THREE ESSAYS ON THE THEORY OF SEXUALITY. The Sexual Aberrations; Infantile Sexuality; The Transformation of Puberty.

First authorised translation in English. Publisher's original blue cloth with gilt titles to the spine, in dustwrapper. A very near fine copy, the binding square and firm with a touch of rubbing and bumping at the spine tips and corners, the cloth and gilt, bright and fresh. The contents, with the ownership name of Valerie Cowie in blue ink at the head of the front endpaper, and a small 'Foyles' paper label to the bottom left corner of the front pastedown, are otherwise clean throughout. One small foxing spot to the fore-edge of the closed text block. Complete with the rubbed and nicked dustwrapper that is toned to the spine and has a single piece of archival tape to the underside of a tiny closed tear at the lower edge of the front panel. Not price-clipped (10/6 to the lower front flap).

The first authorised English translation of Freud's groundbreaking essays on infantile sexuality and human psychosexual development. 'Drei Abhandlungen zur Sexualtheorie' was first published in Vienna in 1905 by Deuticke, with substantially revised and expanded editions appearing in 1910, 1915, 1920, 1922, and 1925. This English translation is based on the author's final revision. The present copy bears the ownership inscription of Valerie Cowie (1924–2023), consultant psychiatrist and a pioneer in psychiatric genetics and the psychiatry of learning disability. She was co-author, with Eliot Slater, of 'Delinquency in Girls' (1968) and 'The Genetics of Mental Disorders' (1971).