Clement Freud 1924-2009

Excerpt from his Diary August 8, 1988:

"My distinguished Aunt Anna had a house on the west coast of Cork and always spoke with affection of the simple, straightforward decency of the local people. She was in Skibereen for her 70th birthday and received hundreds of telegrams of goodwill from all parts of the world where psycho-analysis rules OK.

The messages were telephoned through to the postmistress, who inscribed them on greetings forms and hired a boy to deliver them hourly to the Freud house. During the afternoon she received one which read: "The rapists of Philadelphia send good wishes and best regards." Over which my elderly maiden aunt puzzled greatly. When she called on the postmistress the next day she asked if they might send off for verification. The postmistress said that she, too, had been shocked by the words and checked them, and they had been right. Therapists is not a word in common usage around those parts."