Email Responses

x

“The soul, then, as being immortal, and having been born again many times,
and having seen all things that exist, whether in this world or in the world
below, has knowledge of them all; and it is no wonder that she should be
able to call to remembrance all that she ever knew about virtue, and about
everything.”

Now, as a scientist, I don’t literally believe that there is a soul that is
repeatedly reborn – but I would certainly grant that this concept in Plato
has a scientific basis, namely the fact that we all harbor instincts, formed
over millions of years and thousands of generations, which indeed represent
a sort of ancient “knowledge” that we all possess.

That said, however, I would argue that nothing in Plato’s Meno even
approaches meeting my five specific requirements, namely:
To qualify as a bona fide case, the individual described in the work must:
1) experience a severe trauma (abuse, sexual assault, a
near-death experience, etc.); and 2) develop amnesia for that trauma for
months or years afterwards (i.e. be clearly unable to remember the traumatic
event as opposed to merely denying or avoiding the thought); where 3) the
amnesia cannot be explained by biological factors, such as a) early
childhood amnesia – in which the individual was under age five at the time
of the trauma, or b) neurological impairment due to head injury, drug or
alcohol intoxication, or biological diseases. Also, the individual must 4)
“recover” the lost memory at some later time, even though the individual had
previously been unable to access the memory. Finally, note 5) that the
individual must selectively forget a traumatic event; amnesia for an entire
period of time, or amnesia for non-traumatic events does not qualify.

I assume that you would agree with me that within the Meno, there is surely
no individual person described who SELECTIVELY FORGETS A TRAUMATIC EVENT (as specified in my criteria number one and number five). Instead, there is a
general philosophical concept that the soul might have amnesia (or if you
will, an ability to “call to remembrance”) for an entire block of
knowledge – not just a specific traumatic event, but all manner of
knowledge, good and bad, from past lives.

Now, if you think I am wrong, and you can cite a specific place in the Meno,
describing an individual who meets all five of the criteria enumerated
above, do not hesitate to get back to me – but I hope that my above
discussion will satisfy you that Plato’s Meno does not satisfy my
requirements.

Harrison G. Pope Jr., M.D.

No, I don’t think you’re wrong, upon re-reading your criteria.

Personally, I think repressed memory syndrome isn’t a syndrome at all but
simply one possible sympton of PTSS, but I am a skeptic when it comes to
such things, and I believe that many of the so-called modern ‘syndromes’ are
socially-defined. Maybe I read too much medical sociology.

x

Then later it says:

Epimetheus was troubled by the hard looks and the cold words of the men who
once had reverenced him. He turned from the houses and went away. In a quiet
place he sat down, and for a while he lost sight of Pandora. And then it
seemed to him that he heard the voice of his wise and suffering brother
saying, “Do not accept any gift that Zeus may send you.”

So he lost memory of his suffering brother and then got it back.
I’ll keep looking for more references for you.

x

Second, it is not clear from the English translation that Epimetheus was
literally UNABLE to remember the information, in a matter that modern
literary characters are portrayed as having utter amnesia for a traumatic
event. Rather, it seems that Epimetheus was simply so smitten with the
Golden Maid that he simply failed even think about the bad things that it
happened to his brother, and his brother’s warning to watch out for Zeus.
Clearly, Epimetheus remembered his brother, and the fact that his brother
had given the gift of fire to mortals – because he showed this with pride
to Pandora when he took her to the village.

In any event, I would certainly grant that examples such as yours contain
some features of “repressed memory,” even though they are not fully
qualifying cases. Indeed, it is quite frequent, throughout the literature
of the world, that a supernatural force (be it malevolent or benign) causes
someone to develop forgetfulness – but often the forgetfulness is for good
things, or for a measure of good and bad things, and not for a traumatic
event. Examples are King Dushyanta’s amnesia of his love for Shakuntala as
a result of a curse in the great Shakuntala drama of the fourth century
Sanskrit poet Kalidasa; references in the Qur’an to forgetfulness imposed by
the Shaitan, the Islamic equivalent of Satan, or the gift of forgetfulness
given by Hashem (God) to Adam and Chava (Eve) upon leaving the Garden of
Eden in the Midrash.

So in summary, I would submit that our ancestors around the world were
certainly familiar with forgetfulness and amnesia generically – and they
wove this into their literature and their mythology – but that none of the
above examples represents true “repressed” and “recovered” memory as we see
them portrayed in modern literature.

Are you satisfied with my analysis? Don’t hesitate to get back to me if you
think that I’m wrong in any way.

Harrison G. Pope Jr., M.D.

http://hinduism.about.com/library/weekly/aa021201b.htm

This story talks about a king who forgets his own wife due to a curse.

Regards,

x

Nevertheless, if you think of any other examples, do not hesitate to write to me. Thank you!

Harrison G. Pope, Jr., M.D.

Even beyond the need to accept the null hypothesis (the absence of a case
used to provide contrary evidence), there’s another problem. Consider
what Pope and Hudson said in offering their challenge, with just one term
changed for another.

“The concept of autism…might be simply a romantic notion dating from
the 1800s, rather than a scientifically valid phenomenon. To test this
hypothesis, we are offering a reward….We would argue that if autism
were a genuine natural phenomenon that has always affected people, then
someone, somewhere, in the thousands of years prior to 1800, would
have witnessed it and portrayed it”.

Autism was first identified by Kanner in 1943 and independently by
Asperger in 1944. Descriptions of anything resembling autism earlier than
this are scarce. Perhaps the best candidate is the case of the Wild Boy
of Aveyron. Even if we accept this as a true case of autism, which is
debatable, the published account of Itard dates from 1801, and so falls
just under the cut-off date. But even though diagnosable autism does not
appear before 1800, does this mean that the disorder is not
scientifically valid?

Next case; Parkinson’s disease. It was first described in 1817 by James
Parkinson. But does the absence of earlier reports mean that Parkinson’s
disease is merely a silly romantic notion?

The outcome of this challenge will be interesting. But the failure of
anyone to claim the prize can’t be used to invalidate the concept of
repressed memory.

x

2) Lear’s amnesia is not just selective but total, consuming his identity.

3) In the end, he remembers enough of himself and his daughters to forgive and then to mourn Cordelia.

As I read it, Lear demonstrates precisely those feature of repressed memory that you are searching for–the experience of an event too painful to be recalled, the effect of which is to cause the mind to act so as to conceal the event from consciousness (in this case, at the expense of a great deal of conscious operation), and the end-result of which is the ultimate restoration of that memory as part of a resolution to the original trauma.

x

Clearly, at the beginning of Shakespeare’s play, Lear foolishly fails to recognize the hypocrisy and insincerity of Goneril and Regan, as they make flattering professions of their love to their father – and he equally foolishly fails to recognize the actual sincerity of Cordelia. But he does not exhibit amnesia for a specific traumatic event; it is not as if there is any specific trauma that occurred earlier in Lear’s life which he is currently unable to remember. If one maintains that he has some actual loss of memory for the prior evils of the two older daughters, then one would also have to admit that he has equally failed to remember the prior goodness of the youngest daughter – so he is forgetting nontraumatic material just as much as he is forgetting traumatic material.

In short, one can certainly say that the old man exhibits denial, even blindness (a central metaphor of the play, obviously) to the true character and intention of his daughters, and only slowly comes to appreciate the errors of his judgments. But Lear’s realization evolves
gradually, as the evil of the older daughters grows more obvious, and as he ultimately realizes – too late – that Cordelia truly loved him. It is not as if a “repressed memory” of a specific traumatic event suddenly pops back into his mind, causing him to suddenly come to a realization of his errors all at once – in the manner that such things happen in modern novels, dramas, and screenplays.

So in summary, Lear is a parable of human blindness, certainly – and blindness is an immortal human failing that may apply equally to both goodness and treachery – but the play does not contain an instance of actual amnesia for a specific traumatic event.

I think probably you’ll buy my analysis above – but don’t hesitate to get back to me if you still think I’m wrong.

Harrison G. Pope, Jr., M.D.

All the best,

x

Are you offering a prorated, partial credit prize?;-)

X

[Harrison G. Pope, Jr., M.D.]

I would bet that a substantial percentage of American women (and
possibly some men?) have read this book; it was a NY Times bestseller when
it came out. The issue of repressed memory validity aside, it’s a great
book: back in ’93, I thought it was the best suspense novel I’d ever read.

x

********************************************************

All Around the Town

Mary Higgins Clark

Published: 1992
College student, Laurie Kenyon has been accused of murdering her English
professor. She claims to have absolutely no memory of this, and is at a
loss to explain how her fingerprints are all over the murder scene and the
murder weapon.
Laurie’s sister is an attorney and she brings in psychiatrist Justin
Donnelly to help with the defense. Justin learns that Laurie was kidnapped
at age four and reunited with her family two years later. Those two years
have been lost to Laurie as she has repressed horrible memories.
Laurie begins to suffer strange emotional states and unexplained anxiety
attacks since beginning her therapy. Nearing a breakthrough, Laurie begins
to fear she may have actually killed the English professor. Justin
Donnelly feels Laurie’s lost years can unlock the present mystery. He is
close to uncovering the truth but it may not be in time to save her from
life in prison.

I note the year of Kipling’s “Captains Courageous” – 1896. This was approximately when Freud changed his mind about repression.

I have tried to find any non-European sourced culture for which the concept of involuntary repression of memories (traumatic or otherwise) is intrinsic.I’m still searching. It appears to be a feature of countries that are mainly English-speaking, plus a very few others in Western Europe, or which are intrinsically European, e.g non-Arabic Israel. I haven’t even found it in India even though England established most of its professional and governmental institutions. But, of course, Hindu India is relaxed about human sexuality and not given to the moral panics of USA, UK, and much of Europe.

All up, that’s the minority of humanity for which the English language appears to be the infecting vector. Or is it Judaism and Christianity? Maybe it’s the conjunction of a sexually up-tight culture and the activity of psychotherapy. This would account for the absence of repressed memories from sexually oppressive Islam.

Regarding references to RMs in literature, if you have a list of citations for the period 1800 to Freud, I would appreciate receiving a copy.

Those who lean towards an evolutionary world view, rather than the Creationist view, will find the following insight persuasive:

“If it were human nature to repress memories of traumatic events,
the human species would have been wiped out soon after it began”.

This is a powerful insight which deserves broad dissemination.

x

If any of you knows any other web sites where we might post our challenge, please get back to me, because I want to make sure that the challenge is disseminated as far as possible, and that I have exhausted every possible avenue for finding a case before 1800.

Harrison G. Pope Jr., M.D.

1. Anonymous. The Ranayama. Transcribed circa fourth century B.C. Chapter 14: Rama meets Hanuman. Translated by Shah CS. Available online at: http://www.boloji.com/hinduism/ramayana/14.htm

2. Kalidasa. Abhijnana Sakuntalam (Shakuntala). (Circa fourth century A.D.) Translated by Ryder AW. New York: EP Dutton & Co. 1914; available online at: www.sacred-texts.com/hin/sha

x

Harrison G. Pope, Jr., M.D.

Isn’t the supposed clinical significance of repressed memories that they result in psychopathology in their owners, so that such individuals are not “otherwise healthy” even though they don’t know why? Seems to me your requirements are too restrictive. Unless, of course, the Globe got it wrong (again).

Thanks,

x

Below: in answer to an email of mine, from a friend. With thanks for your challenge. I took it up but in different ways.

It’s not really about the money, it’s being “on the money” in terms of what we think, say, do.
There was nothing written about this prior to the eighteen hundreds. If this is true it’s only because we NAME things and there was no name for this, then and probably no awareness of repressed memories until Freud.

Ah, the importance of naming, of language. I remember that many years ago an artist friend of mine told me that human ability to perceive color has developed along with language. There was a time (apparently not too many millennia ago) when humans couldn’t perceive blue; hence no word for it. Which came first, the word or the color? There’s a question for the day.

x

A corollary to hypotheses IA and IB, also deserving consideration, asserts that dissociative amnesia is indeed suggested in various writings prior to 1800, but that our ancestors might have visualized, interpreted, and described psychological phenomena differently from ourselves. For example, people in earlier centuries might have witnessed dissociative amnesia, but portrayed it as demonic possession or some other supernatural event, or described it in language entirely different from what we would use today. Certainly this may be true—but dissociative amnesia is a very graphic and striking phenomenon; if an otherwise lucid individual spontaneously develops complete amnesia for a specific, seemingly unforgettable, traumatic event, then a description of such a case would surely be recognizable, even through a dense veil of cultural interpretation. Therefore, if dissociative amnesia were a genuine natural phenomenon, one would find not just oblique religious or supernatural references to it, or accounts that arguably showed some similarities to it; one would also find numerous straightforward, simple, clear-cut cases.

Indeed, to “repress” and subsequently “recover” a memory is such a wonderful literary device – as attested by its ubiquitous use in 20th-century literature and film – that ancient writers would surely have used it also, if it had really existed as a natural human psychological phenomenon. Shakespeare would have had numerous cases of “repressed” and “recovered” memory as a device in his plays (regardless of the name that he might have put on it); Greek tragedy would be filled with similar instances, and so forth. But there aren’t any. We are left, by default, with the realization that “repressed memory” is merely a cultural artifact of recent times– but we are so wedded to the idea, as a result of long standing popular belief, that we can’t believe we’re wrong!

Harrison G. Pope, Jr., M.D.

I expect you have done a thorough search of the literature though it’s
probably not possible to search through “everything”. I waswondering
about the poets, perhaps the Sufi poets and others. Certainly poetry is full of allusions to a different kind of “amnesia” with reference to past lives.

I am not so sure that because trauma is so visible that we don’trepress.
We certainly do remember lots of trauma but there is alsothis phenomenon
Freud described so vividly in his patients and whichwe still see, namely
dissociative identity fragmentation which wehave in the past, certainly
traced to severe trauma and havedescribed in detail how the body
creatively manages to suppress thisfrom consciousness.

Your premise is an interesting one that definitely is a “tease” inthat
it makes me wonder why there isn’t a literature of this sort. Idon’t
think, however, that the absence of such a literaturenecessarily forces
your conclusions. I also don’t know what to dowith my own clinical
observations if there is now “no such animal”. How do you explain what we
see clinically?

X

[H. G. Pope, Jr., M.D.]

X

[H. G. Pope, Jr., M.D.]

“You will, though,” the Queen said, “if you don’t make a memorandum
of it.”

~Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass

Remember to remind me this fall, and I’ll send you the finished paper as
soon as I can release it.

[H. G. Pope, Jr., M.D.]

X

In short, I must insist on evidence, not just speculation.

[Harrison G. Pope Jr., M.D.]

Perhaps you will argue that “fear” is not “trauma.” If so, you are asking
for 20th Century words in the 1st Century. But if my view that your
contest is disingenuous is incorrect, then I’ll be happy to tell you
which charity to send the $1,000.
Sincerely,

x

And yet there is not a thing in man so fraile and brittle againe as it
is, whether it be occasioned by disease, by casual injuries and
occurrents, or by feare, through which it faileth sometime in part, and
otherwhiles decaieth generally, and is cleane lost.

From Pliny the Elder, Historia Naturalis 7.24. Trans. Philemon Holland
(1601).

CHAP. XXIIII.

Examples of memorie.

Harrison G. Pope, Jr., M.D.

Dear x,

Thank you for your e-mail. For at least three reasons, I would respectfully
suggest that your quotation from Pliny the Elder does not meet, or even
approach, our criteria for “repressed memory.”

First, the translation that you cite dates from 1601, and is not a very good
translation from the vantage point of modern English. For a better
translation in modern English, see the Perseus translation at:

http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?doc= Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.02.0137&query=head%3D%23296

Here is the relevant portion of the Perseus translation for your
convenience:

Nothing whatever, in man, is of so frail a nature as the memory; for it is
affected by disease, by injuries, and even by fright; being sometimes
partially lost, and at other times entirely so. A man, who received a blow
from a stone, forgot the names of the letters only;5 while, on the other
hand, another person, who fell from a very high roof, could not so much as
recollect his mother, or his relations and neighbours. Another person, in
consequence of some disease, forgot his own servants even; and Messala
Corvinus, the orator, lost all recollection of his own name. And so it is,
that very often the memory appears to attempt, as it were, to make its
escape from us, even while the body is at rest and in perfect health.

An even more precise translation, provided this morning by our colleague and
co-author Dr. Michael Poliakoff, is:

No other thing is equally fragile in a human being (as memory): it is
sensitive to the influence of the injuries of disease and accidents and even
fear, at times piecemeal, at times completely.

In this sentence, regardless of the translation, Pliny lists three things
that can affect the memory. The first two are the injuries of disease and
accidents – and both of these, certainly, can sometimes cause memory to be
lost completely. Therefore, Pliny is perfectly accurate in saying that
certain things can cause memory to be lost completely. But there is nothing
in the sentence to specify that fear, per se, could cause memory to be lost
entirely. And indeed, when we see the examples that Pliny provides for
illustration, he mentions injury and disease, but importantly, does not
mention a case of fear. Therefore, one would be drawing unjustified
inferences, leaping far beyond Pliny’s actual words, if one interpreted the
sentence is saying that fear alone could cause someone to have complete
amnesia for an event.

Indeed, it is noteworthy that Pliny does not provide any examples of fear in
his subsequent list of four examples. If Pliny had heard of cases of
otherwise lucid individuals who spontaneously developed complete amnesia for
a specific traumatic event, why would he not provide an example of this,
also? Certainly, if an individual experienced a traumatic event (say,
witnessing the death of loved ones) and thereafter experienced amnesia for
it – in the absence of any head injury or disease – such a case would be
sufficiently striking that one would think that someone like Pliny would
mention it. Yet we have not been able to find any example of anyone, in all
of the millennia before 1800, who mentions such a case in any written work.

Second, it is well known that fright or fear can affect the memory. One of
the classic examples of this phenomenon is that people who are robbed at
gunpoint sometimes cannot remember the face of their assailant, because
their attention has been captured by the assailant’s weapon. But this
phenomenon is simply incomplete encoding, and not “repressed memory.” One
doesn’t have amnesia for the traumatic event itself; one simply fails to
encode inconsequential aspects of the event (to face) because one is focused
on aspects important to survival (the gun). Dr. Richard McNally, in his
article, “The science and folklore of traumatic amnesia,” (Clinical
Psychology: Science and Practice 2004; 11:29-33) points out that individuals
sometimes confuse incomplete encoding with traumatic amnesia (which is the
term that he uses for “repressed memory”). Dr. McNally’s paper, which you
may have seen, lists a number of other memory phenomena that are sometimes
erroneously confused with “repressed memory.” So in short, Pliny was
completely correct in saying that memory could be affected by fright;
incomplete encoding is typical in such situations. This is not synonymous
with “repressed memory.”

Third, I believe that you perhaps have not have seen the actual text of the
“repressed memory” challenge that we have posted on the Web, in discussion
groups, and in print. I’ve attached a copy of the full text for your
convenience. As you will see, the challenge requires an example of an
actual case – an individual who experiences a traumatic event, that allows
amnesia for that event, and so subsequently “recovers” the “repressed”
memory. Once you read the text of the challenge, I would assume that you
would agree, without further debate, that the passing mention of fear in one
sentence of Pliny – even if interpreted in a manner most favorable to the
hypothesis of “repressed memory” – clearly does not constitute an actual
case, as the challenge requires. Of course, if you still believe that this
sentence of Pliny would somehow meet the four criteria required by the
challenge, it could be submitted to arbitration with Dr. Lukas as described
in the text of the challenge, although I would think that you would agree
that that is unnecessary.

In conclusion, I would suggest that there is nothing “disingenuous” about
the challenge itself: there are numerous 20th-century novels, plays,
Hollywood movies, and, of course, numerous nonfictional 20th-century cases
that would easily fulfill the criteria of our challenge without any need to
stretch the definitions or speculate on the meaning of words. Therefore, we
have certainly not set the bar too high by asking for a case before 1800
that would meet those same basic criteria.

Do not hesitate to write back to me in the future if you believe that you
have found a clear-cut case of “repressed memory” in a written work before
1800, meeting the basic criteria of our challenge.

Sincerely yours,

Harrison G. Pope Jr., M.D.

The Pliny the Elder quote proves that you are wrong about the third
point. And the third point was the motivation for your contest. Indeed, it is
the very point that you claim to be “testing.” The fact that he does not
provide examples is irrelevant. Your claim is that the very idea is
purely modern. Obviously, it is not.

I was unaware that translation was one of your fields of expertise. But
notably, all of the translations your cite use the concept of fear as
one thing that might cause memory loss. In short, the idea that fear could
cause memory loss has been around for 2,000 years.

Your unwillingness to recognize that this evidence disconfirms your
claim is not surprising. At least now I have direct documentation that bears
out my view of your so-called challenge.

Sincerely,

x

Sincerely yours,

Harrison G. Pope, Jr., M.D.

Sincerely,

x

For my part, I will publish my full historical study in the peer-reviewed
literature in the near future, where you and any other scholars will be
free to respond to it in the public scientific forum. I’ll try to alert
you once it is in press in a peer-reviewed journal.

Harrison G. Pope, Jr., M.D.

You used the phrase “peer-reviewed” three times in a very brief message, so I gather that you place very high value on that process. I would note that peer-review of your “challenge” will be meaningful, however, only if the peers are historians.

My prediction is that no peer-reviewed journal in history will ever find a paper about your “challenge” worthy of publication. My further prediction is that you will not even try to send this work to a place where it will be subject to the standards and norms of historiography.

I look forward to reading your work and to finding out whether my predictions come true.

Sincerely,

x

I’m writing in the interests of interdisciplinary communication: I’m a
Professor of English and a Shakespeare specialist, not really a
psychoanalytic critic but appreciative of some of its accomplishments. My
reaction on hearing the “Here and Now” story about your challenge to cite
an instance of “repressed memory” (and perhaps I read of this elsewhere) was
to fear a kind of gross reductionism in regard Freud-if I heard correctly
that this amounted to a challenge to Freud’s fundamental idea of an
unconscious. My thought is that it is a very rich concept with a lot of nuances and
rival interpretations, and it shouldn’t be reduced to an idea of “represssed
memory.” After all, for Freud the repressed always “returns” in some
way-in dreams, in slips of the tongue, in emotions without a clear “cause”-so
that repression is never total or complete. And because in the theory the same
“split” that creates the unconscious also creates the consciosness or ego
in a nuanced dialectic that Lacan espcially has made much of-and related to
language acquisition as well.

Nevertheless, to return to the challenge. I think the most interesting
cases of the idea of possible “repressed memories” can be found in the two plays
that most impacted Freud himself: Sophocles’ Oedipus the King (5th
century BCE Shakespeare’s Hamlet.(c. 1600).

The case of Oedipus, however, is a subtle one. No character actually
“recovers” a repressed memory as such. Jocasta, it seems, had not realized
the truth of her situation until the messenger and shepherd’s report about
Oedipus having survived abandonment and ended up unknowingly adopted. But
when she does realize the truth, the impact is stunning and she commits
suicide. Oedipus is also overwhelmed and gouges out his eyes. And the
chorus informs us that “Already many mortals in their dreams/Have shared their
mothers’ beds.”

In the build-up to the great “recognition” scene, the dialogue seems to
suggest that Oedipus knows where he is going, that he realizes the truth
of something that he had earlier repressed-or, more precisely and related to
repression, to use another Freudian term-was in denial about. The play
overall achieves a powerful impact by suggesting (without literally
saying-literature is like that) that the unhappy incestuous pair had
discovered something that everyone is some sense uncannily “knows” but has
“forgotten” about. This is not unrelated to Plato’s claim in one of the
dialogues that geometry is a process of “remembering” what we used to know
but have forgotten. In other words, both Sophocles and Plato seem to me
to imply a concept of repressed memory.

Shakespeare’s Hamlet uses the technique of the soliloquy to provide access
to the interiority of characters in a way the Greeks did not, and Hamlet
is a complex case in point. An uncanny sense of his “remembering” something
that he had known but not been completely aware of appears in his first
reaction to the Ghost’s accusation against Claudius: “Oh my prophetic
soul-my uncle!” Famously the play records his fervent acceptance of the
Ghost’s challenge that he avenge his father’s death in a complex
meditation in response to the Ghost’s closing requiest to him, “Remember me”
(1.5.91):

Remember thee!

Ay, thou poor ghost, while memory holds a seat

In this distracted globe. Remember thee!

Yea, from the table of my memory

I’ll wipe away all trivial fond records,

All saws of books, all forms, all pressures past,

That youth and observation copied there;

And thy commandment all alone shall live

Within the book and volume of my brain,

Unmix’d with baser matter (1.5.95-105)

The “table” referred to in the image of “the table of my memory” refers,
scholars have discovered, to a waxed, multi-layered hardpaper board that
was sold in the day’s paper shops for use as a kind of portable notebook-one,
however, which could be wiped with a cloth to erase what had been written
there before. It is a striking image of a mind capable of erasing memories.

As the play proceeds, we seem to watch exactly such a repression in
action. Hamlet becomes so engrossed in his plan “to put an antic disposition on”
that he seems to forget about the command to revenge. In two famously
soliloquies, he highlights his inability to “know” aspects of himself, the
causes of his dilatory behaviour, strkingly. First is the meditation on
the paradoxes of dramatic acting-how a “player” “in a fiction” can rouse up
emotions over events that had no reality. In the rest of the soliloquy he
searches himself for the causes of his inactivity, accuses himself of
cowardice, but can find no answers. It is a striking instance of the idea
of the unconscious. Hamlet finds that he cannot “know himself” by
intro-spection. He is “another.” Claudius gets at the idea in another
striking image that I will have to paraphrase:

There’s something in his soul that sits on brood,

the hatch of which promisesgreat danger to our state.

Hamlet accuses his mother of a kind of repression of memory in her hasty
re-marriage:
You will not go till I have set you up a glass [a
mirror]
Where you may see the inmost part of you.

(3.4.20-21).
That is, she has become forgetful of part of herself. He goes on to accuse
her of lacking sense or the power of the five senses in preferring so
loathesome a man as Claudius to his illustrious brother, Hamlet, Sr.
Again, an idea of a repressed or denied memory is assumed. Similarly in his last
soliloquy, Hamlet is once more engaged in introspection, unable to explain
to himself “Why yet I live to say/This thing’s to do.” One of his
speculations is, precisely, “beastly oblivion.” That is, a memory like
that of a beast, without true consciousness engaged merely in eating and
sleeping (4.4.32ff). This would also seem to be a clear reference to the idea of
repressed memories.. Similarly Claudius describes the mad Ophelia as

Divided from herself and her fair judgement

Without the which we are pictures or mere beasts.

(4.5.86-87).

All these instances led the late Shakespeare and Renaissance scholar Joel
Fineman to write that it was not the case that Shakespeare was a Freudian,
but rather than Freud was a Shakespearean.

Also relevant here is a distinction made in a lot of poststructuralist
interpretations of the motif of memory in the play, one orginally taken
from Hegel. I reproduce below a footnote on this taken from a manuscript of
mine in progress:
Cf. Paul de Man, ‘Sign and Symbol in Hegel’s Aesthetics’, Critical Inquiry
8 (1982): 761-65; and Marjorie Garber, Shakespeare’s Ghost Writers:
Literature as Uncanny Causality (New York: Methuen, 1987), 147-53. DeMan borrows a distinction in Hegel between an internal, self-reflective kind of memory
(Errinerung) and external, rote memory (Gedächtnis), associating the first
kind with symbol, the second kind with allegory. Garber ties deMan’s
distinction to Hamlet and Hamlet’s change from an initial state of
internalized, ‘symbolic’ memory in the first soliloquy to one of
externalized, ‘allegorical’ memory in need of being written down when he
turns to his tables after seeing the Ghost (312-14).Garber goes on to
discuss Jacques Derrida’s use of the same distinction to define the work
of mourning as requiring a substitution of Errinerung by Gedächtnis and
claims that is precisely what Hamlet does when he writes on his tables (152-53).

You can send the prize to:

x

To qualify as a bona fide case, the individual described in the work must: 1) experience a severe trauma (abuse, sexual assault, a near-death experience, etc.); and 2) develop amnesia for that trauma for months or years afterwards (i.e. be clearly unable to remember the traumatic event as opposed to merely denying or avoiding the thought); where 3) the amnesia cannot be explained by biological factors, such as a) early childhood amnesia – in which the individual was under age five at the time of the trauma, or b) neurological impairment due to head injury, drug or alcohol intoxication, or biological diseases. Also, the individual must 4) “recover” the lost memory at some later time, even though the individual had previously been unable to access the memory.

Note that the individual must develop amnesia for a traumatic event; amnesia for an entire period of time, or amnesia for non-traumatic events does not qualify. Note also that the individual must develop amnesia for a genuine traumatic event; for example, if a defendant in a witch trial suddenly “remembers” that she consorted with the devil, this also would not qualify.

******************************
Although these criteria are quite specific, they certainly do not set the bar too high, because there are numerous fictional and non-fictional examples from the late 19th and 20th centuries that easily meet the criteria. For instance, many examples can be found among 20th-century screenplays in which a character recovers a “repressed” memory of a traumatic event.

I am sending you this note because it does not appear that the pre-1800 example that you have provided meets the full criteria specified above. To reiterate, the work has to describe a fictional or non-fictional individual who explicitly experienced a severe traumatic event and then was explicitly unable to remember that event for months or years, and then recovered the memory. Remember also that a case does not count if it could be explained by biological amnesia (a delirium, dementia, “madness,” drug intoxication, etc.) and also does not count if an individual develops amnesia for an entire block of time or for nontraumatic events (for example, a man who develops amnesia for his betrothal to a woman, perhaps as a result of some supernatural force).

Note that it is not sufficient if some modern commentator has merely argued that the original work might be suggestive of “repressed memory,” or might be interpreted in terms of “repressed memory”; it is necessary that the original work itself contain a straightforward, clear-cut case of “repressed memory” as defined by the criteria above.

If, after reading this discussion, you still feel that the work that you have cited includes a case meeting our full criteria for “repressed memory,” please get back to me with an exact reference as to where I can find the original, pre-1800 text (ideally, an Internet site if possible) and specify as precisely as possible (page numbers, line numbers, etc.) 1) where in the text the specific severe traumatic event is described; 2) where in the text it is made clear that the individual was explicitly unable to remember that traumatic event for months or years; and 3) where it is made clear in the text that the individual “recovered” the previously “repressed” memory.

If you do get back to me with specific lines and page numbers and we still disagree as to whether the example meets all of the above criteria, then it can be submitted for arbitration to Dr. Lukas as described in the text of the challenge attached.

Thank you, and again my apologies for sending you this generic reply.

Harrison G. Pope Jr., M.D.

What this proves is of course another question. Very little, I would say!
Perhaps a footnote in the history of strange plot devices.

Best,

x

[Harrison G. Pope, Jr., M.D.]

In yet another corollary to hypotheses IA and IB, one might suggest, as an analogy, that conditions such as autism or Parkinson’s disease are perhaps absent from written works prior to 1800—though these disorders have probably existed for centuries. But such disorders are not analogous to dissociative amnesia, because they exhibit a whole range of non-specific symptoms, overlapping with many other syndromes that afflicted our ancestors. Thus references to these conditions would be buried amidst generic descriptions of childhood anomalies or disorders of the elderly. By contrast, to reiterate, dissociative amnesia is a much more graphic phenomenon: if an otherwise lucid person showed spontaneous complete amnesia for a major traumatic event, such a case would be recognizable in at least some published document before 1800.

By analogy, there are many phenomena described in the 20th century (the theory of relativity, for instance) that are not described prior to 1800, but which nevertheless exist. But since spontaneous amnesia for a major traumatic event is such a graphic and recognizable phenomenon, one could not plausibly argue that it would not have been noticed by our ancestors if it actually occurred.

With regards your second question, I would have to see the reference to the particular study that you mention to be able to comment – but I have attached a 1998 paper that I wrote in the British Journal of Psychiatry looking at all of the available prospective studies, including some of people brought to emergency wards, and finding that none exhibited a case of “repressed memory.”

[The reference for the "attached paper" described in the paragraph above is:

Pope HG Jr, Hudson JI, Bodkin JA, Oliva P. Questionable validity of ‘dissociative
amnesia’ in trauma victims. Evidence from prospective studies. Br J Psychiatry
1998;172:210-5]

After hearing the story about your repressed memory contest on NPR’s
“Here and Now” I am reminded of two examples of repressed memory in Charles
Brockden Brown’s novel “Edgar Huntly; or, Memoirs of a Sleep Walker,”
published in 1799. Both the main character, Edgar Huntly, and his alter
ego Clithero repress (for very different reasons) traumatic memories that
have to be buried (literally in Clithero’s case) and then dug up (again,
literally for Clithero). Clithero sleep walks and buries the journal
containing his traumatic story, and the journal is later dug up. If
memory serves, Edgar Huntly similarly “buries” his memory (written in a
journal or a letter) in a chest in the attic. The traumatic events are
politically, socially and personally significant–Clithero, the
immigrant, represses events from Ireland, and Edgar Huntly, the American, represses
memories of frontier events including Native Americans.

I am happy to supply more information, including page numbers.

x

Also, don’t hesitate to simply call me if you like. I’m at xxx-xxx-xxxx.
I’ll be here Friday 9 AM -2 PM and interruptible any time. Thanks.

Harrison G. Pope, Jr., M.D.

Best,

x

1. Astrophil and Stella, the Renaissance poem by Sir Philip Sidney (circa 1591), where “Morpheus’ theft of Stella’s image from the dreaming lover prompts the awakened memory of how Stella was in fact stolen from him.” This is a “case” that contains forgetting and later remembering (hence the awakened memory) of something that would not “ordinarily” be forgotten, to wit, having someone stolen from you. Source: A. C. Hamilton, “Sidney’s Astrophel and Stella as a Sonnet Sequence,” ELH, Vol. 36, No. 1 (Mar., 1969) , pp. 59-87.

2. The folktale, The Girl Without Hands (contained in the first Grimm’s collection of 1812, but traceable to Marie Hassenpflug before 1800), where “Dipping into the waters of Memory heals the handless maiden of our tale and allows her to re-tell the story of handlessness.” See, Stephanie Pope, “Seeking The Hands of The Handless Maiden: Reaching For The Felt Sense.”
http://mythopoetry.com/mythopoetics/ essay_handlessmaid.html

x

x

Please note that our “repression challenge” lays out specific criteria
that have to be met in order to qualify as a genuine case of “repressed
memory.” I have attached the full text of the challenge along with this
e-mail in case you have not already seen it; I reproduce here the specific
criteria from that text:

***********************************************

To qualify as a bona fide case, the individual described in the work must:
1) experience a severe trauma (abuse, sexual assault, a near-death
experience, etc.); and 2) develop amnesia for that trauma for months or
years afterwards (i.e. be clearly unable to remember the traumatic event
as opposed to merely denying or avoiding the thought); where 3) the
amnesia cannot be explained by biological factors, such as a) early
childhood amnesia – in which the individual was under age five at the
time of the trauma, or b) neurological impairment due to head injury, drug
or alcohol intoxication, or biological diseases. Also, the individual
must 4) “recover” the lost memory at some later time, even though the
individual had previously been unable to access the memory.

Note that the individual must develop amnesia for a traumatic event;
amnesia for an entire period of time, or amnesia for non-traumatic events
does not qualify. Note also that the individual must develop amnesia for a
genuine traumatic event; for example, if a defendant in a witch trial
suddenly “remembers” that she consorted with the devil, this also would
not qualify.

******************************

Although these criteria are quite specific, they certainly do not set the
bar too high, because there are numerous fictional and non-fictional
examples from the late 19th and 20th centuries that easily meet the
criteria. For instance, many examples can be found among 20th-century
screenplays in which a character recovers a “repressed” memory of a
traumatic event.

It does not appear that any of the pre-1800 examples that you have
provided meets the full criteria specified above. To reiterate, the work
has to describe a fictional or non-fictional individual who explicitly
experienced a severe traumatic event and then was explicitly unable to
remember that event for months or years, and then recovered the memory.
Remember also that a case does not count if it could be explained by
biological amnesia (a delirium, dementia, “madness,” drug intoxication,
etc.) and also does not count if an individual develops amnesia for an
entire block of time or for nontraumatic events (for example, a man who
develops amnesia for his betrothal to a woman, perhaps as a result of some
supernatural force).

Note that it is not sufficient if a modern commentator has merely argued
that the original work might be suggestive of “repressed memory,” or might
be interpreted in terms of “repressed memory”; it is necessary that the
original work itself contain a straightforward, clear-cut case of
“repressed memory” as defined by the criteria above.

If, after reading this discussion, you still feel that a work that you
have cited includes a case meeting our full criteria for “repressed
memory,” please get back to me with an exact reference as to where I can
find the original, pre-1800 text (ideally, an Internet site if possible)
and specify as precisely as possible (page numbers, line numbers, etc.) 1)
where in the text the specific severe traumatic event is described; 2)
where in the text it is made clear that the individual was explicitly
unable to remember that traumatic event for months or years; and 3) where
it is made clear in the text that the individual “recovered” the
previously “repressed” memory.

If you do get back to me with a specific reference and specific lines and
page numbers, and we still disagree as to whether the example meets all of
the above criteria, then it can be submitted for arbitration to Dr. Lukas
as described in the text of the challenge attached. Thank you.
Harrison G. Pope Jr., M.D.

Your “challenge” says nothing about “clarifications,” and given your
response to the Pliny quote, I can well imagine this becoming a series of
endless questions for which no answers will satisfy you. So if you think
that my submissions are inadequate, then kindly just state the reasons
why.

I have no inclination to send something to a friend of yours and call that
“arbitration.” I would prefer to put my submissions and your responses in
a public arena and let the public evaluate whether your “challenge” is
actually a game of three card monte.

Sincerely,

X

Title: The Comedy of Errors (eBook)

by Shakespeare, William.

Publication: Champaign, Ill. (P.O. Box 2782, Champaign 61825) Project

Gutenberg,, .

View this eBook | Show Details | Hide Notes | Remove from My List

Note 1. Comedy of Errors (pg 24)

Act V Scene I p.24 Aegeon and Antipholus of Ephesus

x

Harrison G. Pope, Jr.

X

Submission No 5. The Indian Middle Age myth of Matsyendranath. There are
many variants. All involve the master sustaining unusual memory loss that
is later reawakened. The memory loss is not “normal.” It is often caused
by “the way of the flesh” and when the reawakening of memory occurs, the
Master’s life is saved

The myth obviously demonstrates that the idea of unusual forgetting and
recovered memory where alive and well in the middle ages. Since your
“challenge” apparently does not cognize modern interpretations – but
nevertheless demands modern translations! – I will add no more.

I look forward to hearing why this centuries-old myth does not prove the
existence of the very ideas you claim to have been created by the
Romantics.

x

As described in the full text of our challenge, which I have previously sent
to you, the pre-1800 work has to describe a fictional or non-fictional
individual who explicitly experienced a severe traumatic event and then was
explicitly unable to remember that event for months or years, and then
recovered the memory. Remember also that a case does not count if it could
be explained by biological amnesia (a delirium, dementia, “madness,” drug
intoxication, etc.) and also does not count if an individual develops
amnesia for an entire block of time or for nontraumatic events (for example,
a man who develops amnesia for his betrothal to a woman, perhaps as a result
of some supernatural force).

Note that it is not sufficient if a modern commentator has merely argued
that the original work might be suggestive of “repressed memory,” or might
be interpreted in terms of “repressed memory”; it is necessary that the
original work itself contain a straightforward, clear-cut case of “repressed
memory” as defined by the criteria above.

If, after reading this discussion, you still feel that the pre-1800 work
that you have cited includes a case meeting our full criteria for “repressed
memory,” please get back to me with an exact reference as to where I can
find the original, pre-1800 text (ideally, an Internet site if possible) and
specify as precisely as possible (page numbers, line numbers, etc.) 1) where
in the text the specific severe traumatic event is described; 2) where in
the text it is made clear that the individual was explicitly unable to
remember that traumatic event for months or years; and 3) where it is made
clear in the text that the individual “recovered” the previously “repressed”
memory.

I would again note that one could easily meet these requirements with
numerous 20th century works, so it is only reasonable to set the same
standards for works prior to 1800.

If you do get back to me with a specific reference and specific lines and
page numbers, and we still disagree as to whether the example meets all of
the above criteria, then it can be submitted for arbitration to Dr. Lukas
(should you wish to do so) as described in the text of the challenge.

In your earlier email today, you state, “So if you think that my submissions
are inadequate, then kindly just state the reasons why.” I believe that my
response above states very precisely the ways in which the submissions are
inadequate, and lays out precisely what would be required for a submission
to be adequate.

Harrison G. Pope Jr., M.D.

What I still hope for, however unlikely the chances, is your meaningful engagement of the evidence that contradicts your assertions about the history of ideas about memory before 1800. But if that is not to be, at least there will be a way for the public to see through your “challenge.”

Sincerely,

x

Sincèrement vôtre

x