Professor David Peimer
Freud and Jung: Two Giants Too Big for Their World
Summary
Professor David Peimer compares the lives and worlds of Sigmund Freud (1856–1939) and Carl Jung (1875–1961) and discusses their relationship with one another, which was both incredibly rich and ultimately rather sad.
Professor David Peimer
David Peimer is a Professor of Literature, Film and Theatre in the UK. He has worked for the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, New York University (Global Division) and was a Fulbright Scholar at Columbia University. Born in South Africa, David has won numerous awards for playwriting and directing in New York, UK, Berlin, EU Parliament (Brussels), Athens, Budapest, Zululand and more. He has most recently directed Dame Janet Suzman in his own play, Joanna’s Story, at London Jewish Book Week. He has published widely with books including: Armed Response: Plays from South Africa, the digital book, Theatre in the Camps. He is on the board of the Pinter Centre (London), and has been involved with the Mandela Foundation, Vaclav Havel Foundation and directed a range of plays at Mr Havel’s Prague theatre.
There’s a joke an old friend of mine used to make, I’m a Freud, you’re too young to know. I don’t know if, yeah, probably go with Freud first and then Jung. But not necessarily. You can look at the symbols, the images from a cultural perspective and historical perspective and understand them in that way. Freud would be looking from a more personal, the neurosis and the unconscious. But both of them are dreams. They’re both coming out of that world. It’s just what’s in the dreams.
Well, I don’t think Freud was unaware of these ancient, you know, sculptures or images and so on. And I think, as I said later in his life, and obviously “Totem and Taboo” and “Civilization and Its Discontents,” I mean there’s a lot of culture and history and the story’s going way back and Freud used it. I mean, he said he called Jung the Joshua to him being Moses. I don’t think there’s a discounting or an unawareness of it, but I think Freud, the primary focus was the personal and the personal unconscious. Jung, the collective.