Description
Book SynopsisCraig E. Stephensonâs Ages of Anxiety examines how W. H. Auden in his Pulitzer Prize winning poem, The Age of Anxiety, used C. G. Jungâs psychological types to structure and explore his responses to war and the rise of fascism.
This newly revised edition of Stephensonâs 2015 ZÃrich Lecture Series tracks Audenâs notion of the poetâs responsibilities and of the importance of the symbolic life in a time of conflict. The book tracks how Audenâs poem inspired Leonard Bernsteinâs second symphony and how three choreographers (Jerome Robbins, John Neumeier, Liam Scarlett) created dances set to this work, with Jungâs psychology running through all these creative extrapolations like a common thread. In this expanded edition, Stephenson considers how the contemporary essayists Scott Stossel and Roberto Calasso employ Audenâs poem as touchstones for their own explorations of the meaning of anxiety in our time.
Ages of Anxiety will be of interest to analytical ps
