Notes on Freud’s references to Schopenhauer

Trieb and Wille

Abstract

This article aims to present and analyze Freud’s references to Schopenhauer about the concept of Trieb. Freud always keeps the reticent relationship with philosophy, above all, in terms of texts references, what is justified for his worry in assigning psychoanalysis a founding field (Assoun, 1978). Although, there are numberless philosophical references. In relation to Schopenhauer, it is carried specifically in Beyond the pleasure principle (1920), with regard to the concept of Trieb, to which Freud liken the Schopenhauerian will (Wille) and the duality present in it. Will (Wille) refers to the Kantian thing-in-itself, but far from being a transcendent reason, it inaugurates a philosophy of immanence, where the body and sexuality gain primordial relevance that will be taken up again by Freud’s psychoanalysis as a main field of study.