The Freud/Jung Letters [Abridged] [Paperback]

Sigmund Freud (Author), C. G. Jung (Author), William McGuire (Editor), R. F.C. Hull (Translator), Ralph Manheim (Translator)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0691036438 | ISBN-13: 978-0691036434 | Publication Date: July 11, 1994 | Edition: Abridged

This abridged edition makes the Freud/Jung correspondence accessible to a general readership at a time of renewed critical and historical reevaluation of the documentary roots of modern psychoanalysis. This edition reproduces William McGuire's definitive introduction, but does not contain the critical apparatus of the original edition.

Editorial Reviews

Review

The relationship between Sigmund Freud and C. G. Jung had its bright beginning in 1906 and came to its embittered end in 1913. Its disastrous course was charted by the many letters the two men wrote each other.... In 1970 the Freud and Jung families made the enlightened decision that this correspondence was to be edited as a unit and published.... In no way does it disappoint the large expectation it has naturally aroused. Both as it bears upon the personal lives of the men between whom the letters passed and upon the intellectual history of our epoch, it is a document of inestimable importance. -- Lionel Trilling, The New York Times Book Review

Language Notes

Text: English (translation)
Original Language: German

Product Details

• Paperback: 328 pages
• Publisher: Princeton University Press; Abridged edition (July 11, 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0691036438
• ISBN-13: 978-0691036434
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.4 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #82,865 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #5 in Books > Biographies & Memoirs > People, A-Z > ( F ) > Freud, Sigmund
  • #6 in Books > Biographies & Memoirs > People, A-Z > ( J ) > Jung, Carl
  • #29 in Books > Biographies & Memoirs > Professionals & Academics > Social Scientists & Psychologists

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Archetypal splitting, June 6, 2006

By 

Neal J. Pollock (VA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Freud / Jung Letters: The Correspondence between Sigmund Freud and C.G. Jung (Bollingen Series, No. 94) (Hardcover)

This is an amazing collection of letters which depict the relationship of two of the greatest psychologists of all time. Naturally, there are people who interpret this relationship in different ways, especially as a very specific situation, peculiar to the development of psychology or otherwise. I think otherwise. Life is rarely linear--it's usually Normally Distributed. Things tend to go in cycles, not straight lines. The relationship between Freud the mentor & Jung the mentee is just not that unusual. In fact, it parallels that of every child (especially males stereotypically seeking independence). There comes a time to leave the nest & for the mentee to strike out on his own--just as there is a time for a new paradigm (per Thomas Kuhn's classic, "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions"). This is precisely what occurred between Freud & Jung. It's almost archetypal. There's even something of a parallel between Jung & Father Victor White in Jung's "Letters." This book has some interesting quotes from each of the two psychologists:

By Freud:
p. 119 Take my urgent advice, arm yourself with ill temper against all unreasonable demands.
p. 121 One must try to learn something from every experience.
p. 169 I have long known that one can't change people. Everyone has something worthwhile in him. We must content ourselves with getting it out of him.

By Jung:
p. 84 What people don't know surpasses the imagination, and what they don't want to know is simply unbelievable.
p. 157 one likes human beings around one and not complex-masks.

And, very apropos: p. 462 Emma Jung: it is always the nearest thing that one sees worst.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars LETTERS BETWEEN THE TWO FIGURES OVER THEIR ENTIRE HISTORY, August 16, 2010

By 

Steven H. Propp (Sacramento, CA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Freud/Jung Letters (Paperback)

C.G. Jung was once thought of as Freud's chief disciple. These letters cover the period of 1906 (when Jung sent Freud his Studies in Word Association) until their final "break" in 1914. (There is one additional letter from Jung to Freud from 1923, when Jung was referring a patient to Freud for treatment.)

Here are some representative excerpts:

SF: "The leading lights' of psychiatry really don't amount to much; the future belongs to us and our views, and the younger men---everywhere most likely---side actively with us." (1907)
SF: "I regard (for the present) the role of sexual complexes in hysteria merely as a theoretical necessity and do not infer it from their frequency and intensity. Proof, I believe, is not yet possible." (1907)
CG: "(L)ike Herakles of old, you are a human hero and demi-god, wherefore your dicta unfortunately carry with them a semipiternal value. All the weaker ones who come after you must of necessity adopt your nomenclature, originally intended to fit a specific case." (1909)
SF: "It has occurred to me that the ultimate basis of man's need for religion is infantile helplessness, which is so much greater in man than in animals. After infancy he cannot conceive of a world without parents and makes for himself a just God and a kindly nature, the two worst anthropomorphic falsifications he could have imagined." (1910)
SF: "You mustn't suppose that I ever 'lost patience' with you; I don't believe these words can apply to our relationship in any way. In all the difficulties that confront us in our work we must stand firmly together, and now and then you must listen to me, your older friend, even when you are disinclined to." (1910)
CJ: "My evenings are taken up very largely with astrology. I make horoscopic calculations in order to find a clue to the core of psychological truth." (1911)
CJ: "If you doubt my word, so much the worse for you. I would, however, point out that your technique of treating your pupils like patients is a blunder. In that way you produce either slavish sons of impudent puppies..." (1912)
SF: "I propose that we abandon our personal relations entirely. I shall lose nothing by it, for my only emotional tie with you has long been a thin thread---the lingering effect of past disappointments---and you have everything to gain, in view of the remark you recently made in Munich..." (1913)

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An inside view of two brilliant minds, May 12, 2007

By 

Diane DeArmond "Psych Prof" (Hartford, CT) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Freud/Jung Letters (Paperback)

I loved this book mostly because I have been fascinated by Freud for many years and now I am studying Jung. To have the privilege of reading their letter back and forth is a treat. Also there are insights into current problems that Psychology still grapples over.