Otto Gross and Else Jaffé and Max Weber
Section one of this article gives the narrative background to the love affair between Otto Gross and Else Jaffe. Otto Gross took Freud's psychoanalytic method in a libertarian direction and he became an influential figure in German anarchist circles shortly before 1914. Else Jaffe was a leading figure in Heidelberg's academic community. Section 2 provides the first complete translation of the Gross-Jaffe letters. Section 3 contrasts the positions of Gross and Max Weber to Nietzsche and comments on Else Jaffe's intermediate role. It was her person that contributed to the development of both men's thinking on the erotic. An appendix provides the transcription of the Gross-Jaffe correspondence in German.