Beatrice M. Hinkle


Beatrice Moses Hinkle was a pioneering American feminist, psychoanalyst, writer, and translator of C. G. Jung.

Background, marriage, education

Hinkle was born in San Francisco, California, to physician B. Frederick Moses and Elizabeth Benchley Van Geisen. In 1892 she married Walter Scott Hinkle, an assistant district attorney. Hinkle had considered studying law, but after being discouraged by her husband "with a good hardy laugh", she entered Cooper Medical College in 1895. She graduated with a degree as a medical doctor in 1899, age 25.

Early career in medicine and psychology

In 1905, Hinkle was appointed the city physician of San Francisco, becoming the first woman doctor in America to hold such a public health position. The responsibilities of this office marked her subsequent career in medicine.
A widow, in 1908 Hinkle moved to New York City. That year she and Dr. Charles R. Dana founded the country's first "psychotherapeutic clinic" at Cornell Medical College located in Manhattan.
In 1909 she left for Vienna to study under Freud. Although she admired Freud's contributions to psychoanalysis, she eventually broke with his teachings. As was the norm in training to practice as a therapist in psychoanalysis, she herself became a patient in 1911. Hinkle was "analyzed by Jung", probably in Zurich.
After beginning therapeutic work with her own patients, she had grown increasingly dissatisfied with Freud's narrow understanding of the human psyche, especially regarding gender and the role of women. Hinkle later wrote, "I found myself more in sympathy with Jung's points of view... than with the rigid sexual hypotheses of the strictly Freudian analysts". Freud's approach seemed to her to lack the proper recognition of a women's psychic autonomy, so that Freud pushed Hinkle to align with adherents of Carl Jung.
Hinkle attended the Weimar Conference in 1911. At this psychoanalytic gathering both Freud and Jung participated. A welcome novelty was the presence of women psychoanalysts from the Zurich school. In addition to America's Dr. Hinkle, there were continental women: Lou Andreas-Salomé, Maria Moltzer, Toni Wolff, and Emma Jung. Due to illness Sabina Spielrein was absent.
Hearing repeated by Freud his assertion that the female psyche was a derivation of the male's, Dr. Hinkle returned to New York in 1915 determined to spread Jung's contrary views. In 1922 "Jung's most prominent advocate in the United States Beatrice Hinkle".

Translation of Jung's ''Wandlungen und Symbole der Libido'' (1912)

A major contribution of Beatrice Moses Hinkle was being among the first to present C. G. Jung's writing to the English-speaking world. Jung had attracted her admiration because of his understanding of the female psyche as independent from that of the male. She became the first official translator of his work in America.
Entitled Psychology of the Unconscious. A Study of the Transformations and Symbolisms of the Libido, her translation was published in New York in 1916 by Moffat, Yard, and in London in 1917 by Kegan, Paul. It included her 40-page "An introduction to psychoanalysis and analytic psychology". The psychologist and editor John Kerr many years later commented on Part I of the Jung's 1912 book and her rendering of it:
Jung had half a masterpiece here and he seemed to know it from the first page. The English translation is flawed, but even so, it captures some of the flavor of what was basically a stylistic triumph. Here is how the translator Beatrice Hinkle, rendered Jung's beginning: "Anyone who can read Freud's Interpretation of the Dream without scientific rebellion at the newness and apparently unjustified daring of its analytic presentation and without moral indignation at the astonishing nudity of the dream interpretation... will surely be deeply impressed...."

In her 40-page "An introduction" Hinkle demonstrated her assimilation of the viewpoints both of Freud and Jung. A patient's psychiatric symptoms may stem from forgotten memories of very painful events. Hidden to avoid traces of psychic trauma, the memory drops out of the patient's consciousness. Yet a later recall of 'forgotten' events is possible. In fact, if the patient can establish a conscious connection between the 'repressed' memory of painful events and the disturbing emotions left by trauma, the troubling symptoms might disappear, an astonishing cure. A clinical method or process, 'the free association of ideas', might assist the patient, by letting impressions or feelings flow, despite existing mental blockage. This therapeutic method may unlock the most affected elements, and thus allow the patient to establish a conscious link between the 'forgotten' event and its corresponding trauma: hence, the cure. "This important group of ideas or impressions, with the feelings and emotions clustered around them, which are betrayed through this process, was called by Jung a complex."
She had become somewhat a part of her translation since her own ideas, it is claimed, had entered into it. She renewed and augmented its theories, contributions derived from her work as a therapist and her personal experience with both Freud and Jung. She broadened the context of terms such as "repression" and "complex", manifested by the patient while being psychoanalyzed.
In 1952 "an extensive revision" of this work was published by Jung with a new title, Symbole der Wandlung. In 1950 referring to advancements in psychological studies that'd cause him to revise this book, Jung drew particular attention to Erich Neumann, his key work The Origins and History of Consciousness. The book's editors also footnote to Neumann's The Great Mother.
Under the English title Symbols of Transformation, in his "Translator's Note" R. F. C. Hull states, "During the preparation of this volume, the text of the original English translation by Beatrice M. Hinkle... was freely consulted."

"A Study of Psychological Types" (1922)

Hinkle composed her article as a "detailed elaboration" in response to Jung's 1913 article "A preliminary study of Psychological Types". She drew on her experience of employing Jung's type theories in her therapeutic practice, with ambiguous results. Her article was written before the publication of Jung's 1921 book Psychologische Typen, but her article "A Study of Psychological Types" did not appear in print until 1922.

''The Re-Creating of the Individual'' (1923)

After an introduction, Part One follows with four chapters: I. Analytic Psychology; II. The Child; III. The Unconscious; IV. Dream, Phantasy, and Symbolism. Part Two has chapters on these subjects: V. Psychological types, VI. Masculine and feminine, VII. The artist, VIII. Reintegration of the individual, IX. Spiritual life.

Psychotherapy practice in New York City

On her 1915 return to New York, she not only translated Jung and wrote her book and articles, Dr. Hinkle resumed her medical practice. Notable therapy patients included Margaret Naumberg and her sister Florence Cane, who both later became educators and wrote on art therapy. "Beatrice Hinkle one of the leading female psychoanalytic therapist in New York City".
Among her analysands was the poet James Oppenheim, who later became a lay analyst. Oppenheim dedicated a book of poetry to Jung and Hinkle. He also published several popular books on Jungian psychology.

Later writings on psychology and gender

Dr. Hinkle thought that one of the most attractive parts of Jung's theories was referred to the relief for those in revolt against the repressive character of the patriarchal society that under girded Freud's worldview. In this aspect, Jung proposed that the mother is the real dominant figure in the child's life and not the father as proposed by Freud. This also allowed for a break with the masculine dominance of Freudian psychology without blurring the traditional distinctions between masculine and feminine psychosexual roles. About this particular Jung's assertion, Dr. Hinkle expressed: "Jung's development of this point of view shows very clearly that, just as the problem of the father is the great fact of Freud's psychology, the problem of the mother is the essence of Jung's, with the struggle carried on between the two great forces of love and power". Thus Jung's consideration of the female psyche as independent from males, attracted the admiration of Dr. Hinkle in such degree that she became the official translator of his work in America.
Hinkle was a member of the Greenwich Village based feminist network, the Heterodoxy Club, lending credence to the group by being the only professionally trained and practicing psychoanalyst. It was as a member of this group that she began writing, including occasional contributions to 'Progressive Education Survey' and Harper's Magazine. Her themes included women's rights, women's suffrage, and issues of divorce, individualism, and legal status. She wrote often of the need for women to liberate themselves from what she called the "psychic bondage" of women to men.

Primary

;Translation
;Book
  • Hinkle, The Re-Creating of the Individual.
;Selected articles
  • Hinkle, , in Psychotherapy 2/16-17.
  • Hinkle, in New York Medical Journal.
  • Hinkle, "A study of Psychological Types" in The Psychoanalytic Review, vol. IX, no.4.
  • Hinkle, in Our Changing Morality: A Symposium, edited by Freda Kirchwey.
  • Hinkle, "The Chaos of Modern Marriage", in Harper's Magazine.
  • Hinkle, "Marriage in the New World", in The Book of Marriage, edited by Hermann von Keyserling.
  • Hinkle, "Woman's Subjective Dependence Upon Man", in Harper's Magazine.
  • Hinkle, in These Modern Women: Autobiographical Essays from the Twenties, edited by Elaine Showalter.

Secondary

;Books
  • C. G. Jung, Psychology of the Unconscious. A study of the transformation and symbolism of the Libido.
  • C. G. Jung, Symbols of Transformation.
  • C. G. Jung, Psychologische Typen.
  • C. G. Jung, C. G. Jung Speaking. Interviews and encounters.
  • John Kerr, A Most Dangerous Method. Jung, Freud, and Sabina Spielrein.
  • Clarence J. Karier, Scientists of the Mind. Intellectual founders of modern psychology.
  • Robert McHenry, Famous American Women. A bibliographic dictionary.
  • Sonu Shamdasani, Jung and the Making of Modern Psychology.
  • Jay Sherry, The Jungian strand in transatlantic modernism.
  • Gerhard Wehr, Jung. A biography.
;Articles
  • C. G. Jung, "A contribution to the study of Psychological Types" , as Appendix 1 in Psychological Types. CW, v.6.
  • William McGuire, "Introduction" in Jung.
  • Anne O'Hagan, in Woman Citizen, v.12, p.47.
  • Constance Long, "Review of Beatrice Hinkle, 'A study of psychological types'", in British Journal of Psychology 2/4, 229-233.
  • Jay Sherry, “Beatrice Hinkle and the Early History of Jungian Psychology in New York”, in Behavioral Science, 3/3: 492–500
  • Jay Sherry, "Jung, Hinkle, and Teller, the New York Times reporter" in Jung in the Academy and beyond, edited by Mattson, Wertz, Fogarty, Klenck, and Zabriskie.
  • Eugene I. Taylor, "Foreward" in Jung.
  • Kate Wittenstein, "The feminist uses of psychoanalysis: Beatrice M. Hinkle and the foreshadowing of modern feminism", in Journal of Women's History, 10/2.
  • Book review, in The New York Times.