Flying Saucers: A Modern Myth of Things Seen in the Skies

750 Third Aveue, New York 17, N. Y.: Harcourt, Brace & Company - Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., 1959. Stated at copyright: First American Edition, 1959. Includes a new preface from Jung in 1958 for the English edition. Black full cloth boards, crisp silver impressed cover, spine titles, moderate shelf, edge wear. Pages very good, moderate toning. Attractive vintage owner detail inside cover: "Kenneth P. Fanshaw, 219 W. Granada Ct., Ontario, California, Yukon 68887". Frontispiece painting: Plate I. A UFO Vision - page 81. Also, seven additional highly intriguing plates throughout. Bind fine; hinges intact. Original dust wrapper, moderate edge wear, rub, crease; unclipped 3.95, protected in the new clear sleeve. Classic 1950's jacket design by Janet Halverson of black silhouetted human head w/glowing yellow eyes in forehead area (reminiscient of mothman descriptions) over dark blue b.g. w/yellow cover and spine titles. Excerpt from preface of Jung at back panel. Summary description at front flap; stern Jung portrait and short bio at back flap. Scarce very good first edition complete in original wrapper. Jung's primary concern in Flying Saucers is not with the reality or unreality of UFO's but with their psychic aspect. Although he does admit they are physically real, in addition to his area of study - the sublimated psyche. Rather than speculate about their possible nature and extraterrestrial origin as alleged spacecraft, he asks what it may signify that these phenomena, whether real or imagined, are seen in such numbers just at a time when humankind is menaced as never before in history. The UFOs represent, in Jung's phrase, "a modern myth." As a myth in the making, the centre of a quasi-religious cult, as carriers of technological and salvationist fantasies, as projections of unconscious psychic contents, as symbols of 'self' or psychic totality. "In the threatening situation of the world today, when people are beginning to see that everything is at stake, the projection-creating fantasy soars beyond the realm of earthly organizations and powers into the heavens, into interstellar space, where the rulers of human fate, the gods, once had their abode in the planets... Even people who would never have thought that a religious problem could be a serious matter that concerned them personally are beginning to ask themselves fundamental questions. Under these circumstances it would not be at all surprising if those sections of the community who ask themselves nothing were visited by `visions,' by a widespread myth seriously believed in by some and rejected as absurd by others."--C. G. Jung, in Flying Saucers Printed in the United States of America. Includes fine detailed 7-page index. 186 pages. Insured post.. First Edition. Hard Cover. Very Good/Good. 12mo - over 6¾" - 7¾" tall.