''The Red Book: Liber Novus'' is a red leather‐bound folio manuscript crafted by the Swiss psychiatrist
Carl Gustav Jung
Carl Gustav Jung ( ; ; 26 July 1875 – 6 June 1961) was a Swiss psychiatrist and psychoanalyst who founded analytical psychology. Jung's work has been influential in the fields of psychiatry, anthropology, archaeology, literature, philo ...
between 1914 and about 1930. It recounts and comments upon the author's psychological experiments between 1913 and 1916, and is based on manuscripts (journals), known as ''
Black Books
''Black Books'' is a British sitcom created by Dylan Moran and Graham Linehan, and written by Moran, Kevin Cecil, Andy Riley, Linehan and Arthur Mathews. It was broadcast on Channel 4, running for three series from 2000 to 2004. Starring Mo ...
'', first drafted by Jung in 1913–15 and 1917. Despite being nominated as the central work in Jung's oeuvre, it was not published or made otherwise accessible for study until 2009.
In October 2009, with the cooperation of Jung's estate, ''The Red Book'' was published by
W. W. Norton in a
facsimile edition, complete with an English translation, three appendices, and over 1,500 editorial notes. Editions and translations in several other languages soon followed.
In December 2012, Norton additionally released a "Reader's Edition" of the work; this smaller format edition includes the complete translated text of ''The Red Book'' along with the introduction and notes prepared by
Sonu Shamdasani
Sonu Shamdasani (born 1962) is a London-based author, editor in chief, and professor at University College London. His research and writings focus on Carl Gustav Jung (1875–1961), and cover the history of psychiatry and psychology from the mid- ...
, but it omits the facsimile reproduction of Jung's original calligraphic manuscript.
While the work has in past years been descriptively called simply "The Red Book", Jung did emboss a formal title on the spine of his leather-bound folio: he titled the work ''Liber Novus'' (in Latin, the "New Book"). His manuscript is now increasingly cited as ''Liber Novus'', and under this title implicitly includes draft material intended for but never finally transcribed into the red leather folio proper.
Context and composition
Jung was associated with
Sigmund Freud
Sigmund Freud ( , ; born Sigismund Schlomo Freud; 6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for evaluating and treating pathologies explained as originating in conflicts ...
for a period of approximately six years, beginning in 1907. Over those years, their relationship became increasingly bitter. When the final break of the relationship came in 1913, Jung retreated from many of his professional activities to intensely reconsider his personal and professional path. The creative activity that produced ''Liber Novus'' came in this period, from 1913 to about 1917.
Biographers and critics have disagreed whether these years in Jung's life should be seen as "a creative illness", a period of introspection, a psychotic break, or simply madness.
Anthony Storr
Anthony Storr (18 May 1920 – 17 March 2001) was an English psychiatrist, psychoanalyst, and author.
Background and education
Born in London, Storr was educated at Winchester College, Christ's College, Cambridge, and Westminster Hospital. ...
, reflecting on Jung's own judgment that he was "menaced by a
psychosis
Psychosis is a condition of the mind that results in difficulties determining what is real and what is not real. Symptoms may include delusions and hallucinations, among other features. Additional symptoms are incoherent speech and behavior ...
" during this time, concluded that the period represented a psychotic episode.
[ Paul Stern made similar claims in his biography of Jung, ''C. G. Jung: The Haunted Prophet'' ] According to
Sonu Shamdasani
Sonu Shamdasani (born 1962) is a London-based author, editor in chief, and professor at University College London. His research and writings focus on Carl Gustav Jung (1875–1961), and cover the history of psychiatry and psychology from the mid- ...
, Storr's opinion is untenable in light of currently available documentation.
[, pp. 71-3. Shamdasani rebuts the assertions made by both Anthony Storr and Paul Stern about Jung's supposed "psychosis."] Jung himself stated that: "To the superficial observer, it will appear like madness."
It appears that Jung has premeditated the arguments of Storr and (Jung biographer) Paul Stern and, in riposte, declares the analyses of Storr and Stern superficial.
During the years in which Jung engaged with his "nocturnal work" on ''Liber Novus'', he continued to function in his daytime activities without evident impairment. He maintained a busy professional practice, seeing on average five patients a day. He lectured, wrote, and remained active in professional associations. Throughout this period he also served as an officer in the
Swiss army and was on active duty over several extended periods between 1914 and 1918 during
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
.
Jung referred to his imaginative or visionary venture during these years as "my most difficult experiment." This experiment involved a voluntary confrontation with the unconscious through wilful engagement of what Jung later termed "mythopoetic imagination".
In his introduction to ''Liber Novus'', Shamdasani explains:
"From December 1913 onward, he carried on in the same procedure: deliberately evoking a fantasy in a waking state, and then entering into it as into a drama. These fantasies may be understood as a type of dramatized thinking in pictorial form.... In retrospect, he recalled that his scientific question was to see what took place when he switched off consciousness. The example of dreams indicated the existence of background activity, and he wanted to give this a possibility of emerging, just as one does when taking mescaline."
Jung initially recorded his "visions", or "fantasies, or "imaginations"—all terms used by Jung to describe his activity—in a series of six journals now known collectively as the "
Black Books
''Black Books'' is a British sitcom created by Dylan Moran and Graham Linehan, and written by Moran, Kevin Cecil, Andy Riley, Linehan and Arthur Mathews. It was broadcast on Channel 4, running for three series from 2000 to 2004. Starring Mo ...
". This journal record begins on 12 November 1913, and continues with intensity through the summer of 1914; subsequent entries were added up through at least the 1930s. Biographer
Barbara Hannah
Barbara Hannah was born in England. She is well known for her association with Carl Gustav Jung whom she joined in 1929 in Zurich and remained so until his death.
Biography
Hannah began analysis with Jung in 1929. She befriended Joseph L. Hen ...
, who was close to Jung throughout the last three decades of his life, compared Jung's imaginative experiences recounted in his journals to the encounter of
Menelaus
In Greek mythology, Menelaus (; grc-gre, Μενέλαος , 'wrath of the people', ) was a king of Mycenaean (pre- Dorian) Sparta. According to the ''Iliad'', Menelaus was a central figure in the Trojan War, leading the Spartan contingent of th ...
with
Proteus
In Greek mythology, Proteus (; Ancient Greek: Πρωτεύς, ''Prōteus'') is an early prophetic sea-god or god of rivers and oceanic bodies of water, one of several deities whom Homer calls the "Old Man of the Sea" ''(hálios gérôn)''. ...
in the ''
Odyssey
The ''Odyssey'' (; grc, Ὀδύσσεια, Odýsseia, ) is one of two major ancient Greek epic poems attributed to Homer. It is one of the oldest extant works of literature still widely read by modern audiences. As with the ''Iliad'', th ...
.'' Jung, she said, "made it a rule never to let a figure or figures that he encountered leave until they had told him why they had appeared to him."
After the outbreak of World War I in August 1914, Jung perceived that his visionary experience was not only of personal relevance, but entwined with a crucial cultural moment. In late-1914 and 1915 he compiled the visions from the journals, along with his additional commentary on each imaginative episode, into an initial manuscript. This manuscript was the beginning of ''Liber Novus''.
In 1915 Jung began artfully transcribing this draft text into the illuminated calligraphic volume that would subsequently become known as the ''Red Book''. In 1917 he compiled a further supplementary manuscript of visionary material and commentary, which he titled "Scrutinies"; this also was apparently intended for transcription into his red folio volume, the "Red Book". Although Jung labored on the artful transcription of this corpus of manuscript material into the calligraphic folio of the Red Book for sixteen years, he never completed the task. Only approximately two-thirds of Jung's manuscript text was transcribed into the Red Book by 1930, when he abandoned further work on the calligraphic transcription of his draft material into the Red Book. The published edition of ''The Red Book: Liber Novus'' includes all of Jung's manuscript material prepared for ''Liber Novus'', and not just the portion of the text transcribed by Jung into the calligraphic red book volume.
In 1957, near the end of his life, Jung spoke to
Aniela Jaffé
Aniela Jaffé (February 20, 1903 – October 30, 1991) was a Swiss analyst who for many years was a co-worker of Carl Gustav Jung. She was the recorder and editor of Jung's semi-autobiographical book '' Memories, Dreams, Reflections''.
Life
Jaffé ...
about the ''Red Book'' and the process which yielded it; in that interview he stated:
"The years... when I pursued the inner images, were the most important time of my life. Everything else is to be derived from this. It began at that time, and the later details hardly matter anymore. My entire life consisted in elaborating what had burst forth from the unconscious and flooded me like an enigmatic stream and threatened to break me. That was the stuff and material for more than only one life. Everything later was merely the outer classification, scientific elaboration, and the integration into life. But the numinous beginning, which contained everything, was then."
In 1959, after having left the book more or less untouched for about 30 years, Jung wrote a short epilogue: "To the superficial observer, it will appear like madness."
Creation and physical description
![The_Red_Book_-_Liber_Novus](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/63/The_Red_Book_-_Liber_Novus.jpg)
Jung worked his text and images in the Red Book using
calligraphic
Calligraphy (from el, link=y, καλλιγραφία) is a visual art related to writing. It is the design and execution of lettering with a pen, ink brush, or other writing instrument. Contemporary calligraphic practice can be defined as ...
pen, multicolored ink, and
gouache
Gouache (; ), body color, or opaque watercolor is a water-medium paint consisting of natural pigment, water, a binding agent (usually gum arabic or dextrin), and sometimes additional inert material. Gouache is designed to be opaque. Gouache ...
paint. The text is written in German but includes quotations from the
Vulgate
The Vulgate (; also called (Bible in common tongue), ) is a late-4th-century Latin translation of the Bible.
The Vulgate is largely the work of Jerome who, in 382, had been commissioned by Pope Damasus I to revise the Gospels u ...
in Latin, a few inscriptions and names written in Latin and Greek, and a brief marginal quotation from the
Bhagavad Gita given in English.
The initial seven folios (or leaves) of the book—which contain what is now entitled ''Liber Primus'' (the 'First Book') of ''Liber Novus''—were composed on sheets of
parchment
Parchment is a writing material made from specially prepared untanned skins of animals—primarily sheep, calves, and goats. It has been used as a writing medium for over two millennia. Vellum is a finer quality parchment made from the skins o ...
in a highly illuminated medieval style. However, as Jung proceeded working with the parchment sheets, it became apparent that their surface was not holding his paint properly and that his ink was bleeding through. These first seven leaves (fourteen pages, recto and verso) now show heavy chipping of paint, as will be noted on close examination of the facsimile edition reproductions.
In 1915, Jung commissioned the folio-sized and red leatherbound volume now known as the Red Book. The bound volume contained approximately 600 blank pages of paper of a quality suitable for Jung's ink and paint. The folio-sized volume, by , is bound in fine red leather with gilt accents. Though Jung and others usually referred to the book simply as the "Red Book", he had the top of the spine of the book stamped in gilt with the book's formal title, ''Liber Novus'' ("The New Book").
Jung subsequently interleaved the seven original parchment sheets at the beginning of the bound volume. After receiving the bound volume in 1915, he began transcribing his text and illustrations directly onto the bound pages. Over the next many years, Jung ultimately filled only 191 of the approximately 600 pages bound in the Red Book folio. About a third of the manuscript material he had written was never entered into the illuminated Red Book. Inside the book now are 205 completed pages of text and illustrations (including the loose parchment sheets), all from Jung's hand: 53 full-page images, 71 pages with both text and artwork, and 81 pages entirely of calligraphic text.
The ''Red Book'' is currently held, along with other valuable and private items from Jung's archive, in a bank vault in
Zurich.
Publication and display
During Jung's life, several people saw his Red Book—it was often present in his office—but only a very few individuals who were personally trusted by Jung had an opportunity to read it. After Jung's death in 1961, Jung's heirs held the book as a private legacy, and refused access to it by scholars or other interested parties.
After many years of careful deliberations, the estate of C. G. Jung finally decided in 2000 to allow publication of the work, and thereafter began preparations for the publication. The decision to publish was apparently aided by presentations made by Sonu Shamdasani, who had already discovered substantial private transcriptions of portions of the Red Book in archival repositories.
Editorial efforts and preparation for publication were underwritten by major funding from the
Philemon Foundation.
In the United States, on occasion of the publication in October 2009, the
Rubin Museum of Art
The Rubin Museum of Art, also known as the Rubin Museum is a museum dedicated to the collection, display, and preservation of the art and cultures of the Himalayas, the Indian subcontinent, Central Asia and other regions within Eurasia, with a per ...
in New York City displayed the original book along with three of Jung's original "Black Book" journals and several other related artifacts; this exhibit was open from 7 October 2009 to 25 January 2010. The ''Red Book'' was subsequently exhibited at the
Hammer Museum in Los Angeles from April 11 – June 6, 2010. It was the center of a major display and conference at the
Library of Congress
The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library ...
from June 17 – September 25, 2010.
Thereafter, the ''Red Book'' has been the focus of museum displays in
Zurich,
Geneva
, neighboring_municipalities= Carouge, Chêne-Bougeries, Cologny, Lancy, Grand-Saconnex, Pregny-Chambésy, Vernier, Veyrier
, website = https://www.geneve.ch/
Geneva ( ; french: Genève ) frp, Genèva ; german: link=no, Genf ; it, Ginevr ...
,
Paris
Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...
, and other major cities.
See also
*''
The Black Books''
*''
Seven Sermons to the Dead
''Seven Sermons to the Dead'' (Latin: ''Septem Sermones ad Mortuos'') is a collection of seven mystical or "Gnostic" texts written and privately published by C. G. Jung in 1916, under the title ''Seven Sermons to the Dead, written by Basilides of ...
''
References
Bibliography
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External links
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C. G. Jung and the Red Book: Liber Novus An in-depth encyclopedia article on Jung and the Red Book.
''New York Times Magazine'' feature by Sara Corbett
C.G. Jung and The Red BookA series of eighteen audio lectures on 'Jung and The Red Book: Liber Novus', presented by Lance Owens MD.
NPR interview about the bookwith writer Sara Corbett, author of NYT article and book on Jung's Red Book
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Red Book, The (Jung)
2009 non-fiction books
Works by Carl Jung
Literary illuminated manuscripts
W. W. Norton & Company books
Books published posthumously