When searching for an particularly good illustration of how Freud approached the study of myth, commentators typically cite his analysis of the story of Oedipus in The Interpretation of Dreams (1900/1953). And indeed, I suspect that few would disagree with Robert Segal's (2004a, p. viii) suggestion that that particular analysis was “Freud's own key analysis” when studying myth. Taken as face value, the ease with which commentators turn to this example might seem to suggest that the psychoanalytic study of myth has been a part of the psychoanalytic tradition almost from the beginning. Yet that is misleading.
As a start, consider that Freud himself did not identify the Oedipus story as a myth. On the contrary, although he starts off by calling it “a legend that has come down to us from classical antiquity,” he quickly moves to a consideration of the Oedipus story as told specifically in Sophocles' Oedipus Rex, a literary text. Freud reinforces this emphasis on literary texts by following his analysis of Oedipus Rex with an analysis of Hamlet. In other words, the event routinely cited as being the seminal event in the psychoanalytic study of myth turns out not really to be about myth at all.
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Carroll, M. (2009). The Psychoanalytic Study of Myth Since Freud Pursuing the Dream. In: Belzen, J.A. (eds) Changing the Scientific Study of Religion: Beyond Freud?. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-2540-1_7
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