Alfred Adler (Page 9)

Adler's Last Years

On his way home in May, Adler stopped in London to discuss the publication of his English lectures. His editor, Philip Mairet, had just published The ABCs of Adlerian Psychology, the first popular English book about Individual Psychology. Hoffman (p. 210-211) indicates Mairet’s surprise at the jumble of disorganized material that Adler expected him to create a book from, as well as Adler’s apparent disregard for the process. It appears that Adler simply trusted his editor to develop the book with the only caveat being, "Do not fear to elaborate or extend in our sense."

Adler returned to Vienna flushed with the success not only of his latest US tour, but of his secure knowledge that he had many loyal friends at home. The following year appears to have included (in addition to public lectures, the training of therapists, and starting more child-guidance clinics) a daily sameness.

He came to his office early, and worked alone until around 11 AM. Then he would invite friends and colleagues to gather to talk about clinical or educational matters. At 2 PM he would begin seeing patients. At least once a week an evening was spent with friends at the Café Siller, discussing Individual Psychology.

Adler’s third American tour began in January 1929. It was hoped that he newest book would generate a response similar to Understanding Human Nature. It did not. Published the year before in Germany under a lengthy title, it was published in the US as The Case of Miss R. Hardly anyone bought it or read it, and it is generally considered today to be Adler’s least-well-known book.

Adler began his tour with a visit to California, where he lectured at and visited colleges and local schools. By early March he was again lecturing at the New School for Social Research in New York, in two classes of some forty lectures. One was an introductory course in Individual Psychology, while the second was on advanced applications of IP to specific issues. Also, he conducted live demonstrations of his method of interviewing children and parents. From transcriptions of these demonstrations came another book, The Pattern of Life, involving 12 cases.

During this stay, he worked hard to establish parent-education centers modeled on those begun in Austria. It was estimated that 40,000 people took part in his parenting classes in the first six months. (Hooper and Holford, p. 123)

After his return to Vienna in the summer of 1929, Adler decided to relocate to the United State permanently. Raissa refused to join him, because her friends were in Vienna, she did not speak English, and she abhorred American politics. Thus began an informal but amicable marital separation, seeing each other each summer. But in 1935, Adler became ill and wrote a telegram to his wife from his hospital bed in America, asking her to join him. She agreed, but said she would come only to support him in his illness, and on the condition they would return to Vienna for the summer.

In 1933, their oldest daughter, Valentine, had moved to Moscow with her husband. She was never heard from again, letters and telegrams being returned. Adler’s inability to learn anything about her cast a dark shadow on the remaining years of his life. Only after intervention with the Russian government, by Adler’s friend Dr. Albert Einstein in 1945, was it discovered that she had been imprisoned in a Siberian gulag, where she died in 1942. For Adler, the news came eight years too late.

When Alfred and Raissa stepped off the boat in New York in September of 1935, reporters were on hand to interview them. Adler is reported to have delivered a statement about "the foolishness of thinking that women are inferior. Women’s inferiority is a male lie, and repetition of the lie is responsible for women believing it." (Hooper and Holford, p. 134).

He settled in New York as Professor of Medical Psychology at the Long Island School of Medicine. By this time his approach had become popular world-wide, and nearly three dozen associations of Individual Psychology had been formed in many countries. By all accounts, Adler spent the last two years of his life constantly writing, conducting therapy, teaching, and planning or carrying out lecture tours. The most extensive of all, covering six countries in 3 months, was set for 1937. One morning on that tour, in Edinburgh, Scotland, he decided to go for a morning walk. He collapsed of a heart attack, and died in the ambulance on the way to the hospital. Following are selections from a poignant reminiscence by Adler’s life-long friend Carl Furtmüller:

An indefatigable worker all his life, Adler labored harder than ever in the years he divided his activities between Europe and America. One may say that year after year he did a full year’s job on each continent. What normally should have been times of vacation became periods of especially concentrated work for him. There were his numerous courses and lectures, his work at clinics and with private patients, and preparation of a long series of papers and books to be published. . . .

Unfortunately there were more serious consequences of his overworking. Advancing age would have demanded economizing of his forces. He did not care, confident of his seemingly unconquerable physical health. During his whole life he had had only three attacks of serious illness. But now, finally, the strain was too much. His heart began to give out, and Adler, always the astute diagnostician, knew it. Maybe he had set himself a term after which he would relax or at least diminish his activities. For when friends warned him against overdoing it in the spring of 1937, he answered, smiling, that he would take a real vacation the next year. That was not to be. In April, 1937, Adler went to Europe, and from April 26 to May 28 he gave lectures in Paris, Belgium, Holland, and Scotland. At the end of May he went to Aberdeen to give a course of lectures at the University for medical students and student teachers. other lectures were added to the program. It was the concentration of work Adler was always used to, and he enjoyed it as always. On the morning of May 28 he took a walk. Suddenly he collapsed. he died in the ambulance which was taking him to the hospital. (Furtmüller, in Ansbacher & Ansbacher, 1964, pp. 390-392)

A word about Adler’s appearance. The Ansbachers, introduced to each other by Adler when Adler and Rowena were faculty members at the People’s Institute, described him as "possibly a bit shorter than average, stocky and well rounded though not heavy." (1964 p. 346, footnote.). To summarize Hoffman’s descriptions, Adler was about 5’7" tall, possessed strong physical stamina, required little sleep, rarely missed a day’s work, liked smoking cigarettes and cigars but rarely drank liquor, and took his health habits seriously. Shortly after his marriage, Hoffman says, spending time in the café with Raissa, eating pastries, he "soon began acquiring the paunch typical for successful men of his milieu" (p. 31). About his face, biographer Hertha Orgler said,

"It is not easy to get a good likeness of Adler. Although he had a well- cut and prominent chin with a deep dimple his nose offered difficulties. Broad in front, sharp in profile, it thoroughly changed his aspect according to the point of view. His under lip was full, his curved upper lip partly covered by a little dark mustache; his well-shaped ears lay close to his head. The growth of his hair was of a remarkable abundance considering his age, and his forehead was high. (Orgler, 1963, p. 208)