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There are two distinct ways in which to deal with genius and the works of genius: The old and the new.

The old method may be characterized as the descriptive. It is, generally speaking, negative. It occupies itself mainly with the conscious motives and the external phases of the artist and his life and gives a more or less literal interpretation of his creation. From an historical point of view the descriptive method has its own peculiar value; from the psycho-analytic viewpoint it is less meritorious, since it adds but little, if anything, to the deeper understanding of the creative mind.

The new or interpretative method is based on psychology. It is positive. It deals exclusively with man’s unconscious motivation as the source and main-spring of works of art of whatever kind and independent of time and locality. Thus while the descriptive method accepts at its face value the work of genius, the new or psychoanalytic method penetrates into the lower strata of the Unconscious in order to find the key to the cryptic message which is indelibly though always illegibly written in large letters on every work of art.

Gustaf Uddgren’s Strindherg The Man (En ny bok om Strindberg) is not a psycho-analytic interpretation of Strindberg in the true sense of the term. It is rather descriptive with a strong analytic tendency. As a matter of fact, it contains a number of elements of such general