Carl Jung's "The Red Book". First impression comes from its huge size and weight. It is 16" x 12" and weights about 8 pounds. So far it is the largest of all my books from my library...
The physicality of this book is immense and disturbing. It contains Jung's text set in calligraphic handwriting and his pictures. I'm fortunate to be able to acquire it just few months after it has been published after about 90 years of total secretion. The first time it was revealed to scholars was only in 2001. At this moment I prefer to stay away from any comments about the book content. The time will come and I will write.
Today I just wanted to share with you my amazement about this extremely tangible proof of the importance of physical books for our culture....
BTW, my childreen's she-cat named "Szpinak" (yes yes Spinach !) is here to show you how big is the book... and she was really interested - I used to say - she practices Zen :-)
I found the links in this post very interesting.
ReplyDeleteI look forward to hear more. Why do you think the book wasn't published for nearly a century? By the way,your remark about the Cat made me wonder,have you read any of Lobsang Rampa's books? In some of his books,there are some incredible facts about cats.
I will be reading this book slowly, but as soon as I get some clue why it was kept under a roof in a safe - I will tell you.
ReplyDeleteI haven't yet read Lobsang Rampa books.
I saw quite o along list of them.
Which one has cat's motives ???
Rampa's Candle light, Twilight and some other books. Pleas note that the books are not about cats, but contain some interesting, even strange
ReplyDeletethings about cats. If you intend to read any at all, better start with The Third Eye,the very first book by him.
I could imagine, after reading an article about him on Wikipedia - he was not writting just about cats. Seems to be quite interesting author....
ReplyDeleteThanks for the recommendation, it is amazing, my recent turn back to Conrad, was also after I got recommendation, though quite specific - so to speak :-),
BTW, have you ever read anything written by Conrad? Read Heart of Darkness - as first (see my recent review)