History has bestowed on London an eclectic range of museums that explore the development and applications of psychoanalysis, psychology and related disciplines.
The capital also boasts a vibrant agenda of exhibitions and events for anyone keen to deepen their knowledge of the human psyche.
We have put together a pocket-sized selection of some of the sites and (sounds) that have been pivotal to our understanding – and misunderstanding – of mental health, mental illness and mental care over the generations… more than enough “medicine for the mind” to feed even the hungriest soul!
The Freud Museum
“A fascinating cult site, a place of mythic memory, a shrine, a monument, a haunted house”, so begins Marina Warner’s introduction to the Freud Museum in Hampstead.
Freud had long had a penchant for London, in spite of “the fog and rain, the drunkenness and conservatism” not to mention (still in his own words!) “the many peculiarities of the English character”. It was, however, in the most traumatic of circumstances that the father of psychoanalysis landed in the capital in 1938, escaping the clutches of Nazi Austria in the hope, as he put it, of “dying in freedom”.
Soon after arriving in London, Freud settled at 20 Maresfield Gardens, and it was in these brick, revivalist-style surroundings (which Ernst, his youngest son, helped to renovate) that he was to spend the last year of his life. It was here, too, that Freud’s daughter Anna practised as an analyst for over four decades after her father’s death.
Even as he struggled with cancer, Freud opened Maresfield Gardens not just to fellow analysts (such as Melanie Klein) but also to figures from the world of literature (Leonard and Virginia Woolf, H. G. Wells) and art (notably Salvador Dali). And, although the museum may well be a “shrine” for some, it also energetically reflects the liveliness of Freud’s mind.
Visitors can admire the concrete representations of this inquisitiveness in the outstanding collections of books, paintings, antiquities, rugs and furniture that dominate every corner of the house. That monument to psychoanalysis, Freud’s consulting room – and, yes, his couch – are still in situ, objects of awe and wonder that feel so familiar even to anybody who has never seen them “in the flesh” before.
Bethlem Royal Hospital Museum
Founded in 1247, Bethlem Royal Hospital is one of the world’s oldest institutions dedicated to caring for people with mental health difficulties. Bethlem’s first home was on the site of what is now Liverpool Street Station, which (some might say) seems appropriate, given that the hospital’s nickname – Bedlam (a “colloquial contraction” of Bethlem) – is a byword for pandemonium.
Bethlem remained in Bishopsgate for 400 years until moving to Moorfields and then on again, in 1815, to Southwark – where you can wander freely through part of the old building, which metamorphosed into the Imperial War Museum when Bethlem upped sticks again in 1930.
Bethlem’s current home is a modern campus in the south-eastern suburbs of London, a world away from the days when the hospital was a central feature of the capital’s tourist trail, with visitors paying to goggle at the “lunaticke people” and “people that bee distraught in wits”. Long gone, too, are the once-celebrated stone figures (by Caius Gabriel Cibber) known as “Raving Madness” and “Melancholy” that adorned the gates of the institution in the 17th century.
Bethlem now houses a small museum that investigates the hospital’s extraordinary history, as well as a gallery that boasts a renowned collection of art designed “to showcase the inspirational talents of artists who have experienced mental health difficulties”.