Lou von Salome: A Biography of the Woman Who Inspired Freud, Nietzsche and Rilke Paperback – Illustrated, October 15, 2008

The book arrived quickly and is in brand new condition. Thank you.

The book will keep you going to the very last page with one breath. I was reading few pages before going bed everyday on my kindle no matter how tired I was so I could forget my extremely busy and long days. Every woman should know Lou, we can only benefit from her strength. The book is written in such way, that if it was an autobiography. You'd become friend with Lou and you'd admire her like if you met her in person. She is powerful and so the book!!!

I'm a journalist and college professor who has read almost everything written by and about the extrordinary Lou von Salome, Russian-born psychoanalyst/novelist who is all-too-often overlooked as a vital participant in Freud's Vienna Circle. I'd previously considered H. F. Peters' currently out-of-print book, MY SISTER, MY SPOUSE, A BIOGRAPHY OF LOU ANDREAS-SALOME, to be the 'definitive' bio of Salome. But VICKERS not only equals Peters' bio in depth of understanding of one of the world's most remarkable human beings, she also writes just as clearly and beautifully! Vickers works for PBS, and I can only hope that she will convince them to allow her to do a documentary on Salome. What a program that would be! ELAYNE WAREING FITZPATRICK, CARMEL VALLEY, CA [ASIN:1436382424 Traveling Backward: Curious Joureys and Quixotic Quests Beyond The Youth of Old Age]

Good background for understanding the relationship between Nietzsche and Lou von Salome. Lou was a true intellectual femme fatale --a fascinating woman who truly knew what she wanted out of life and would not let anything get in her way.

Well written and informative.

This is a fascinating character that left a mark in modern Philosophy.

One of a kind!

Lou von Salome: A biography of the woman who inspired Freud, Nietzsche, and Rilke is set in the backdrop of the European cultural revolution at the turn of the last century. An extraordinary woman, far ahead of her time Lou von Salome, was writer, critic, inspiration, and cultural revolutionist.In Vickers biography we can see the patterns, habits, loss, frustrations, fears, and joys of Lou von Salome. Lou, through her writing, gives to the world a fresh viewpoint to the male dominated cultural revolution of Europe at the turn of the last century. In her quest to understand herself she reaches out to and inspires some of the greatest minds of the time. Ms. Vickers provides a clear vision of Lou's life from fairy tale childhood, questing adolesence, confident adult, to inspired old age. Vickers writing style has a delicate touch, and at times is almost lyrical. At times I believed the author must even have known Lou personally, although that can not be possible.I recommend this book to anyone who is interested in psychology, philosophy, religion, or poetry. I didn't want to put it down.

This is a slim volume at less than 200 pages of text on somebody who was neither a seminal writer of the period, although at the time popular in parts of Europe and whose importance has not lasted the test of time. Has she been wrongly ignored and are the claims made for her influence on Nietzsche, Rilke and Freud justified?Salome's early childhood seems to have been spent bathed in the mysticism of the Russian orthodox church and her own imagination. One thinks of Tsarina Alexandra's bizarre relationship with Rasputin. Having denied her religion at an early age she finds a confessor figure to replace her deceased father and engages in a relationship with him that reminds you of renaissance works by Bernini and Michaelangelo in their erotic passion for the idealised and unattainable. It is a pattern that is to follow her for a large part of her life. Indeed the consummation of her intense sexual connection with Rilke that relieves her of her denial of the erotic side of her nature seems to rob her of the foundations of her writing. Her unconsummated marriage, although it seemed to suit both parties is a clear failure to connect with herself as a woman and as an adult. She was undoubtedly fiercely intelligent and made for a woman of the period and her class background a brave decision to place her intellectual development above other considerations. It is this intelligence and depth of feeling that made her such an attractive figure of pursuit for men whose relationships with women were often so limited and destructive.That Nietzsche was attracted to her is undeniable, but he was a man who fell in love with an idealised picture of women which she may have fitted, and women of her overt intellect, drive and daring outspokeness were a rarity. Her influence on his work is more difficult to gauge, in intellectual terms. I suspect it was more limited than the author allows, but in inspirational terms it may have been significant. Her meeting of minds with Rilke is of a different plane. She was older than him and acted both as a maternal figure, an intellectual guide and fostered and matured his development. It might even be worth saying that without her he might not have achieved what he did. His passion for her ran deep and long.By the time she met Freud, Salome was a well known figure in the European literary and intellectual circles in her own right. Respected both as a writer and critic, her insightful biography of Nietzsche is still highy regarded, this is almost a meeting of equals. Her ability to seduce here is with the breadth and the depth of her mind and her confidence in her own place in the world. That she took to psychoanalysis as a form that she could engage with and was able to develop her own theories shows the depth of the pursuit of knowledge that this new branch of medicine seemed to offer. Her maturity in standing back from the early disputes in psychoanalytic circles and particularly Freud's egotism shows that did not in anyway consider herself a supplicant in the relationship. Indeed he referred patients to her.For a thin volume you do get a real flavour of Salome as a woman (confused, searching and somewhat destructive) and an intellectual (dedicated, single-minded, hugely intelligent and with Rilke particularly an absolute inspiration). She is a fascinating figure at once modern but mystical, available but remote.I did enjoy the book, but another 30-40 pages giving more in-depth detail of her fit with the social an intellectual milieu of the period, various relationships are mentioned but not fully fleshed out, would have made her a more substantial figure for me and enabled me to say that her contribution was more significant than it at first appears. Her position on women's role in the early debates on feminism is hardly touched upon. On the other hand she is briefly mentioned in Harry Kessler's diaries, no mean achievement considering he knew practically everybody worth knowing.Disappointingly there are numerous errors of spelling and syntax in this publication, which given the price quoted is less than acceptable for such a short work.

Fascinating account of her life, her search for knowledge, and, unusual for a woman at that time, her friendships with various famous men. Definitely worth reading.

Exceptionally well written biography that contextualises not only her incredible contribution to psychoanalytic and philosophical thinking, but the influence her brilliant mind had on some of the worlds most amazing thinkers and scholars, like Nietzsche and Freud.

Stunning Book