ABSTRACT
The ground broken by Freud and Breuer's pronouncement, in the 'Preliminary Communication' concerning the psychogenesis of hysteria, that 'hysterics suffer mainly from reminiscences' brought to view the tangled roots linking the developing concept of a hidden and powerful unconscious with nineteenth century anxieties concerning memory's absence and excess. The 'discovery' of the unconscious arguably undercut notions of self-determination and placed limits on 'agency'. The relative 'empowerment' effected by the turn to fantasy was arguably accompanied, moreover, by a 'democratizing' and 'universalizing' tendency in the revised understanding of psychical life that it produced. Whether in the pages of psychiatric journals or on the 'self-help' or 'personal growth' shelves of community bookstores, this movement emphasizes the pathological effects of trauma upon future mental and emotional life. Showalter readily acknowledges that those who succumb to these 'hystories' are suffering and experiencing difficulties that must not be dismissed.
