SFA Web Site Introduction

Carl G. Jung

(1875 1961)

In the early 1950s, Dr.Kurt Eissler recorded an extensive, in depth, interview with Carl Jung. The interview can be reviewed in it's entirety by contacting the Manuscript Division of the Library of Congress (www.loc.gov).

Carl Jung was the son of a Protestant Minister with relatives who were clergymen on both sides of his family. His defection from the fledgling psychoanalytic “movement” occurred after an initial very close personal and professional relationship with Freud. Jung praised Freud’s theories in his (1906) “Psychology of Dementia Praecox”, and referred to “Studies on Hysteria” and “The Interpretation of Dreams” in his early writing. He visited Freud in 1907 and they conversed for some thirteen hours. Accompanying Freud in 1909 to Clark University for lectures and honorary degrees, Jung became the first president of the International Psychoanalytical Association and was designated as Freud’s choice of a successor to lead psychoanalysis. The defection of Jung was fostered by a personality clash between the two independent thinkers, as well as Jung’s infusion of religion and mysticism into psychoanalytic theory, and his anti-semitism.

There has been a recent revival of interest in Jung’s “Analytic Psychology”. Jung contributed to the psychoanalytic understanding of symbols and myths, and he was probably the first to recommend training analysis for future analysts. While Jung’s “collective unconscious” and archetypes are quite different from traditional Freudian psychoanalytic concepts, his initial emphasis on unconscious fantasy, self or personality development, and individuation throughout the life cycle resonate with contemporary psychoanalytic thought. This interview of Carl Jung is thus relevant to the history of psychoanalysis, biographical studies, and current concepts.

Harold P. Blum, M.D.

Executive Director, Sigmund Freud Archives