The news that there is a psychoanalytic interpretation of Sam Clemens's adoption and use of a pseudonym is hardly surprising, to say the least. Like alchemy, another discipline which conveniently ignores pesky facts, the reconstruction/deconstruction of history to fit sometimes attractive, if not entertaining theories, is a mainstay of psychoanalysis, and interpretation of Clemens's use of "Mark Twain" as a form of reparation may well be another example. Instead of noting the obvious, or simplest explanation, psychoanalysis often deposits layers of intellectual effluvium in service of tenuous theories, and I suspect this latest development may constitute yet another example. Consider the following: Artemus Ward - Charles Farrar Browne Petroleum Vesuvius Nasby - David Ross Locke Orpheus C. Kerr ("Office Seeker") - John Newell Josh Billings - Henry Wheeler Shaw Dan DeQuille - William Wright Mark Twain - Samuel Langhorne Clemens Notice a pattern here? As Freud himself observed, "Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar." Martin Zehr Kansas City --- On Mon, 11/22/10, John Davis <[log in to unmask]> wrote: From: John Davis <[log in to unmask]> Subject: Re: new article on psychology of Clemens' pseudonym To: [log in to unmask] Date: Monday, November 22, 2010, 7:55 AM Please send me one as well ([log in to unmask]). Thanks. On Sun, Nov 21, 2010 at 9:04 AM, Richard Waugaman, M.D. <[log in to unmask]>wrote: > I just published an article in the Psychoanalytic Review, titled = > =20 > =93Samuel Clemens and Mark Twain: Pseudonym as Act of Reparation.=94 If > =20= > > anyone would like a pdf of it, send me an email. (The publisher asks =20 > that the article not be posted on any website.) > > Richard M. Waugaman, M.D. > Training & Supervising Analyst Emeritus, > Washington Psychoanalytic Institute > Clinical Professor of Psychiatry, > Georgetown University School of Medicine > Reader, Folger Shakespeare Library > email: [log in to unmask] > 301-654-9771 > 301-656-3437 Fax > -- John H. Davis, Ph.D. Professor of English Department of Language and Literature Chowan University Murfreesboro, North Carolina 27855