Born in 1856, Freud struggled with poverty and with his own identity, emerging as a young "nerve doctor" of great ambition and little restraint. The question of whether his theories and therapies were truly derived from objective study has tainted his legacy with accusations of recklessness and pseudoscience.

Tentatively anchored in the study of dreams, astrology, hypnosis, electrical flows, and hysteria, Freud's practice relied perhaps more on his own inventiveness and idiosyncratic interpretations than on empirical evidence.

Ferris's life of Freud reveals the full scope of the doctor's strength and fallibility. He writes of Freud's obsessive interest in sexual frustration, noting the context of Freud's own passionless marriage. He recounts the young physician's advocacy of cocaine as a miracle drug, without neglecting his regret at learning of its sorrowful consequences.

He presents the many aspects of this complex soul: the charismatic personality, the persistent superstitions and neuroses, the vindictive temper and willful self-confidence, and finally, the quiet strength of a man enduring chronic pain and disfigurement from the cancer that eventually killed him.