Mucho ha sido escrito y reflexionado acerca de Sigmund Freud y el desarrollo
histórico del psicoanálisis fuera y dentro de la comunidad científica. Desde esta
perspectiva, como hombre, original pensador y sagaz clínico se ha debatido su rol en la
historia del psicoanálisis, y especialmente, en la historia del saber freudiano. De forma
diferente ha sucedido con quienes le acompañaron en su devenir vital, esposa, hijos y
familiares, por citar los más cercanos, cuya vida ha quedado ensombrecida tras la sombra
del gigante, del genio que nos enseñó entre otras cosas la vía regia para acceder
al inconsciente analizando los sueños o el funcionamiento del aparato psíquico con su
modelo de mente. De quienes le apoyaron en su vida y formaron parte de su círculo
familiar más íntimo, nos centramos en este trabajo en su esposa Martha y su cuñada
Minna. La primera, con quien se casó en 1886, dándole seis hijos y una estabilidad para
trabajar y despreocuparse de las tareas cotidianas, mientras la segunda siendo la fiel
confidente de sus logros intelectuales, especulaciones teóricas y (de acuerdo a algunos)
su amante. El objetivo de todo ello es ofrecer una imagen lo más fiel posible de Martha
Bernays, como escudriñar la evidencia que apoya la existencia de tal liaison entre Freud
y su cuñada Minna Bernays. Visibilizamos así la influencia que ambas hermanas ejercieron
en el padre del psicoanálisis como hombre e investigador de la mente. El edificio
psicoanalítico, pues, más que por su creador, es aquí revisitado desde la perspectiva de
dos mujeres que acompañaron a Freud en su vida y en la difícil conformación y desarrollo
de la matriz psicoanalítica.
There has been a vast amount of writing and reflection about Sigmund Freud
and the development of psychoanalysis over time, from both within and beyond the
scientific community. Freud has been regarded through different prisms – the man, the
original thinker, the sage clinician – and his role in the history of psychoanalysis, and
more particularly in the development of the Freudian approach, has been hotly debated.
Less has been said about those who accompanied him throughout his life’s work, his
wife, his children and his family members, to name but the closest, whose lives were
lived in the shadow of the colossus, the genius who taught us among other things how
dream analysis can unlock the secrets of the unconscious and how to account for the
workings of the human psyche through his model of the mind. From among those who
supported him in his daily life and formed his innermost family circle, this study centres
on his wife Martha and his sister-in-law Minna. The former, whom he married in 1886,
bore him six children and provided the stability for him to work free from the demands of everyday chores, while the latter became the faithful confidante of his intellectual
achievements and theoretical speculations, and [according to some] his lover. The aim
is to offer as accurate as possible a portrait of Martha Bernays, and to scrutinize the
evidence in support of the claim that there was a liaison between Freud and his sisterin-
law Minna Bernays. We can thus gain an insight into the influence of the two sisters
on the father of psychoanalysis as a man and researcher into the mind. In this respect,
the edifice of psychoanalysis is revisited less from the perspective of its creator than of
the two women who accompanied Freud throughout his life and throughout the difficult
configuration and development of the psychoanalytic framework.
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