Jung: A Biography

Rating:
Summary: Carl Jung
Review: It might be expected that Bair, the author of two feminist biographies (Anais Nin and Simone de Beauvoir) would have an interesting take on the women in Carl Jung's life. And it is these portraits of Jung's mother, the "strange and mysterious Emilie, his wife, Emma, patient and mistress Toni Wolff, therapist and OSS spy, Mary Bancroft , and his American patient and publisher, Mary Mellon, that Bair excels. In addition, Bair has mined the archives to give a fair-minded appraisal of Jung's complex and compromising relation to the Nazis and, above all, what it meant for Jung to be Swiss. Jung was a complicated man and this is a compelling book. This will be the definite biography for years to come.

Rating:
Summary: Carl Jung
Review: It might be expected that Bair, the author of two feminist biographies (Anais Nin and Simone de Beauvoir) would have an interesting take on the women in Carl Jung�s life. And it is these portraits of Jung�s mother, the �strange and mysterious Emilie, his wife, Emma, patient and mistress Toni Wolff, therapist and OSS spy, Mary Bancroft , and his American patient and publisher, Mary Mellon, that Bair excels. In addition, Bair has mined the archives to give a fair-minded appraisal of Jung�s complex and compromising relation to the Nazis and, above all, what it meant for Jung to be Swiss. Jung was a complicated man and this is a compelling book. This will be the definite biography for years to come.

Rating:
Summary: The definitive treatment so far
Review: Some have knocked this latest bio of C.G. Jung for not explicating his philosophy. But that is precisely one of its strengths! There are innumerable books that try to explain Jung's thought. Bair's focus is on Jung's life, told objectively, with particular attention to the many controversies about him that persist to this day. She doesn't flinch from such tough issues as his rumored womanizing or his alleged support for the Nazis. (On which point she reveals, among other surprises, that Jung actually worked as a special agent for the U.S. in Switzerland during WWII, reporting to Allen Dulles, future head of the CIA.) Unlike such writers as Richard Noll in "The Jung Cult," her goal isn't to vilify her subject. Ultimately she pictures a man who was far from perfect but deserved his place among the great thinkers. A must for anyone interested in Jung.

Rating:
Summary: Fascinating & Well Written
Review: This book is clearly the definitive biography of Carl Jung. Ms. Bair has carefully researched the details of Jung's life and provides the reader with an unvarished but quite balanced view of this profoundly important psychologist. The book focuses on Jung's life and the people who were important to him and not on his theoretical and practical contributions to Psychology. As a scholar in the field I learned much and am grateful to the author for her work.

Rating:
Summary: Fascinating & Well Written
Review: This book is clearly the definitive biography of Carl Jung. Ms. Bair has carefully researched the details of Jung's life and provides the reader with an unvarished but quite balanced view of this profoundly important psychologist. The book focuses on Jung's life and the people who were important to him and not on his theoretical and practical contributions to Psychology. As a scholar in the field I learned much and am grateful to the author for her work.