Von Franz, Marie-Louise, C. G. Jung: his myth in our time. First published in German 1972. Trans. from the German by William H. Kennedy for the C. G. Jung Foundation for Analytical Psychology, 1975.  Hodder & Stoughton 1975. Pp.  x + 355. £pD4.95.

A number of recent books have surveyed Jung's life and work as a whole, but Dr von Franz's book is in a different category. Its special character may derive from some of the circumstances of her life. She trained as an analyst with Jung himself, remained in close touch with him for 25 years, participated in his researches and has contributed substantial original work of her own. She is also one of the few whose intellectual knowledge extends over a range comparable to Jung's.

It is not a book specifically about analysis, psychotherapy or analytical psychology as such. It is rather an encyclopaedic presentation of the archetypal context, both historical and contemporary, within which analytical psychotherapy is practised. It is packed with symbolic material and clarifications of technical terms, techniques, concepts and Jung's unique and frequently revolutionary views of the psyche and reality. There is an extensive bibliography, a carefully detailed index and a meticulous acknowledgement of all sources and colleagues. It is an invaluable book for advanced students of Jung who can bring to it the living reality of their own experience of the unconscious and its processes.

At the same time the author demonstrates that Jung's unsystematic and immensely diverse explorations of the psyche do indeed form an organic whole. She achieves this in several ways. A thread runs consistently through the book showing the relation between Jung's inner life experience, as he himself portrayed it in Memories, dreams, reflections, his creative personality and his psychological formulations. In every chapter a complex constellation of facts is grouped around a nodal symbol that was of peculiar interest to Jung. This format makes it possible to show the interdependence of widely different aspects of his work with an authenticity which might not be possible in a strictly linear and merely rational statement.

Dr von Franz suggests that Jung's personal encounter with the unconscious, both as a