SOURCE: "Psychoanalyzing Alice," in The Nation, New York, Vol. 144, No. 5, January 30, 1937, pp. 129-30.

Krutch is regarded as one of America's most respected literary and drama critics. A conservative and idealistic thinker, he was a consistent proponent of human dignity and the preeminence of literary art. In the following essay, he rejects Paul Schilder's psychoanalytic reading [reprinted above of the Alice books.]

Most readers of The Nation must have seen in their daily paper some account of the adventures of Alice in the new wonderland of psychoanalysis. Many years ago the late André Tridon undertook to explore the subconscious mind of the same little lady, but Tridon was something of a playboy while Dr. Paul Schilder, research professor of psychiatry at New York University, was presumably in dead earnest when he warned his hearers at a recent meeting of the American Psychoanalytical Society against exposing children to the dangerous...