Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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111 of 111 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Crystallized Jung, June 16, 2003
Edited by Joseph Campbell, this 650 page book does a phenomenal job of encapsulating the essence of Dr. Carl Gustav Jung's psychological concepts. The Introduction gives us an overview of Dr. Jung's life and published books which is no small task. The book starts out by describing the functions of the psyche and how it develops from childhood and throughout the lifespan. The role of instinct and the unconcsious are described next. The role of archetypes and the collective unconcsious is given a thorough review. The psychological types: of extraversion and introversion are connected with the feeling, thinking, sensing, and intuitive functions as theorized by Jung. Dream symbolism and alchemy are analyzed in depth. The roles of transcendence, the anima, animus, shadow and synchronicity are examined in the development of the psyche, as man creates meaning in life. This is one of the best introductions to Jungian psychology on the market. It provides a great sampling of his works and simplifies the concepts for the average reader. Most readers will delve further into the vast universe of Jungian psychology immediately after reading just this one book. Erika Borsos (erikab93)
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139 of 141 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
The Portable Jung, January 22, 1999
By A Customer
The introduction to this volume, written by Joseph Campbell, promises that anyone who proceeds through it faithfully from the first page to the last will emerge with a substantial understanding of Analytical Psychology and a new realization of the psychological relevance of mythic lore to his or her psychological development. Having read its nearly 700 pages from the first to the last, I can attest that it has lived up to its promise. The Campbell introduction provides a good overview of Jung's life along with a detailed chronology. The English translation by R. F. C. Hull is very readable; however, Jung's writings are very scholarly and contain a good deal of Latin and Greek. Most of the Latin and Greek is parenthetically translated, but not all. Not being adept at those languages, I found it helpful to have a Latin-English and a Greek-English dictionary available for reference. Although Jung can be very abstruse at times, for the most part his concepts are clearly expressed and supported with concrete examples. The book begins with a selection of works designed to help the novice learn Jung's terminology and basic concepts. After building the appropriate foundation, it then ranges through a cross section of his life's work including the psychological aspects of marriage, personality types, art, dream symbolism, science, religion, and Eastern and Western culture. Jung was first and foremost, an empiricist. He offers no metaphysical theories to explain the psyche, but he takes great pains in documenting and correlating its tremendous variety of conscious and unconscious content. He establishes the reality of the psyche as a whole (conscious and unconscious) on its observable effects. His concepts of the collective unconscious with its archetypal images, the transcendental function, synchronicity, his views on God, and other insights are amazing and engagingly fascinating. He manages to entangle the reader in a bewildering world of arcane images from mythology and alchemy in his dream interpretation sequences. In spite of the natural skepticism one may feel toward the relevance of these unconscious archetypes, it is difficult to avoid the discomfiting feeling that there is, after all, a great deal of relevance there. For anyone wishing to broaden his or her consciousness and understanding of the human psyche, the time and effort needed to purchase the results promised in the introduction is well spent.
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47 of 47 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Adventures in the Human Psyche, April 25, 2003
By A Customer
I am not a psychologist. I am a curious reader who wanted to know more about Jung's psychology. I had not read any of Jung's work before, and now, having read the book, I feel I have a good grasp of Jung's major concepts. Joseph Campbell edits this volume and writes a nice introduction, explaining briefly Jung's major achievements. At the end, he's included an outline of Jung's complete works, which catalogs the amazing fecundity of Jung's mind. I was hoping that Campbell, hero of mythology that he is, would have included some of Jung's mythological work in this book, like a clip from "Symbols of Transformation," but he didn't. What a pity. After Campbell's intro, the book consists of three parts: one focusing on Jung's theory, one on Jung's application of his theory, and the third part contains some curiosities that demonstrate the range of Jung's thinking. (Part I) Introduces Jung's Big Ideas. The collective unconscious; archetypes; the psychological types (introversion/extroversion and all that jazz). Most of this section is easy and stimulating to get through, until you hit the psychological types, which get very technical. If you think about how the types apply in real life to people you know, it makes plowing through Jung's dry descriptions a little easier. (Part II) Jung in action. Campbell gives us a healthy serving of Jung's dream analyses, which I recommend skimming, unless you're really into alchemical symbology. The two essays on contemporary life are still fresh. (Part III) The essay on synchronicity is a mind-bending read, and it makes you suddenly aware of all those little coincidences in life. "An Answer to Job" starts off as a playful, almost Nietzschean essay where Jung performs a psychological deconstruction on the god of the Old Testament. Then it degenerates into a discussion of the psychological development of the idea of god as traced through the Bible, which turns out to be not exciting as it sounds. Even if Jung occasionally crosses the boundary of credibility, you get the sense that he's a true scholar, dedicated first and foremost to seeking the truth. This volume is a good peep into the mind of one of the twentieth century's most daring thinkers exploring the uncharted depths of the human psyche. Another good intro to Jung that's easier to get through is "Man and his Symbols."
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