Young Sigmund Freud embarked on the strangest scientific adventure of modern times. He dared to explore the unknown region of the human mind . . .

Freud could have been just another doctor, healing sick bodies. But sick minds interested him far more. What caused the tensions and terrors that made people nervous? What lay at the root of tremors, paralysis, hysteria? And could not crippled minds be cured instead of cursed?

Freud found some of the answers in the hospital of Salpetriere, where the broken and mad women of Paris ended their days. Always he listened to the discredited sick who were accused of pretending to be ill. He knew that their illness was very real, and he sought ways to help them.

It wasn't easy. Slowly, painfully, he worked toward the theories that have revolutionized the thinking of our time. Digging deep into the hidden memories of his patients, interpreting the symbolism of their dreams, he was the first to probe and record the mysteries of the unconscious mind. And out of the darkness, psychoanalysis was born.

The medical world was unimpressed. In Vienna, Freud lectured to empty halls. Even his wife thought his ideas were nonsense. His theory of the Oedipus complex was considered shocking. His colleagues were hostile or contemptuous. A few followers left him, and he worked on alone.

This is the fascinating story of a scientist who challenged the terrors of the unconscious mind -- and won. The Nazis burned Freud's books but they couldn't dim the flame of a genius that influenced medicine, psychiatry, education and art. They swept away his life earnings, but he had already earned the respect of a grateful world. In doctors' offices, schoolrooms and hospitals, the conquest of fear had begun. And the man who collected a thousand dreams saw his own come true.

From the dust jacket