An Alternative History of Psychoanalysis: Fact and Fiction in Irvin D. Yalom’s When Nietzsche Wept

Abstract: This essay provides an analysis of the novel When Nietzsche Wept written by Irvin D. Yalom. The novel takes place during the late eighteen hundred century in Vienna and throughout this essay I explore how Yalom has created a setting, where he has placed some of most prominent philosophers of this time in his fictional world in order to educate the reader about the birth of psychoanalysis and give an alternative version to how it emerged. I argue that Yalom manages to implement different original theories in connection to psychoanalysis to show how the ideas circulating at that point in history contributed to the development of psychoanalysis. The essay compares the original theories of Freud, Breuer and Nietzsche to those brought forward by the characters and illustrates the similarities in order to support Yalom´s alternative version. In conclusion, this essay demonstrates how Yalom has created an alternative version of the development of psychoanalysis by blending original theories with fictive events in order to show how psychoanalysis was a zeitgeist of its time and had more than one founding father.