Exploring C. G. Jung's Red Book

Following his break with Freud, and as Europe descended into the catastrophe of the First World War, Carl Jung entered a period of profound inner upheaval. Severed from the intellectual alliance that had shaped his early career, he turned inward with unusual resolve. Instead of dismissing the strange fantasies, visions, and voices that rose from the depths, he chose to face them consciously and methodically.

Jung undertook a series of disciplined, meditative descents into what he would later call the imaginal realm. He allowed figures to emerge, landscapes to unfold, and dialogues to take form. He questioned these presences, argued with them, and followed them wherever they led. These were not idle reveries, but rigorous experiments in psychic encounter. He recorded these experiences in the private journals now known as the Black Books.

Years later, Jung transcribed and artistically elaborated this material into the illuminated manuscript we know as the Red Book. Part visionary text, part mythic drama, part psychological record, it remains an unparalleled document of a modern individual confronting the depths of his own psyche.

Jung later described this period as his “confrontation with the unconscious,” the most decisive and formative phase of his life. The images, symbols, and dialogues that emerged during these years became the generative source of analytical psychology. Archetypes. The collective unconscious. The individuation process. These ideas did not begin as abstractions, but as lived realities, encountered and endured in solitude.

In this course, we retrace Jung’s path. We set aside the exclusively rational posture of the modern mind and enter the imaginal territory he dared to explore. Through immersive reading and discussion, we will encounter the same challenges and figures that confronted Jung and begin to formulate our own relationship to the depths they represent.

Readings will be provided, or you are welcome to bring your own copy of the Red Book.