What is The Red Book?
Jung’s Red Book documents inner turmoil and intense creativity
The Red Book, or Liber Novus, documents a formative period in Jung’s early forties during which he began to explore his fantasies and document his internal world of images. Jung started keeping notes of these experiments in his personal notebooks in 1913. In 1914, Jung reviewed these notes, deciding to transcribe and rework them into what became an illustrated, calligraphic manuscript contained in a volume bound with red leather, which he displayed on a purpose-built lectern in his study. The Red Book process, which lasted until the 1930s, represents a vital episode in Jung’s intellectual and psychological development, in which he grappled with his transition from the rational world of external achievements to his unknown, unpredictable, chaotic, creative interior.
On the eve of his Red Book episode, Jung was working as a successful psychiatrist and university lecturer. The eruption of his unconscious material, which occurred most intensely between autumn 1913 and spring 1916, was a time of great turmoil during which Jung called everything into question: his career, his marriage and his extramarital affairs. During this time, Jung recorded his fantasy dialogues with Biblical figures-such as the devil and the prophet Elijah-as well as characters like Philemon, a retired magician. Jung later tried to translate his Red Book experiences into what are now familiar Jungian concepts such as the anima, the animus, the shadow, the collective unconscious but during The Red Book episode itself, he had not found this language yet.
Jung had completed work on the text of The Red Book by 1917 but he continued to paint the accompanying images for many years afterwards. The Red Book’s editor, Sonu Shamdasani, has described it as “the most laboriously worked item in Jung’s corpus.” However, perhaps because The Red Book is so raw and personal, Jung did not publish it in his lifetime. Instead, he revealed its contents only to select peers and friends. After his death in 1961, The Red Book was committed to a Swiss bank vault and it was not until 2009 that the book found its way to the public. You can read a story of the book’s publication here article (subscription only) and see selected images here.
In a recent paper (subscription only) for the Journal of Analytical Psychology and a blogpost for the journal’s website, I discuss the impact of The Red Book on contemporary clinical practice and I consider the implications for those of us working as therapists and analysts within the Jungian tradition.