The Red Book by Carl Jung

The Red Book by Carl Jung

During the first world war, Carl Jung embarked on an extended self-exploration he called his 'confrontation with the unconscious'. At the heart of this exploration was The Red Book, a grand, illuminated volume which he created between 1914 and 1930, in which he developed the nucleus of his later theories.

The book is a remarkable blend of calligraphy and art; an illuminated manuscript that bears comparison with The Book of Kells and William Blake. But while Jung considered The Red Book his most important work, only a handful of people have ever seen it. Finally, nearly 80 years after it was completed, it is available in a facsimile edited by Jung historian Sonu Shamdasani.

Publication and display

Until 2001, Jung's heirs refused to permit publication of the book and did not allow scholars access to it.Until September 2009, only about two dozen people had seen it. Historian Sonu Shamdasani, an employee of the Jung heirs and their advisor in the handling of unpublished Jung material, and Stephen Martin, a Jungian analyst, created the Philemon Foundation in order to facilitate publication of Jung's works.

Ulrich Hoerni, Jung's grandson and manager of the Jung archives, decided to publish it after three years of persuasion by Shamdasani.W. W. Norton & Company was preparing an edition of the Red Book in its original German, with English translation and extensive footnoting. In 2007, DigitalFusion scanned it, one-tenth of a millimeter at a time, with a 10,200-pixel scanner.It was published on 7 October 2009.

The Rubin Museum of Art in New York City displayed the original book and Jung's original small journals from 7 October 2009 to 25 January 2010.The Red Book exhibit was also at the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles from April 11 – June 6, 2010. A series of Red Book Dialogues with celebrities and psychologists such as James Hillman, Helen Hunt, Leonard Nimoy, Sonu Shamdasani and others was also hosted at the Hammer.The Red Book was on display at the Library of Congress from June 17 – September 25, 2010.