THURSDAY LECTURES
Lectures take place on the third Thursday of most months at the Essex Church, 112 Palace Gardens Terrace, London W8 4RT.
The lectures are followed by discussion and sometimes by refreshments. Click on speaker's name to get biographical details.
Plan your journey here (Nearest Tube Station: Notting Hill
Gate):
18 September, 2008 (7:30-9:00pm)
Jung and Nature
JULIAN DAVIDIn the Visions Seminar, Jung replies to one of the participants: "But I am quite of your opinion. I am certain there would be no spirit if it were not part of nature". That there are not two things, spirit and matter, but two aspects of one thing seems ever more apparent, but it is exceedingly difficult to go beyond that and see what it implies. It is a problem that Jung and the quantum physicist, Pauli, struggled with and found no way through, though both believed it could one day be scientifically shown. Imaginally, however, we might say that it already is. "Something eternal," says Traherne in the Centuries of Meditation, " behind everything appeared, which talked with my expectation and moved my desire." The theme chimes through experiential literature. "Eternity in a grain of sand", says Blake, "and heaven in a wild flower." It is found also in philosophy. "If we take eternity", says Wittgenstein, "to mean not infinite temporal duration but timelessness, then eternal life belongs to those who live in the present."
16 October, 2008 (7:30-9:00pm)
The Psychology of Conception as imaged in Lorenzo Lotto's Annunciation of 1535
IRENE CIOFFI WITFIELDIn this talk Lotto's archetypal image will be "read" like a dream. As does a dream, Lotto's image reveals itself to the receptive viewer and brings insights into the natural process of the objective psyche, which is the spontaneous creation of "image". Uniquely, in this Christian image of divine conception, the incarnation of the saviour brings no sense of peaceful harmony, but rather a feeling of tension, conflict and unease. Historical evidence suggests that Lotto himself experienced the powerful emotional quality of creative psychic penetrations, which by their very nature are chaotic and dangerous to ego-consciousness, as well as potentially transforming.
20 November 2008 (7:30-9:00pm)
Gaia: A Myth for our Time?
JULES CASHFORDGaia was the Goddess of Earth, Mother of All, in ancient Greece, the last time in the west that the Earth was formally revered as sacred. Gaia is also the name of James Lovelock's 'Gaia Hypothesis', which proposes the Earth as a self-regulating system, and has, albeit unintentionally, awakened long-forgotten memories of the autonomy of Earth, whom Plato called a Zo-on, a Living Being. Is it possible that what was once a local Story of Origin could become, two thousand years later in our hour of need, a universal Cosmology which enables us to comprehend our Earth as a dynamic living whole? For, as Jung says, 'nothing in the psyche is ever lost'.
22 January, 2009 (7:30-9:00pm)
C G Jung and Ancient Egypt
MICHAEL RICEFrom his childhood on C G Jung was fascinated by Ancient Egypt. He had an ambition to become an archaeologist, but there was no suitable faculty at the University of Basle and so medicine and specifically analytical psychology claimed him. His interest in the civilization and culture of Ancient Egypt was sustained however and was one of the abiding influences of his life, reflected in his published works and especially in his correspondence. His first visit to Egypt in 1925 was profoundly important to him and his record of it is notable for the perceptions of some of the more subtle aspects of the Nile culture.
19 February, 2009 (7:30-9:00pm)
The Jungian Days of Miss Elsie Beckingsale
TONY BECKINSALEElsie Beckingsale studied in Zurich with Dr Jung at the suggestion of Dr Peter Baynes, and later had a practice in London. China was a deep concern to her and she helped Chinese refugees when the Japanese invaded in 1938. After the war Elsie began to be called Laura. Tony Beckingsale met her late in her life, and only recently opened a suitcase full of bits of her life that had been in his loft for 25 years. Amazed by what he found, he will talk about his discoveries, and the book he is planning, interspersing Elsie’s poetry and biography. He also has 23 cassette tapes which reveal the timing, expression, and emotion in her voice A retired Financial Adviser who was co-executor to her estate, Tony visited her every three months for five years prior to her death, to make sure she was coping despite failing sight and health.His research into Laura's life has opened up new avenues of interest and enabled him to meet most interesting people.
19 March, 2009 (7:30-9:00pm)
Sacral Transformations: The Synthesis of Analysis, Religion and Radical Politics
GOTTFRIED HEUERAt Ascona, the small Swiss village which was the Bohemian countercultural capital of Europe at the turn of the last century, three men met and started a revolution by analyzing politics and politicizing analysis and imbuing them with a sense of the sacred. Otto Gross, the psychoanalyst, Erich Muhsam, the anarchist writer, and Johannes Nohl, the religious scholar, recognized individual change as prerequisite for collective transformation. They came to see as one the relationship of the individual to him/herself, to the other, to collective society, and to God.
21 May, 2009 (7:30-9:00pm)
On First Looking into Ted Hughes' Letters
EAN BEGGThe Poet Laureate was one of the century's most prolific and
durable poetic geniuses. The Hughes voice is made up of many tones and
timbres - an extraordinarily flexible instrument, capable of
tenderness, intimacy, grandeur and purity. A volume of his letters was
published not long ago.
After the lecture we will toast Ean Begg on his forthcoming 80th
birthday
18 June, 2009 (7:30-9:00pm)
Pentecost: Fire from Heaven
ELIZABETH GORDON"And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting, and there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost and began to speak with other tongues." This talk will explore the story of Pentecost from a Jungian perspective, focussing particularly on the symbolism of the mighty wind, the cloven tongues of fire and the coming of the Holy Spirit and examining what it means to speak with other tongues. We will compare this story with that of Prometheus, punished for stealing fire from heaven, and examine both in the light of present day experience and the dreams of individuals.
16 July, 2009 (7:30-9:00pm)
The Valley Spirit - an Introduction to Taoism
SHANTENA SABBADINIThe boundaries of Taoist philosophy are fuzzy and its basic notions can be interpreted in various ways. In spite of this (or perhaps actually because of this!) its texts have an uncanny way to speak rather precisely to our contemporary philosophical and existential concerns. One of the challenges of Taoist texts of Taoism is the invitation to hold multiple meanings of words, concepts and statements together. It's an invitation to function not so much in an either/or mode as in an and/and mode. Using a simile from my original field of study, we are challenged to hold a quantum superposition view of things, rather than a classical, object-oriented one. Tao is "the Way" but it is also "ways". As we shall see, the Lao Tzu and the Chuang Tzu can be read both as mystical statements and as treatises of metaethics: statements about what can be meaningfully said about the "true" and the "good".
Saturday 18 July 2009
- TAOISM EMBODIED: Moving Imagination in the T'ai Chi Ch'uan - A workshop with Tim Lamford and Caroline Reommele
For further information and booking form click on Saturday Conferences
While many of our evening speakers are analysts, we also invite speakers who work in areas such as medicine, religion or the arts whose contributions serve to widen our discussions beyond the bounds of clinical practice.
It is not necessary to book in advance for these lectures. Admission payable at the door £8 (£6 concessions).
Some lectures are recorded and CDs may be purchased for £7 (including p&p) or borrowed by members for £5. Purchase from the Library. No other recording is permitted. Email the