Quadrant: The Journal of the C.G. Jung Foundation

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Volume XLIII:1 Winter 2013

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From the Editor — Kathryn Madden

This issue of Quadrant is being finalized during a painful period in the life of the American people. Tragically, in the final four months of 2012, we witnessed over and over again an all too familiar product of the unintegrated and distorted human psyche: namely, evil in all of its raw ugliness and horror. The thoughtful contributions in this issue address a far different and uplifting product of the human psyche: that is, the unconscious roots of creativity. And it is a good thing to focus on this aspect of our humanity now, in the wake of such a wave of horror and terror that has assaulted our collective consciousness. So, whether you are a clinician or journeying on your own path of spiritual and emotional development, let us each be mindful that the work of individuation, of integration, of wholeness, is serious business. It can sometimes be a matter of life or death.

Heidi Sylvia Volf's The Sweetness of Dreams: Freud, Jung, and Wild Strawberries features an in-depth and comparative analysis of the Ingmar Bergman film, Wild Strawberries. Dreams have a "numinous power we cannot fully comprehend," says Volf drawing a connection to the medium of film as "a means of conveying collective dreams." In this way, film makers act as contemporary mythographers. Volf proceeds to analyze the film, Wild Strawberries, calling it "complex and convoluted, more of a psychological Ulysses in cinematic form than a more traditional plot-driven work." In her analysis of this film, Volf draws insights from Freud, Jung, Hillman, and Robert Johnson concluding that "association, amplification…and conversing with the images brought forth through active imagination can lead to significant psychic healing."

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- Kathryn Madden, Ph.D., Editor-in-Chief

The Sweetness of Dreams: Freud, Jung, and Wild Strawberries —Heidi Sylvia Volf

Film has evolved into a means of conveying collective dreams that catalyzes individuation and can transform the individuals who view them. Certain films trigger transformation more numinously than others. One of these is Ingmar Bergman's Wild Strawberries (1957). The film recounts a day in the life of Dr. Isak Borg, whose dreams are bringing painful truths to the surface. By using the images of Isak's initial dream, as well as the events that follow in the film, I will illustrate and discuss the dream theories of Freud and Jung, with input from Hillman and Johnson, showing the varying merits of each approach to working with dreams. These methods have much to offer and build upon each other for effective interpretation, individuation, reintegration, and soulmaking.

Dragons and Dreams — Evija Volfa Vestergaard

Imagination sparked by the dream-like quality of folk tales makes for a rich source of inner intelligence and wisdom. The author recounts never-before-translated Latvian folk tales about dragons and explores them as the collective dreams of a people. The folktales convey messages from the imaginal realm directly to the unconscious mind, bypassing the potentially crippling logic of the conscious mind. The dream work methods of Carl Jung, James Hillman, Stephen Aizenstat, and Robert Bosnak (active imagination, dialoguing, and embodying) are used to engage with the folk tales to allow for even greater imaginal knowing.

Freeing the Spell-Bound Prince: The Journey Toward Integration of Heart and Mind — Bridgette Goetze.

The tales, Frog King or Iron Heinrich and Beauty and the Beast have been interpreted as stories about sexual awakening. However, such language tools as theme, diction, and image reveal that both stories explore the consequences of keeping/breaking promises, indicating ethics as the central issue of both texts. The following analysis explores a woman's need to value the power and beauty of her mind: freedom from projection (or spells in the language of the tales) can only be obtained if she integrates thoughts and feelings. Thus empowered she is able to reject conventionality and choose authenticity.

"The Creative Impulse as a Living Thing:" An Imaginal Dialogue with the Voice that Moves Me — Deborah Quibell

In his exploration of the creative urge, Jung stated that it "lives and grows in [us] like a tree in the earth" and that "we would do well, therefore, to think of the creative impulse as a living thing implanted in the human psyche" (Jung, 1966, p.75). This paper is an exploration of the question: What is it that seizes us as artists? What is this living thing implanted in the human psyche? The essay does not approach this question with concepts or theoretical explanation, but rather by avenues of the imagination and poetic dialogue, by allowing the "living thing" to speak for itself.

Book Reviews — Beth Darlington, Review Editor

Reviews by Robin S. Brown, Ilona Melker, and Carl V. Boyer

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