Apostle of Freedom: Alfred Adler and His British Disciples

The psychology of Alfred Adler is traditionally considered to be one of the three so-called in-depth or psychoanalytic therapies, the other two being the theories of Sigmund Freud and Carl Gustav Jung. This article demonstrates that Adler's Individual Psychology was especially influential on teachers in Vienna between the two world wars. There exists a fair amount of research into how Adler's ideas were disseminated in the USA, but Adlerian influence in Britain has not yet been thoroughly researched, and this paper gives an account of two, perhaps rather unlikely, advocates of his work. These were the British novelist and political activist, Phyllis Bottome, and her husband Ernan Forbes-Dennis. (Contains 31 footnotes.)