|
Jay Geller had more than his share of challenges at the Sigmund
Freud Museum in Vienna, Austria. When he arrived, the museum was
being renovated, most of its collections were under dropcloths
and its historian was away on holiday. Geller, who had expected
to spend most of his time immersed in research and writing, had
no workspace or computer access. The museum hosts four public
lectures for its distinguished visiting scholar. But Geller's
first lecture was overshadowed by an international furor, and
the three others were poorly publicized.
However, those talks led to invitations to submit articles to
American and German journals. And his secondary Fulbright appointment,
to the University of Vienna's Institute for Jewish Studies, exceeded
all his expectations.
Geller is a professor of religious studies at Vanderbilt University.
In Vienna, he taught a four-month course on "Freud and Jewish
Identity." The course drew an amazing cross-section of history,
philosophy, Jewish studies and Protestant theology scholars, ranging
in age from 18 to 80. They included a contingent of "thirty-eighters"-the
now-elderly Jews who had fled Vienna in 1938 but who eventually
returned. During the lively class discussions, the thirty-eighters
drew on their memories of Vienna before the Anschluss. Geller,
by studying the "Jewish content" (or lack of it) in
Freud's notes and case studies of his patients, was able to enhance
his students' understanding of Jewish culture and conflict in
Vienna during Freud's lifetime.
Despite Geller's initial difficulties at the museum, "my
last six weeks were great," he adds. He says he "was
blown away" by contemporary European writers he had not known
before, including Hungary's Imre Kertész (he's using a
Kertész novel in his course on the Holocaust).
What Geller misses most since his return to Nashville is Vienna's
public transportation.
"For a monthly fee of about $35," he says, "you
can get on and off buses, street-cars and subways and explore
different parts of the city and its incredible variety of people
and neighbor-hoods. You can ride on and on…."
Please contact us
if you would like to submit your own story and/or photographs.
|
