Chronology
Biographical NoteErich Fromm (1900-1980), psychoanalyst, author, educator and social philosopher, was born in Frankfurt, Germany, the son of Naphtali Fromm, a wine merchant, and Rosa (Krause) Fromm. Although raised in the Jewish faith, Fromm while still young abandoned Judaism for what was to become in his writings a humanistic ethic based upon love. In 1914 he declared himself a pacifist. After graduating from Heidelberg with a doctorate in sociology he continued his studies at Munich and at the Psychoanalytic Institute at Berlin. By his late twenties Fromm had become a practicing psychoanalyst and had established himself as lecturer in psychoanalysis and in social psychology at the University of Frankfurt's Psychoanalytic Institute and at its Institute for Social Research. While at Frankfurt he began his investigation into the mentality of the German worker under the Weimar Republic, work which he was to continue in New York. In 1932, suffering from ill health, Fromm resigned his lectureships at Frankfurt and repaired to Switzerland where he recuperated and became associated with the Institute for Social Research at Geneva, editing and writing articles for its journal. In 1933 he visited the United States during which time he sought (unsuccessfully) to negotiate the transfer of the Institute to the University of Chicago. The following year he emigrated to the United States, settled in New York City and continued his employment with the International Institute for Social Research, which, under the directorship of Dr. Max Horkheimer, had found a home on the campus of Columbia University. In 1941 Fromm became a naturalized American citizen. Until his resignation in 1939 Fromm was employed at the Institute, lecturing, writing for its journal, helping to complete its study Die Autorität in der Familie which was published in 1936, and finishing the manuscript of his study of the German worker. During this time he also continued to practice psychoanalysis, saw many patients (several of whom were academic colleagues), participated in a study on authority and the family at Sarah Lawrence College, and completed the manuscript of Escape from Freedom (1941). The book won him broad public acclaim and established his reputation as a social theorist of unusual brilliance and originality. The book was published (1942) in England under the title The Fear of Freedom. As an analyst without a medical degree Fromm was not permitted to teach psychoanalysis on an equal basis with other faculty members at the Institute who were physicians. (For the same reason he was granted only honorary membership in the newly formed Association for the Advancement of Psychoanalysis.) This, combined with a dispute over pay and personal differences with Horkheimer, who failed to authorize the publication of his study of the German worker, led to his resignation from the Institute although he continued to lecture at Columbia through 1941. During the war years Fromm taught at Bennington College in Vermont, and subsequently held teaching posts at numerous institutions including the William Alanson White Institute for Psychiatry, Psychoanalysis, and Psychology, the New School for Social Research, Yale University, the National Autonomous University of Mexico, Michigan State University, New York University, and the Mexican Institute for Psychoanalysis. Throughout much of the remainder of his life Fromm continued to publish and to edit works directed towards a broad reading public. Included among his many books which reached a wide audience are The Art of Loving (1956); Sigmund Freud's Mission: An Analysis of His Personality and Influence (1959); May Man Prevail? An Inquiry into the Facts and Fictions of Foreign Policy (1962); My Encounter with Marx and Freud (1962); The Nature of Man (1968); The Revolution of Hope: Toward a Humanized Technology (1968); The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness (1973); and To Have or To Be? (1976). His book The Sane Society (1955) was instrumental in the formation (1957) of SANE: A Citizens' Organization for a Sane World, which became a powerful advocate for ending nuclear testing and the arms race. On March l8, 1980 Fromm died of a heart attack at Muralto, Switzerland. He was survived by his third wife, Annis Freeman Fromm whom he married on December l8, 1953. She died in September 1985. His first marriage (June l6, 1926) to Frieda Reichmann ended in divorce. His second marriage (July 24, 1944) to Henny Gurland ended with her death in 1952. Melanie A. Yolles |