The Red Book

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(5 stars) - a unique work of art, literature and psychology
For a three-part, full length report (with images) on this book and the exhibit which features the original copy at the Rubin Museum of Art in NYC, please see [...].

Jung repeatedly rejected the idea that the "Red Book" was an artistic product - either literary or visual. He insisted that his journey through his unconscious was that of a psychologist, and that working through his visions and the meaning of the symbols in them would result in a new understanding of psychotherapy.

The psychiatry of his time, he believes, was incapable of distinguishing between deeply spiritual experiences and psychopathology. He, on the other hand, believed it imperative to utilize the terrors and beauties of his self-induced spiritual visions and integrate them into consciousness. His "journey" into self, his "journaling" of it, and his belief that the individual had the means to cure him or herself from within thus became the model not only for a psychotherapy of self-realization (Jung called it "individuation") but for much of the New Age literature in our bookstores.

(5 stars) - Long Awaited Wonders ....
Other reviewers have described this marvel, so I'll spare future readers from repeated verbiage.

I began reading Jung over 20 years ago when I was in undergraduate. It was Jung's works that inspired me to move from studying business to learning psychology ... (and what a long, strange trip that experience has been!) I've been making my living as a counselor for over 15 years now.

In all the time I studied Jung, the Red Book was something that Jungians whispered existed, but no one (whom I spoke to anyway) had ever seen it.

This is a wonderful book that was clearly lovingly and carefully written by one of the greatest thinkers of the 20th century. I'm very excited by its publication, as I truly did not think it would be published in my lifetime (if ever).

So ... many thanks to everyone who was involved in bringing this book to print, and to the heirs of Jung for allowing the Red Book to be printed!

Judging from the reviews, several other reviewers apparently read the Red Book quite quickly.

I prefer to savor it and read it slowly. The parts I've read have been amazing. I'm blogging about my journey through the Red Book here:

[...]

If you are at all interested in Jung's word, this book is a must read.

Highly recommended.

Tim Warneka
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(5 stars) - deeply fascinating
How can i possibly review this book, was my first thought, and it still is. I decided to do so anyway, because i think it might bring something to the table.
The book is huge, the imagery alone would take a tremendous amount of time to study. These things contribute to a certain "wow" effect that needs to settle before one begins reading the actual text, or, well at least in my case, even think of doing a review of the book.

So here we are: The book itself. The first's part of the book contains a preface by Ulrich Hoerni Followed by Jung's artwork and calligraphy presented as an original re production of Liber Novus. At the back of the book is the translation, which I think is very well done, I should say I do read German, but I'm in no way a professional translator. The book is devided into liber primus and liber secundus and scrutines which contain an entry of black book 5 (bare with me but I'm gonna quote Sonu Shamdasani from a Harpers magazine article instead of explaining the black books myself:
"To begin with, one must clearly differentiate Jung's Black Books, in which he initially wrote his fantasies together with reflections on his mental states, from Liber Novus. The former were records of a self-experiment, while the latter drew in part on these materials to compose a literary and pictorial work."

So is there a "before and after the red book" which has been state before. I cant say, I don't think anyone can for sure. After reading the book I had a lot of AHA! moments contributing to a better understanding of some of Jung's other works. The book has given me a much much clearer image of Jung as a person, but that image is inheritably flawed, simply because I did not know Jung. So weather or not the book, takes away from Jung's image, or adds to it, is in the end, not really that interesting.
The book is more straightforward in its text then many of Jung's academic works and as such is easier to read. The concept though, is far from straightforward and might take a lot longer to absorb then the usual academic material from Jung.

(5 stars) - Extraordinary
In 1913, a 40 year old world renowned psychologist suffers recurring dreams and visions of world catastrophe. His expertise as a psychiatrist working with incurable psychotics forces him to conclude that he is on a course to madness. His training as a scientist compels him to meticulously document what he imagines will be his unavoidable decline into insanity. With the outbreak of World War I, he experiences relief in the realization that the images that have haunted him over the prior ten months pictured not his own undoing, but that of the world. As the outer conflict unfolds, he continues to record the process unfolding within his own psyche, which is reflective of the events in the larger collective. He continues the process until near the War's end, and then spends more than a decade devotedly elaborating, amplifying and illustrating the material that burst upon him during that time in order to render it comprehensible.

The Red Book is not "personal" as we use that word now. It is "personal" in the sense that it details one individual's very unique experience of coming into relationship with what Jung termed the Self, and in prior times was referred to as God, but it is at the same time very impersonal, and actually universal, in cataloguing the drama inherent in any person's formation of that relationship. The book is at home with The Odyssey, The Divine Comedy, Goethe's Faust, and, as much as anything, The Red Book is Jung's response to Thus Spoke Zarathustra and to Nietzsche's proposition that for modern man, God is dead. The response is that God is neither dead nor to be found in outer religious, national or political containers, but is to be discovered and struggled with in the living of each individual life.

A not uncommon dream is of stumbling upon a previously unknown addition or wing of one's dwelling, which addition is found to be many, many times the size of the existing structure, and to contain objects and treasures of previously unimaginable value, interest and numinousity. One is filled with awe and wonder at the new found wealth and possibilities. The experience of encountering The Red Book after spending 30 years in Jung's existing body of work is equally stupefying. That there could be so much more that Jung had to share and communicate about the human soul seems not just improbable, but impossible. Yet The Red Book is that much, much larger, more nuanced and tremendously numinous structure that is behind, under, around and the foundation for all of Jung's subsequent ideas, theories, publications and works. Extraordinary.

(5 stars) - An Encounter with Mana
I finished the Red Book last night. It is a magnificent book of power. Here, you will find a side of the chameleon Jung that cannot be found in any of his Collected Works, his published Seminars, or his published Letters (all of which I have read). The only book that sometimes points, tonally, in this direction is Memories, Dreams, Reflections. The Red Book unleashes Jung the Poet, Jung the Painter, Jung the Prophet, and Jung the Shamanic Explorer and Revealer of the depths. Combined with his previously published oeuvre, the Liber Novus demonstrates the remarkably large personality that Jung was, and his cultural importance for our time.

My first impression in browsing the book, examining the vividly detailed art work and calligraphy was that the Red Book is reminiscent of the Book of Kells, or medieval Islamic or Christian Illuminated Manuscripts. As a previous reviewer mentioned, this book has a Presence. It generates a circle of energy, a power that can't be missed. It renews a respect for the printed book, so long second nature to educated humans, which can be forgotten in this age of digital media. The dust jacket has a sort of cheap look and feel, so I immediately was a bit put off; however, the quality of the pages, the color and vividness of the art work and the printing left me amazed that the Philemon Foundation could sell the book at the price they do and hope to make a profit.

Jung's words answer many questions about the development of his personality, his psychology and Active Imagination. Shamdasani's Introduction is outstanding in places, answering other questions and providing very helpful background; in other places it is superficial and some of his statements about Jung's psychology are dubious. It is more effective as an Epilogue than an Introduction, as it sets the wrong tone for this remarkable exploration of the Unconscious. The included Notes (translator and editorial) are interesting but written in high Academese; they feel a bit out of place. Still, Shamdasani, and all those involved, have achieved a tremendous opus, themselves, in releasing this buried treasure.

The Red Book demonstrates, in magnificent, poetic words, and breathtaking, unforgettable imagery, nothing less than the Process of Self-transformation, of Individuation. As Jung says, "the supreme meaning is the path, the way and the bridge to what is to come." In this Book of Mana, Jung reveals that process of creating/finding/building the New Path/Way/Bridge.

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