Otto Rank (1884-1939) wrote the present work at the height of his creative powers, betweenWill Therapy andArt and Artist. Here he presents a sweeping history of psychology-individual and social-from the animistic era to psychoanalysis. An earlier translation (by William D. Turner, 1950) was incomplete and somewhat inaccurate. Unlike Sigmund Freud, his mentor, Rank viewed religion with respect and clarifies its role in individual and communal life through this study of soul-belief through the ages. The book contains important insights on immortality, will, dreams, Judaism and Christianity, Hamlet and Don Juan, Jung and Adler, and Freud himself.