The long-awaited publication of C.G. Jung’s Red Book in October, 2009 was a signal event in the history of analytical psychology. Hailed as the most important work in Jung’s entire corpus, it is as enigmatic as it is profound. Reading The Red Book by Sanford L. Drob provides a clear and comprehensive guide to The Red Book’s narrative and thematic content, and details The Red Book’s significance, not only for psychology but for the history of ideas.
Reviews:
„Drob writes with the heart of a spiritual seeker and the mind and eye of a scholar… Reading The Red Book, along with his earlier work, has established him as an important and unique voice in Jungian scholarship.”
„Sanford Drob has provided us with an indispensable guide to the structure and function, the purpose and meaning of Jung’s hidden masterpiece: this lucid commentary will surely establish itself as the inevitable starting-point of Red Book interpretation for many years to come.”
„An outstanding map to guide the reader through the labyrinth of associations, images, and thoughts contained in Jung’s Red Book. Drob locates its innumerable themes within an historical context of classical, modern, and postmodern philosophy, connects Jung’s ideas with his later works, and elucidates Jung’s unique contribution to Western thought. Reading The Red Book is a work of exploration that serves as a companion to any reader who wishes to fathom the secrets of Jung’s most enigmatic work.”
„In this essential companion to Jung’s Red Book, Drob tracks the path of Jung’s psychological wrestlings, placing those struggles within the broader tradition of philosophical, theological, and mystical thought. In this way the reader is privileged access to witness not only the astonishing raw, bloody, personal birthing of Jung’s ideas—but then also to be led into more tranquil areas for reflection. Drob’s comments as well as thematic groupings aid one in imagining those squirming offspring into realms with implications both practical as well as ideological. This book is clear, intelligent and helpful—truly a must read for those who dare cross the Red Book portal.”
„…a much needed antidote to the perilous times in which we live where our political, economic, educational and environmental practices are in dire need of the soul’s perspective.”
Sanford L. Drob is on the Core Faculty in Clinical Psychology at Fielding Graduate University in Santa Barbara, California. His most recent books are Kabbalah and Postmodernism: A Dialog and Kabbalistic Visions: C. G. Jung and Jewish Mysticism (Spring Journal Books, 2010).
See author’s blog: „The Red Book of C. G. Jung”
Tags: Jung, Red Book, Sanford Drob
