More on Karl Abraham's 'Spider'

The Spider Book

George Devereux, writing in Dreams in Greek Tragedy: An Ethno-Psycho-Analytical Study (1976), says:

Citing striking clinical data, Abraham (/) shows that, at times, the longlegged spider's legs are seen as female p*bic hair and the spider's body as the "female p*nis." If, however, the spider lurks inside its web, the cobweb is both the female p*bic hair and the v*gina, while the spider itself (in its net) is the "hidden" female p*nis. (p. 336)

Much of this is clearly nonsense - Freudianism gone hogwild! But I need only show that such links exist - in the minds of some - between spiders and female genitalia, just to make my academic point.

Update: Yes, I've bowdlerized the quote since some might object that kids could too easily stumble upon this brief passage.