Hermann Rorschach

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Hermann Rorschach
Hermann Rorschach
Born	8 November 1884 Zurich
Died	1 April 1922 Herisau
Nationality	Swiss
Fields	psychiatry, psychometrics
Known for	Rorschach inkblot test
Influences	Eugen Bleuler

Hermann Rorschach (German pronunciation: [herman roːrʃax]; 8 November 1884 Zurich - 1 April 1922 Herisau) was a Swiss Freudian psychiatrist and psychoanalyst, best known for developing a projective test known, from his name, as the Rorschach inkblot test.

Rorschach spent his childhood and youth in Schaffhausen. He became known to his high school friends as Klecks, or "inkblot" since, like many other young people in his native country, he enjoyed Klecksography, the making of fanciful inkblot "pictures." Unlike his classmates, however, Rorschach would go on to make inkblots his life's work.

Like his father, an art teacher, Rorschach showed great talent at painting and drawing conventional pictures. When it was time for him to graduate from high school, he could not decide between a career in art and one in science. He wrote a letter to the famous German biologist Ernst Haeckel asking his advice. The scientist suggested science, and Rorschach enrolled in medical school at the University of Zurich. At the end of 1913, after graduation, he married Olga Stempelin, from Kazan, Republic of Tatarstan, Russia and the couple moved to live in Russia.^[1] They had a boy born 1917, and a girl born in 1919.

Rorschach studied under the eminent psychiatrist Eugen Bleuler, who had taught Carl Jung. The excitement in intellectual circles over psychoanalysis constantly reminded Rorschach of his childhood inkblots. Wondering why different people often saw entirely different things in the same inkblots he began, while still a medical student, showing inkblots to schoolchildren and analyzing their responses.

By July 1914, Rorschach had returned to Switzerland, where he served as an assistant director at the regional mental hospital at Herisau.^[2]

In 1857 German doctor Justinius Kerne had published a popular book of poems, each of which was inspired by an accidental inkblot and it has been speculated that the book was known to Rorshcach.^[3] French psychologist Alfred Binet had also experimented with inkblots as a creativity test.^[4] In 1921 Rorschach wrote his book Psychodiagnostik, which was to form the basis of the inblot test, but he died the following year of peritonitis, probably brought on by a ruptured appendix.^[5] He was associate director of the Herisau hospital when he died at the age of 37, on April 1, 1922.^[6]

The character Rorschach in Alan Moore's graphic novel Watchmen is based on the Rorschach inkblot test, due to the psychological problems of the character and the distinctive design of his mask.

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Biography from WhoNamedIt.com
• The Hermann Rorschach Archives and Museum, organized by the International Rorschach Society and the publishing company Hans Huber
• Swiss Info bio

Persondata
NAME	Rorschach, Hermann
ALTERNATIVE NAMES
SHORT DESCRIPTION	Freudian psychiatrist
DATE OF BIRTH	8 November 1884
PLACE OF BIRTH	Zurich
DATE OF DEATH	1 April 1922 (37 years old)
PLACE OF DEATH	Herisau