Freud and Jung: Years of Friendship, Years of Loss

by Linda Donn

"One evening years after the rupture between Freud and Jung, the Swiss psychiatrist C. A. Meier spent an hour alone with Freud in his study at Berggasse 19. "There was one topic of conversation," Meier remembered. "Jung. Freud was full of questions about Jung, about his family, his life and what he was doing. Every conceivable question," Meier said. "Because he still cared." Meier would find the same anguish in Jung. "He didn't like to talk about Freud
because it was so painful." Another Swiss analyst agreed. "The wound was always there, it never healed. It was a tragedy." The hours that Freud and Jung had spent in Freud's dim and quiet study lay in the past.

The long ordeal of Freud and Jung was reminder and more that some piece of the human psyche was beyond comprehension. The moment when the world's first analysts, unable to alleviate their pain, played with stones at the edge of a dry lakeshore or stood for hours before the statue of an angry prophet, bore witness to the intransigent mystery of the human spirit. That mystery was the terrible beauty of the psyche, and they lived it, Freud and Jung, alone."

- from Freud and Jung

Previously published by Charles Scribner's Sons

Genres: Psychology, History

238 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1988

About the author

Linda Donn holds an MA in clinical psychology from the New School for Social Research. She and her husband have three children and divide their time between New York City and Vermont.

Reviews

[M.D. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Predates the more well-known and widely circulated "A Dangerous Method", this forgotten biography on Freud and Jung's fickle relationship is just as worthwhile as that book, plus it's written with style, aptitude, and zeal.

[Khrystine · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book reads like fiction, something I always appreciate in non-fiction. You also really feel like you've been in Freud and Jung's heads, and really get to know their personality. Excellent.