| Abstrakt: |
"We all have reason to envy you the rich experience you are having". Walter-Fritz Seemann’s stay in Chicago as reflected in his correspondence with Alexander Mitscherlich. W. F. Seemann was a "special student" at the Institute of Psychoanalysis in Chicago from November 1948 until June 1949 thanks to a Fellowship from the Rockefeller Foundation, which had originally been granted to his wife, Ursula Seemann-de Boor, who had been a political prisoner under the Nazis. Based on a close reading of the correspondence between Seemann and Alexander Mitscherlich the author outlines precisely the way in which professional knowledge and experience were transmitted to post-war Germany, which had been devastated by nationalsocialism and World War II. Seemann, as one of the first non-emigrant Germans received into an analytic institute in the USA, was given a surprisingly friendly welcome. He profited from the rich libraries, the cooperative style of the scientific community and some training analysis with Fritz Moellenhoff, an immigrant from Berlin. Seemann conveyed his experience back to Mitscherlich and post-war Germany by sending much-needed research literature and by making contact with analysts who would agree to publish their work in the newly founded Psyche. After his return to Germany Seemann became one of Mitscherlich’s closest colleagues in Heidelberg. However from 1954 onwards Seemann stroke out on his own professionally. |
