One respects Freud anymore. Is that a mistake?

A new book argues that psychoanalysis, once central in psychiatry, remains more effective than drug treatment for mental healing—at least in the view of its proponent, South African neuropsycologist Mark Solms. The article traces the decline of Freudian influence, from a Time magazine cover in 1956 lauding Freud as a driver of diagnostic progress, to later dominance of biological psychiatry after the DSM-III. Solms spent nearly 30 years translating Freud’s “Revised Standard Edition” of the complete psychological works into English, a 24-volume edition released in 2024. His latest U.S. release, “The Only Cure: Freud and the Neuroscience of Mental Healing,” says Freud’s core insights about the mind were broadly on the right track, even if some ideas were wrong.