This a must book for starting to read Jungian Psychology. This first copy ends with detailed note and index and credit for hundreds of illustrations and dozens of photographers. John Freeman's Introduction tells the story of how this book was put together and how the section authors were chosen, and much of the input was under Jung's supervision the last year of his life.

This was a fascinating work to thumb through and look for ideas that resonated.
I read a small paperback version, so the figures were not high quality. ( )

Jung examines the full world of the unconscious, whose language he believed to be the symbols constantly revealed in dreams. Convinced that dreams offer practical advice, sent from the unconscious to the conscious self, Jung felt that self understanding would lead to a full and productive life.

Interesting for writers and artists but how these ideas are supposed to help anyone in pain is beyond me.

This is a popular account of Jung’s psychological theories, centred on symbolism. This includes chapters on the Unconscious and Collective Unconscious, its links to mythology, the process of Individuation, and psychological symbols in the arts, and in psychoanalysis. This was written and edited by him when he was near the end of his career, together with four of his disciples who have contributed full chapters.
Unlike his academic works, this is written more for a wide audience, with each chapter here condensing the work of one or more his separate full-length books. For this reason it cannot but help leaving out a lot of the painstaking research that he has done to back up his theories, and presents the findings more on trust. Though there are illustrations throughout from both case histories and research findings, I do not think that these on their own would be sufficient to convince the reader of the credibility of Jung’s theories, were they not already familiar with his longer more detailed works. For a summary however, this book covers a huge breadth of Jung’s work, and does a pretty good job of conveying its importance.
As Jung’s theories touch on so many aspects of life, from art, to dreams, to mythology, mental illness, personal development, and the events of everyday life, this can’t help but being an interesting book. One problem with Jung is that he can sometime come-across as a being a bit mystic, and this reading is not helped in this book where the work is condensed and there is less scope for qualifying terms with scientific precision. I would however still recommend it to those interested in psychology, art, or mythology. ( )

Very accessible read for those unfamiliar with Jung however long and fine print. ( )

Inspirado por um sonho do autor e concluído apenas dez dias antes de sua morte, este livro constitui uma tentativa de expor os princípios fundamentais da análise junguiana para o leitor, sem qualquer obrigatoriedade de conhecimento especializado de psicologia. Enriquecido por mais de 500 ilustrações, O Homem e Seus Símbolos, é um livro destinado a todos que se interessam pelo tema. ( )

This collection of essays was designed by Jung to introduce his work to lay people. Evidently all his other work is very technical.

I've long thought that Jungian psychology was at best an misguided effort to understand the role of culture on the individual and at worst a crock. Reading here about the analysis of the dreams of several women where the analyst steers them into roles determined for them by a masculine elite, I've decided it really is a crock.

If you still find meaning in 20th century psychological thinking and want to get your life to conform to a Western, middle class standard of "good," you will probably find a lot of interesting material in this book. Otherwise, give it a miss. ( )

This ranks as one of the most interesting nonfiction books I've read. Jung's theories and capabilities to generalize across cultures and through time are nothing short of astounding.

Much of this information is so dense that it gave me the feeling of learning something and being influenced without being able to list out general principles.

The illustrations throughout help to strengthen the variety of arguements which are developed and the through-line of counterpoint with Freudian thought creates a nice synergy.

Substance: Jung and his compatriots explain his theories for the non-professional. I find the reasoning about dreams being messages from the subconscious to be circular, regardless of whether or not the theory itself is true. They also go to great lengths to avoid dragging God into the conversation, especially as a possible source of the dreams.
NOTES:
p.p. Jung's four criteria of types of human behavior: "sensation tells you that something exists; thinking telly you what it is; feeling tells you whether it is agreeable or not; and intuition tells you whence it comes and where it is going."
Analyst's mut honor the dreamer's own opinions."...it is more important in therapy for the patient to understand than for the analyst's theoretical expectations to be satisfied. The patient's resistance to the analysts' interpretation is not necessarily wrong; it is rather a sure sign that something does not "click." Either the patient has not yet reached the point where he understands, or the interpretation does not fit."
p. 85 (by ___) "The communits world...has one big myth... It is the time-hallowed archetypal dream of a Golden Age (or Paradise) where everything is provided in abundance for everyone, and a great, just, and wise chief rules over a human kindergarten....We even support it by our own childishness, for our Western civilization is in the grip of the same mythology...(do not say it too loudly) in the Kingdom of God on Earth."
--> the error is in the idea of elite rulers over kindergarteners; God wants us all to grow up and rule over ourselves in righteousness, which will bring about the desired Paradise without compulsion over others, because they are Grown-Ups as well.
"The sad truth is that man's real life consists of a complex of inexorable opposites -- day and night, birth and death, happiness and misery, good and evil. We are not even sure that one will prevail against the other, that good will overcome evil, or joy defeat pain. Life is a battlegrond. It alwasy has been, and always will be; and if it were not so, existence would come to an end."
--> see Alma et al.
p. 255 (by ___) on Nietzsche and Kandinsky, in re the "God is dead" expression of the "dreadful void" of Chirico. This metaphysical idea found expression in the 19th-century poets and 20th -century art. "The cleavage between modern art and Christianity was finally accomplished."
--> abetted by the Smithsonian, National Gallery of Art, NEA, etc.
p.308-309 (by___) parallels of psychology and physics: William James compared the idea of an unconscious to the field concept;
in re flashes of inspiration of scientists: "...our conscious representations are sometims ordered (or arranged in a pattern) before they become conscious to us."
--> Junginas believe that the primordial or collective unconscious contains information we don't consciously process, and so do our individual psyches. In what way would the above look different from genuine revelation or even ESP?
"...rather than ask why something happened (i.e., what caused it), Jung asked: What did it happen for?"
in re the parallelisms of ideas, Jung postulated a unitarian idea of reality "within which matter and psyche are not discriminate or separately actualized)."
--> "spirit is matter, only more refined" according to Joseph Smith ( )

Here are some of Carl Jung's most advanced theories: This anthology of essays by Jung and his colleagues yields great insights into Jung's school of depth psychology and the psychology of archetypes. This is a must read for any magician and other workers of the mind. One of the later essays reports the revelation that the visions of certain attuned minds answer to some of the images of the quantum realm drawn from experiments in quantum physics. Consciousness is a quantum phenomenon expanded to the human scale of size by the central nervous system.

Very interesting collection of writings about archetypical symbology and psychology. ( )

If anthropology is the study of what it means to be human, we may consider Jung as much an anthropologist as a formative psychologist, for he does well to remind us unabashedly of what man truly is – a thinking animal, but a chthonic animal nonetheless. Though we may like to think otherwise, civilized man is not so different from archaic man. “Thoughts … are a relatively late discovery of man,” he stresses, and yet, as Joseph Campbell points out, “consciousness thinks it’s running the shop. But [in fact] it's a secondary organ of a total human being, and it must not put itself in control. It must submit and serve the humanity of the body.” The “human body represents a whole museum of organs, each with a long evolutionary history behind it.” Truly, “Modern man is in fact a curious mixture of characteristics acquired over the long ages of his mental development. This mixed-up being is the man and his symbols that we have to deal with.”

Contemporary man “is blind to the fact that, with all his rationality and efficiency, he is [still] possessed by powers that are beyond his control. His gods and demons have not disappeared at all; they have merely got new names. They keep him on the run with restlessness, vague apprehensions, psychological complications, an insatiable need for pills, alcohol, tobacco, food -- and above all, a large array of neuroses.” In other words, “What we call civilized consciousness has steadily separated itself from the basic instincts. But these instincts have not disappeared. They have simply lost their contact with our consciousness and are thus forced to assert themselves in an indirect fashion.”

In short, our intimacy with the total psyche has been an unfortunate jetsam of evolved society. But Jung points out, “As a plant produces its flower, so [we know] the psyche creates its symbols. Every dream is evidence of this process.” Thus, through these symbols, through these echoes of the unconscious, we can again come to know and relate to the whole Self. Cultivating a relationship with these symbols means becoming more familiar with the unknown parts of one’s Self (and also with the selfsame struggles of ancient man). Jung reminds us that “the study of individual, as well as of collective, symbolism is an enormous task”, but with his help we find ourselves much closer to accomplishment. ( )

The first essay (Jung's) was much more interesting than the others, which I found a bit too academic. ¡ ( )

http://aras.org/ - a useful site with images, and interpretation, based on Jung's visual archetypes. ( )

from the Helen B. Landgarten Memorial Library

Più una copia edito da Longanesi, non illustrato, ( )