Animal Presences: Uniform Edition of the Writings of James Hillman, Vol. 9

by James Hillman

This volume includes the major Eranos lecture “The Animal Kingdom in the Human Dream,” and Hillman’s contributions to the out-of-print bestiary, Dream Animals (with Margot McLean), as well as other essays and conversations on the animal theme.

Genres: Psychology, Nonfiction

300 pages, Hardcover

First published August 1, 2007

About the author

James Hillman (1926-2011) was an American psychologist. He served in the US Navy Hospital Corps from 1944 to 1946, after which he attended the Sorbonne in Paris, studying English Literature, and Trinity College, Dublin, graduating with a degree in mental and moral science in 1950.

In 1959, he received his PhD from the University of Zurich, as well as his analyst's diploma from the C.G. Jung Institute and founded a movement toward archetypal psychology, was then appointed as Director of Studies at the institute, a position he held until 1969.

In 1970, Hillman became editor of Spring Publications, a publishing company devoted to advancing Archetypal Psychology as well as publishing books on mythology, philosophy and art. His magnum opus, Re-visioning Psychology, was written in 1975 and nominated for the Pulitzer Prize. Hillman then helped co-found the Dallas Institute for Humanities and Culture in 1978.

Retired into private practice, writing and traveling to lecture, until his death at his home in Connecticut on October 27, 2011 from bone cancer.

Reviews

[Morgan Blackledge · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another TOTALLY AMAZING read from James Hillman.

I’m going to GUSH about it.

But first.

My mom told me this joke when I was a kid.

GOD and the DEVIL were out an a walk.

GOD said BEHOLD, THE TRUTH.

And the DEVIL said.

QUICK, give it to me so I can ORGANIZE IT.

Yes.

It’s a MOM JOKE.

Maybe not so “FUNNY”.

But SPOT ON nonetheless.

This is part of a series of collected writing.

Whether or not this series was collected and edited posthumously. I’m fairly certain there is a part of Hilman that would have HATED the idea of a TIDY, UNIFORM, CURATED, COLLECTION.

I’m fairly certain of this, because there seems to be a part of Hillman that HATED TIDY, UNIFORM, CURATED, COLLECTIONS of ALL SORTS.

Heck.

There seems to be a part of Hillman that HATED any THING he was presented with. And HATE is not “too strong” a word. If anything, HATE is not STRONG ENOUGH, to capture Hillmans PASSION for OPPOSITION and CRITIQUE.

Hillmans HATRED for CONCRETE/LITERALISM is actually a PASSIONATE LOVE OF the WILDNESS and INEFFABLE, INDEFINABLE ESSENCE of LIFE.

Hillmans HATRED of CONCRETE/LITERALISM is the wake that follows his LOVE of the SOUL.

And his UNRELENTING STRUGGLE to rescue TRUTH/BEAUTY/MADNESS/LOVE from the CONCRETE TOMB of PSYCHOLOGY/SCIENTISM.

Hillman was trying to RESCUE the SOUL from the DEATH GRIP OF PSYCHOLOGY, and restore it as the RIGHTFUL HEART of PSYCHOTHERAPY.

Anyway.

The book is a TIDY, UNIFORM, CURATED, COLLECTION of Hillmans writing on ANIMALS.

And THANK THE GODS (or whom ever) for THIS AMAZING COLLECTION.

YES.

People are ANIMALS.

But people only recently discovered this.

Before that.

We (particularly people of NORTHERN descent) sort of ASSUMED we were somehow different.

REGARDLESS.

ANIMALS are integral to the archetypal realm of PEOPLE.

RELIGION:

Animals are ARCHETYPAL IMAGES in every world religion. From animistic religions, including ancient Egyptian and Greek religion/mythos, to ancient and contemporary Hindu religion.

Animal imagery and archetype are ALL OVER the BIBLE. From Noah’s Arc to Jonah’s whale to Christ as the lamb of god. And on, and on.

POLITICS:

Animal archetype are all over nation state political iconography. From the American eagle and the Russian bear, to the British Bulldog.

CHILDHOOD:

Probably most significantly.

Animals are the first archetypes for children.

Nature shows.

Pets.

Cartoons.

Dreams.

THE COLLAPSE:

Images of starving polar bears, water birds drowning in oil, sea turtles caught in six pack holders, elephants murdered for their ivory, chickens in factory farms, and dolphins caught in tuna nets are the poster children of…

!!!MASS EXTINCTION!!!

We ALL feel SAD, ASHAMED and TERRIFIED regarding the current ECOLOGICAL COLLAPSE.

ANIMALS:

Animals are so important to our psychology.

That we sometime fail to see them as such.

But on a VERY POWERFUL archetypal level.

We ALL contain ANIMAL IMAGES at our CORE.

And this is what this book is ALL ABOUT.

And it’s POWERFUL.

This book.

And Hillman's work more broadly.

Has reinvigorated my explicit understanding of how powerful and important and beautiful animals are to people.

And how people are animals.

And just how DEVASTATINGLY SAD and HOPELESS the current moment feels.

Not that I was out of touch with all that.

But at least PART of me has become NUMB.

Hillman is SO POWERFUL.

That it has an ALGESIC (anti-numbing) effect.

It reawakens the SOUL.

HILLMANS writing and thinking and being and soul AMPLIFY what you’re already feeling.

And trying DESPERATELY to understand.

And as such.

Are probably unable to fully FEEL.

Hillman invites us to STOP TRYING TO UNDERSTAND AND THINK our FEELINGS into OBEDIENCE and OBLIVION.

And just as we did when we were children.

Let our IMAGINATION and FEELINGS run WILD.

Even if it’s TERRIFYING.

Why?

Because it’s how we can BECOME ALIVE again.

And FEEL the world.

And not know.

And perhaps IMAGINE another way.

Or at minimum be present to one another.

And the world.

And the COLLAPSE.

And all creatures great and small.

As the WORLD BURNS.

And something NEW (god willing) EMERGES.

This collection RESISTS the psychological use of ANIMALS as symbols, and PROMOTES a deeper understanding of ANIMAL ARCHETYPES as LIVING, VITAL ESSENTIAL forces. IMMORTAL beings in our inner PSYCHIC PANTHEON.

Hillman asserts “a SNAKE is not a SYMBOL”.

He urges us to interact with snakes (and other archetypal beings) as LIVING.

And to resist what has become the raison d'être of the global north.

The REFLEXIVE/IMPULSE to colonize, commodify, rarefy, domesticate, dominate and enslave all aspects of nature (inner and outer) into a compressed REPRODUCTION/REPRESENTATION of its WILD essence, into a SYMBOL/SYSTEM of self gratification, comfort and SELF IMPROVEMENT/ENHANCEMENT.

This work is part of Hillman's Archetypal Psychology, offering innovative POWERFUL insights into the interplay between human consciousness and the world at large, including all aspects of the human experience, but probably most significantly, the animal kingdom.

HILLMAN is TIMELESS and TIMELY.

HILLMAN AMPLIFIES the SENSE of DOOM that seems to pervade the moment.

And the equally PERVASIVE sense that we need VISION/WISDOM now MORE THAN EVER.

LIKE a FISH, WRITHING in the bottom of a BOAT needs WATER.

Or LIKE a DROWNING POLAR BEAR needs a CHUNK of ICE.

We need SALT WATTER.

We need BLOOD/SWEAT/TEARS.

We NEED what HILLMAN has.

HILLMAN is CRUCIAL.

5/5 stars ⭐️

[Simon · Rating 5 out of 5]

James Hillman is a curious figure. He started out as a student of C. G. Jung but ended up breaking with his Swiss master to create his own system of psychology, just as Jung had done with Freud. Hillman's ”archetypal psychology” is even more mystical than Jung's ”analytical philosophy”, basically re-inventing psychology from scratch as an occult system drawing half on Greco-Roman paganism half Renaissance-era alchemy. If you ask me, the results resemble Alejandro Jodorowsky's Psychomagic or G. I. Gurdjieff's Fourth Way more than either Freud's or even Jung's system. That said, I do sometimes find Hillman's books rather short on concrete examples of his system used in practice and applied to specific case stories, something even Jodorowsky was more attentive with in ”Psychomagic”. That is why I decided to earlier in 2021 read ”Animal Presences”, one of the last books Hillman finished before his death in 2011 as it entered print in 2007, since it contains more specific examples of archetypal psychology in practice.

”Animal Presences” is divided into 13 chapters some of whom spell out the overall philosophical subject matter and points made in the book as a whole, but most of the chapters focus on a specific animal: How the animal appeared in the dreams of his patients and the overall context of their individual case stories, humanity's more specific relation with the respective animal and the role the animal plays in various religions and mythologies. Hillman frequently weaves these musings into ambitious philosophising over humanity's relation to the cosmos, with characteristic harsh words for modern Western anthropocentrism as inseparable from the unprecedented spiritual crisis afflicting the modern West. All this is delivered with the rhetorical finesse I have come to expect from Hillman, and a great sense of humour I have not encountered in his books until now.

For example: There is a hilarious section where Hillman pontificates about how modern day hamburger eating represents a debased form of Mithraic bull-sacrifice symptomatic of modern Westerners' dysfunctional relationship with nature and the divine. It sounds stark raving bonkers when I summarise it here, but Hillman presents it in a way that makes perfect sense in context:

"Under the golden arches, a taurobolium in ketchup, the dead gods are celebrated in strange misshapen recurrences of antique rites. The burgher's burger, a thick secular wafer in a debased myth that is liturgically living because we do not know it is a myth. A uniform daily occurence of the native animal god, with his and her epitheta deorum: Burger King, Big Boy, Big Mac, Dairy Queen, Hamburg Heaven." (p. 71)

While I find Hillman's mentor C. G. Jung to have a better signal-to-noise ratio than I remember, I often find Jung's writing style and language rather clumsy. A complaint I would never aim at Hillman, whom I often find worth reading for his way with language alone. From the same chapter:

"You shall hear great tales of myths and origins; how the bull came into the world; the nature of inflation; of money and the bull market; why the bull of imagination disrupts convention; why Blake said, "Jesus the Imagination"; why Johnny can't read; and finally, and necessary to every American public address, what's wrong with this country, how we got this way, and how we may still be saved. These fifty minutes must promise all this because the theme of this talk and my talk itself is bull from beginning to end." (p. 58)

I would go as far as saying that even if Hillman has limited academic value, there is still literary value in his books and ”Animal Presences” is perhaps the best example I have encountered so far. Another example comes from the chapter ”Horses and Heroes” (pp. 80-84) where he ponders the roles horses have played in human cultures, including the exact reasons why combustion engines' effect is measured in horse-power and why so many automobiles are named after horse breeds:

"The young heroes of Greek myths rode their horses into the air: Bellerophon on Pegasus, Phaethon driving his father's chariot of the sun, Hippolytus racing off the roadside to his death. They couldn't hold their horses, and they crashed.

[...]

And still they carry us, as Broncos and Pintos, Mustangs, Pacers, and Colts, and as the power hidden under the hood. Even driving across the lawn and the golf course, we're still riding horses.
That horse power still brings sudden death on the night roads and highways to so many boys at the verge of bursting into full life - boys like Hippolytus and Phaethon, and Diomedes, that son of Mars and mythic king of Thrace whose horses ate his human flesh. The steed that can so strongly carry life leads that same life to its funeral in the solemn procession of the riderless horse" (p.81)

Speaking of the tension between academic value and literary value, Hillman expends an entire chapter in ”Animal Presences” on belabouring the limitations of traditional psychological dream-analysis and what might instead be gained from viewing animals that appear in dreams as totem animals instead of metaphors. This chapter, ”A Snake Is Not a Symbol”, covers the pages 76-79 and contains a quote often used as a crystallisation of Hillman's entire philosophy:

"For instance, a black snake comes in a dream, a great big black snake, and you can spend a whole hour with this black snake talking about the devouring mother, talking about anxiety, talking about the repressed sexuality, talking about the natural mind, all those interpretive moves that people make, and what is left, what is vitally important, is what this snake is doing, this crawling huge black snake that's walking into your life…and the moment you've defined the snake, you've interpreted it, you've lost the snake, you've stopped it.…" (p. 77)

I am still not sure how much I understand Hillman's ideas as put forth in here let alone agree with them. Yet every chapter in this book has made me think further about the many subjects breached in it and is extremely elegantly written in addition to being gut-bustingly hilarious. It is not often I recommend an ostensible work of psychology for its literary value and its humour, but that is indeed what I would do with ”Animal Presences”.

[Debra · Rating 5 out of 5]

James Hillman's collection of his writings on animals and the psyche explores the relationship between the animals, whether from dreams, nature or art and the human experience. Hillman reminds us of the value of sticking to the image whether we are looking at dream images of actual animals that we observe in nature.
The book includes chapters on rats, dogs, horses, snakes, bugs and yes, humans. What Hillman as a writer does best in this book as well as others he has written, is to return nature to us by returning us to the nature of things through looking more directly at the behavior of animals, whether in dreams, art or nature and exploring our relationship to them in mythology, history, biology and in the psyche, or world of the soul.
Hillman always brings respect and insight to anything he writes about and this book is no exception. His respect and love for language and the world are reason enough to consider reading any of his books.

[Simão Cortês · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is actually a much easier book by Hillman than the ones I have been reading. His discussion of animal symbolism is inspiring and endearing. It actually completely changed my perception of the animal world. His daemonic approach to dream is something deeply special, especially considering it flourished in the academy. Hillman might well be one of the most important Neoplatonic thinker of the last century.

[Kirsten Mortensen · Rating 5 out of 5]

I grabbed a copy of this after finishing The Dream and the Underworld, and liked it very much.

It has helped me gain a bit more sophistication in how I approach the animals that I encounter in my dreams.

Highly recommend if you are interested in dreams and "get" the Jungian way of thinking about the psyche.

[Christian · Rating 5 out of 5]

James Hillman is basically Dr. Dolittle. He knows the animals' secrets--what they reflect in us, and what they have to teach us. He's the only person I know that could pull off saying--in complete sincerity--that a parasitic insect is a metaphor for divinity. I'll never think of an animal dream the same way again.

[Jo Pisa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Si tratta di una raccolta di tre saggi sull'interpretazione dei sogni con animali. Sebbene abbia un'impronta psicologica, però, in realtà parla di molto di più: antropologia, mitologia, arte, etimologia. Un ricco collage di perle umanistiche oltre che di psicanalisi di singole testimonianze e significati onirici nelle diverse categorie (nel primo saggio animali vari, poi gli insetti e nel terzo gli elefanti). Mi ha sorpresa ritrovare un autore che ho conosciuto l'anno scorso, con un'analisi simbolica di un suo libro (che mi ha incuriosita a leggere!).
Le informazioni che vi sono raccolte sono estremamente interessanti e piuttosto accurate, a parte qualche lacuna che ho riscontrato. L'ontogenesi non ricapitola la filogenesi, per un motivo che l'autore stesso descrive qualche pagina prima: l'evoluzione non è lineare, non si tratta di una scala in cui vi sono animali "inferiori" che "tendono" a "salire", bensì è un cespuglio, con enne rami, in cui ogni famiglia, ogni specie fa il proprio gioco... quindi tale visione non ha alcun significato (anche ammesso che tale concezione lineare avesse senso biologicamente o storicamente, come potrebbe una crescita di un singolo individuo ricapitolare qualcosa di tanto diversificato?) Allo stesso modo, Darwin era già consapevole dell'esistenza di qualcosa di più di una "scala" evolutiva: lui la chiamava "corallo evolutivo". (Quando iniziò a parlare di evoluzione, che nell'Origine delle Specie non cita nemmeno, comunque... ma lo vedremo, quando vi parlerò di questo libro!) Poi, come si può parlare di olocausto degli insetti, quando essi sono in tale maggioranza sulla Terra? ... In quest'ultimo caso, come in diversi altri, l'autore sfrutta un po' troppo la sua eloquenza, risultando (almeno qui) impreciso, cadendo più nella filosofia che nella scienza (nulla di male, ma va rimarcato, dal momento che si tratta di due campi ben separati da quando è stato inventato il metodo scientifico). Ciononostante è anche grazie al suo stile che si è trattata di una lettura piacevole, oltre che decisamente illuminante.

[Pippa Bennett · Rating 4 out of 5]

Usefully brings together animal spirit, how they interact and provide messages to us; how to pay attention to what those messages may be

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

It figures that this would finally come out when I can't afford to buy it!