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Christina Puppi
Professor Stephen Barber
English 383
20 March 2015
From Biologism to Intellectualism
As the looming presence of a probable second world war encroached upon Europe, Albert
Einstein wrote a letter to Sigmund Freud, asking him to divulge, from a psychoanalytical
perspective, the answer to this question, Is there any way of delivering mankind from the
menace of war? (The Einstein-Freud Correspondence). This debate intrigued Virginia Woolf
and in 1940, a year into World War II, while bombs were erasing the land and people around her,
she wrote her reply to Freuds argument on Why War?. Woolfs Thoughts on Peace in an Air
Raid, or as it was also titled, Virginia Woolfs Intellectual Call to Arms for Women, is not an
opposing argument to Freuds, as they do not on a whole differ, rather that Woolf takes the basic
themes of Freuds theories and expands upon them.
In answer to Einsteins inquiry concerning the concept of war fevermans
enthusiastic willingness to sacrifice his life, and its relation to human nature, Freud enlists his
studies to explain the core components of human instincts (The Einstein-Freud
Correspondence). From a psychoanalytic standpoint, he says: We assume that human instincts
are of two kinds: those that conserve and unify, which we call erotic and secondly, the
instincts to destroy and kill, which we assimilate as the aggressive or destructive instincts. These
are, as you perceive, the well known opposites, Love and Hate (The Einstein-Freud
Correspondence). Continuing from this argument, he adds that although many consider the two

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instincts to be opposites, they are in fact often alloyed to one another, bounded together as we
are to them. This factor is the beginning of many complications that make the idea of achieving
peace, or the lack of war, appear to be a futile ambition.
One such complication is in regard to the primitive component of human instinct. The
primitive nature allotted to instincts offers human beings a natural excuse for violent actions.
Freud states that the impulse to destroy something, or to exhibit aggression, is conceived from
the instincts to protect oneself. In turn, the basic desire of survival is generated, to which Freud
claims, The death instinct becomes an impulse to destruction the living being, that is to say,
defends its own existence by destroying foreign bodies (The Einstein-Freud Correspondence).
Along with uniting the violent instinct with survival, Freud furthers his argument by including
humanity in the animal kingdom. This link conveys the human primitive condition and that
along with animals, humans cannot detach from the aggressive instinct: it is superior force
brute violence, or violence backed by arms lords it everywhere (The Einstein-Freud
Correspondence). Woolf, however, does not limit humanity to their instincts. In a more
positive and pressing manner, she asserts that intelligence can overpower instinct.
As an air raid transpires above, delivering destruction upon her land, people, and own
life, Woolf delivers a message in response to Freuds reply to Einstein. Where Freud is passive
and pessimistic about the idea of peace, Woolf is assertive and hopeful. Woolf does not dismiss
Freuds theories, but with eagerness she presses upon them. She argues that intelligence is a
force of itself which can be used to combat instinct, and with this, peace can be acted into effect:
we can fight with the mindbut to make ideas effective, we must be able to fire them off. We
must put them into action (Woolf). Peace cannot just remain on a theoretical level, it needs to

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have motion to surge through the instinctual white-waters. Most importantly, and both Woolf and
Freud adhere to, is that the cycle or current of war and fight for peace, need to change direction.
Woolf encourages this by saying, Mental fight means thinking against the current, not with it
(Woolf). The current is a symbol of past and present social concepts that embody a
population. It is also, for Woolf, what she relates to when speaking of instincts. Rather than
continuing from Freuds biological associations with instincts, she attacks them as of being
societal constructs. In the passage, The young airman up in the sky is driven not only by the
voices of loudspeakers; he is driven by voices in himself ancient instincts, instincts fostered
and cherished by education and tradition, the ancient voices are ones operating on a traditional,
historical level. A natural standard society and its leaders illustrated as the blueprint for living.
For Woolf, the individual is acted upon by history and society, and through this assault,
aggressive instincts are triggered into cascading effects.
Complications continue in the campaign for future peace, as Freud takes the primitive
instinct of aggression, and places it within the subconscious. The separation of humans from
their aggressive instinct appears even more improbable; Freud says, it seems that, while the
ideal motives occupied the foreground of consciousness, they drew their strength from the
destructive instincts submerged in the unconscious (The Einstein-Freud Correspondence).
This is a challenging thought since it implies that even if peaceful ideals were attempting to
reign, it is merely a masquerade for the underlying control of aggression. However, if there is a
moment where Freud appears somewhat hopeful, it is in his following statement where he
himself provides a hopeful course of action:Take mans aggression and re-channel it for it
cannot be erased, it is a primal instinctcomplete suppression of mans aggressive tendencies is

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not in issue; what we may try is to divert it into a channel other than that of warfare (The
Einstein-Freud Correspondence). This statement of re-channeling aggression away from
warfare is at the epicenter of Woolfs argument for peace. But, once again, she is not speaking
entirely about the biological cycle, but more so that of society. Woolf wants to break the
propaganda current that societys leaders instill upon its people, in a spate of words from the
loudspeakers and the politiciansevery day they tell us that we are a free people, fighting to
defend freedom (Woolf). Following that passage, Woolf asserts that they as a people are not
free, and to change this a collaborative initiative needs to be taken. She confronts Freuds theory
of the subconscious and the instinctive by insisting, Let us drag up into consciousness the
subconscious Literalism that holds us down, and with it, the desire for aggression; the fires to
dominate and enslave (Woolf). She is asserting that by actively making people aware of their
aggressive desires and bringing this ideology to the foreground, people will not remain prisoner
to their background impulses. Woolf believes in the minds power of invoking a cultural
revolution to deliver a collective strategy in obtaining peace.
For Freud, it appears as a cultural evolution rather than revolution, and he too considered
this a possibility to end war, but he is not convinced that it will come to fruition before disastrous
devastation (as evolution has been deemed a slow process). Yet, what may aid in this dilemma is
the counter-agent of aggression love. Freud says, All that produces ties of sentiment
between man and man must serve us as wars antidote (The Einstein-Freud Correspondence).
Although the concept of a community coming together in a unified cultural evolution seems
unlikely since it appears Utopian, Freuds pessimism is rendered easy with the assurance that
whatever makes for a cultural development is working also against war (The Einstein-Freud

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Correspondence). It is within the community that Woolf enforces her ideas of putting an end to
the cycle of war. Peace, must be thought into existence as a collaborative effort, or all who exist
or will come to exist, will remain in a state of perpetual violence (Woolf). Collective awareness
will help communities maintain peaceful movements. To encourage this, Woolf believes that
once the state of fear leaves the individual,the mind reaches out and instinctively revives itself
by trying to create (Woolf). Creation becomes the effective motion of re-channeling, as Freud
had suggested, to divert the aggressive instinct away from becoming active. The emotions
evoked from thinking of art, places, and friends, are Woolfs weapons to overcome the
psychological destruction of the bombing. She voices, Each of those thoughts, even in memory,
was far more positive, reviving, healing and creative than the dull dread made of fear and hate.
By using her mind, Woolf is able to think peace into existence, even as she is being attacked. For
one individual to be able to achieve a peaceful state in the middle of war by exercising the mind,
an instilled communal practice would be revolutionary.
It would take all facets of humanity to enforce peace, and for Woolf, this means calling
her fellow women to the frontier. This argument is her own, as Freud does not speak of this. In
one of her passages, Woolf describes a common component of war: Up there in the sky young
Englishmen and young German men are fighting each other. The defenders are men, the
attackers are men (Woolf). Women are further suppressed by not being given the equality to
fight against the enemy like the men, nor to defend themselves. Woolf seeks to remind women,
that they are not weaponless, their minds have the ability to break conventional walls, and be a
fighting force. Woolf quotes a Lady Astor who spoke the following passage in The Times,
Women of abilityare held down because of a subconscious Hitlerism in the hearts of men.

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This Hitlerism is the desire for aggression; the desire to dominate and enslave, and Woolf
continues from Lady Astors remark, Certainly we are held down. We are equally prisoners
tonight (Woolf). Woolf is delivering a message to women to stop allowing themselves to be
enslaved. To become aware of the weaponless state theyve consented to, and to take
responsibility for their situation. Through progressive thought, women can use intelligence to
liberate themselves from enslavement, and men from tyranny (Woolf). This progressive thought
must find importance and further action within the youth, as she claims Hitlers are bred by
slaves (Woolf). To keep the aggressive cycle from circling, and to maintain the current of
progressive, peaceful thought, women have the opportunity to further initiate and establish
Woolfs rally.
Woolf has taken Freuds theories and challenged them through progressive and active
thought. She represents the cultural evolution that Freud spoke of, and although he argues that
peace will be attained with great haste, she is a sign that it is in motion. Woolf believes through
active awareness, aggressive subconscious instincts will no longer hinder peaceful conscious
intentions. All human beings have the ability to redirect the social current, and women must unrestrain themselves, and be the outside force in removing men from the cycle of war.

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Works Cited
The Einstein-Freud Correspondence. Public. Arizona State University, n.d. Web. 18 March
2015.
Woolf, Virginia. Virginia Woolfs Intellectual Call to Arms for Women. New Republic. The
New Republic Mag., 27 Aug. 2014. Web. 18 March 2015.