The Red Book (Jung)

In 1957, near the end of his life, Jung spoke to Aniela Jaffé about the Red Book and the process which gave rise to it. In that interview he stated:

The years... when I pursued the inner images, were the most important time of my life. Everything else is to be derived from this. It began at that time, and the later details hardly matter anymore. My

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Biographers and critics have disagreed whether these years in Jung's life should be seen as "a creative illness", a period of introspection, a psychotic breakdown or simply as a period of madness.[7] Anthony Storr, reflecting on Jung's own judgment that he was "menaced by a psychosis" during this time, concluded that the period represented a psycho... See more

Jung referred to his imaginative or visionary venture during these years as "my most difficult experiment".[14] This experiment involved a voluntary confrontation with the unconscious through wilful engagement of what Jung later termed "mythopoetic imagination".[15][16]

In December 2012, Norton additionally released a "Reader's Edition" of the work; this smaller format edition includes the complete translated text of The Red Book along with the introduction and notes prepared by Sonu Shamdasani, but it omits the facsimile reproduction of Jung's original calligraphic manuscript.[1]

While the work has in past years ... See more

"To the superficial observer, it will appear like madness."