Customer Reviews

Jung (Past Masters)

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Let me start to mention that I am not a social scienticst myself; my impression was that Jung is considered as someone who introduced many breakthrough concepts in psychology, but is also being 'hyped'. Therefore I was looking for a few books that would give me a proper (= not too appreciative, but scientifically objective) introducton to Jung and his ideas.

First I read Calvin Halls "A Primer of Jungian Psychology", but I found that book difficult to read. At the end I was unable to summarize Jungs ideas for myself. For me this is always a good test whether or not a book has had any impact on me. A year later I came accross the VSI by Anthony Stevens. Perhaps, reading Hall prepared me, but I found the VSI book very good.

What I like in particular about the VSI book is:
- it seems rather objective to me (i.e. maintaining a somewhat critical undertone)
- it now and then openly acknowledges that Jungs approach was rather non-mainstream, sometimes against-the-stream. Allowing the reader to make up his own mind.
- its division into well organised chapters helps the reader to progress through the book and look up things afterwards.

I also missed a few things:
- Stevens emphasizes Jungs goal to develop a psychology aimed at "personal growth and development". In this context, I would be very interested to see a comparison with the ideas of Viktor Frankl. After all, one cannot discuss existential psychology without mentioning Frankl.
- I would have liked to see more material included about the present day status of Jungs ideas: since I am not a psychologist myself, I wonder to what extent Jungs ideas are still upheld today. Especially all his ideas about dreams: to me this seems difficult to test scientifically.

Summary: easy to read book, after finishing it I have the impression I learned a lot. I recommend it.

This is probably the best introduction to Jung on the market. It is simple, concise, and VERY reader-friendly. It is very current as well including a short introduction to all the major aspects of his work and life. I can't recommend this one highly enough!

The task of creating a concise, well-rounded, and very readable introduction to life and teachings of Carl Jung seemed impossible to me until I read this book. This book is a true work of love written by someone intimately familiar with the subject. This is not surprising, considering that Anthony Stevens is a practicing psychiatrist and Jungian analyst who wrote several good books on the subject as he has been developing ideas of Carl Jung in the last thirty-plus years.
If you need an excellent short introduction to Jungian thought, look no further.

One cannot cover everything authoratatively in this series, but I think that the main goal is to stimulate further reading and interest in Jung and his works. This book succeeds.

Having read a lot of Jung in my early 20s I thought that it would be merely a review read, a sort of re-primer of my existing knowledge, which was, I must admit, clouded with a notion that Jung was little more than an interesting anti-rationalist, or -- at worst --- a dedicated metaphysician.

I was wonderfully reminded that even as Jung taps into things that are commonly regarded a perhaps a little flaky by those students of modern science, he always seems to raise a question of central relevance to humanity. It is these questions and his never ending quest to probe them --- not solve them --- that reminded me of why I was interested in this man in the first place.

A stimulating read.

A professional with no training in psychology, yet long fascinated by Jung. fluent in German, having read Jung's Memories Dreams & Reflections several times, possessing his collected works and having read a substantial portion of them, I picked up this little book wondering what it could tell me and was amazed at the author's superb job of comprehensively summarizing, sympathetically yet critically, and very clearly and readably Jung's life and his work in what is but an evening's read. I learned things I didn't know and gained something from the bird's-eye view. This book is a tour de force. Hats off!

For a layman like myself nevertheless interested by what I'd heard about the ideas of Jung this was just the ticket. Written with warmth and personality, this is an excellent overview of Jung's major ideas which gives you an insight into the character and content of his theories as well as the man himself. Stevens is obviously a Jungian himself but this is an acceptable slant for a book on Jung. It really brings Jung to life compassionately and provides food for thought on a wide range of topics beyond the obvious. Concise, lucid and entertaining.

The original works of Jung are vast, magmatic, extremely creative, and rather confusing. A lot of the confusion comes from Jung's poor choice of terminology and definitions.

This introduction, on the other hand, is simple, decently precise and sufficiently complete. While the number of pages is less than 200, the reader should be cautioned that they are quite densely typed. Therefore the book is only short if compared with the enormity of the Jungian corpus.

The author does a good job in depicting the complex, omnivorous personality of Jung, as well as the richness of his thought. Some quite interesting parts, like the metaphysical implications of his theories are only treated en passant. There is then a certain effort in putting down somehow precisely and schematically the most technical parts, as the archetypes, the shadow, the personae and so on.

In popular culture the departure of Jung from Freud is generally viewed as a (quite reasonable) rejection of the overwhelming importance Freud attributes to sexuality. I think Dr. Stevens makes i good job in showing that Jungian thought is not just an evolution of the Freudian one, or a sort of reasonable correction of Freud's extreme positions: it documents well the complete difference in approach of the two.

To Freud man is deeply negative at his core, being driven by unmentionable pulsions, incompatible with religion, morals, society; its psychology depicts man as the result of a strain between a horrific unconscious and the persona needed in everyday life. Jung's approach is much more positive, and proposes the human being as driven toward happiness as the full realization of the Self, of which he is just a particular manifestation.

The author explains well how Jung is conscious of the different anthropological origin of these two approaches, and uses Jung's distinction between "aryan" and "jewish" psychology to discuss to what extent Jung was indeed anti Semitic.

Overall a good introduction for the layman. As such it is less concerned with the practical/clinical theories/techniques, and more in investigating the weltanshaung from which they originate.

I found this short volume to be an excellent introduction to the world of Jungian psychology. It starts off with a brief biography, since Jung's experiences had a great influence on his way of thinking. Then it gets into some of Jung's key concepts such as archtypes, psychological types, and dreams. Of particular interest is his views on therapy. He deeply disliked the clinical sterility of psychoanalysis, and favored a more person-to-person style of therapy. In this he stressed the involvement of the therapist with the patient--therapy as a two-way process between equals. It is this sense of warmth that makes Jung's ideas attractive. He allows for a more social approach to psychology. For those who haven't read about Jung before and would like a brief introduction, this book is perfect.

I'll pile on with what everyone else has said. I read this one and the VSI to Freud and they're both excellent......and a nice pair to read in sequence. Everything you probably want to know about Jung is here and it's all explained very clearly. A truly fascinating character and a great book.

Books in the 'Very Short Introduction' series almost always do a solid job of introducing their topic. Some, however, do it better than others - and this particular volume, about the important 20th-century psychiatrist and philosopher Carl Jung (1875-1961) is one of the better in the series.

Anthony Stevens, himslf a respected Jungian, gives a relatively thorough overview of Jung's life, and then proceeds to examine important topics of Jung's thought in depth - topics such as the collective unconscious, dreams, and psychological types.

Interestingly, the book also features a chapter on "Jung's alleged anti-Semitism" - a chapter which is a bit too defensive.

All in all, this book is clear, lucid, and accessible, although occasionally the author has a tendency to rely a bit too heavily on psychoanalysis when discussing the issues, for example by saying that "Those who continue to press [anti-Semitic] accusations against Jung... [may] have not worked sufficiently on their own repressed Fascist, anti-Semitic, or anti-Christian shadows." Also, he occasioanlly reverts to overly technical language. Some bias appears because the author is a Jungian analyst, but it doesn't really detract from the value of the book.

Still, a solid work, one of the few really accessible introductions to Jung, strongly recommended.