'the real basis of Psycho-Analysis'. The first edition, first issue in English of Freud's (1856-1939) collected papers, constituting 'the real basis of Psycho-Analysis. All Professor Freud's other work and theories are essentially founded on the clinical investigations of which these papers are the only published record' (editorial preface). Complete with the elusive fifth volume published twenty-five years later.

Grouped chronologically, the papers discuss the history of the psycho-analytic movement, clinical practice and technique, case histories, metapyschology, applied psycho-analysis, and miscellaneous subjects, including hypnotism and suggestion, comprising in total 113 essays across the five volumes.

The text of volumes one to four is taken from the Sammlung kleiner Schriften zur Neurosenlehre, and was translated under the supervision of the British psychoanalyst Joan Riviere (1883-1962), a founding member of the British Psychoanalytical Society formed in 1919. The final volume, published in 1950, is a compendium of Freud's shorter writings published since the issue of the fourth volume in 1925, and marks the first appearance in English of twelve papers, including his essays on Hysterical Phenomena (1892), A Case of Successful Treatment by Hypnotism (1893), and Some Elementary Lessons in Psycho-Analysis (1938).

With provenance for A.H. Smith January 1925, possibly Arthur Hamilton Smith FBA (1860-1941), Keeper of Greek and Roman Antiquities at the British Museum from 1909 to 1925, and a member of the Cambridge Apostles.

First editions, first issues in English; 5 vols; 8vo; text in English, ownership inscription in pencil to vol. II front free endpaper recto, a few minor pencil annotations; publisher's dark green cloth, spines lettered in gilt, minor wear to extremities and corners, spines of vols II-IV a little faded, slight spotting and minor offsetting to endpapers and edges, otherwise internally clean, very good; [4], 359, [1]; 404; 607, [1]; 508; 396pp.

Woolmer 44.