Carl Jung on the Creative Element.

Carl Jung on the Creative Element.

C.G. Jung Letters, Vol. 1: 1906-1950

To Dr. Tochtermann

Dear Colleague, 13 January 1940

By the “creative element” you probably mean a person’s creative faculty.

Your question as to whether this faculty is present from the beginning is not easy to answer.

There are undoubtedly cases where one can take it as certain that it was present from the start, but in other cases it seems to develop in the course of life.

I personally incline to the view that this faculty, like everything else, was present from the start.

Your second question, regarding the relation between creativity and the mother complex, can be answered as follows: A creative person who has not yet developed this faculty sufficiently will generally have a mother complex, which does not mean that anyone with a mother complex is also creative.

So when a mother complex is resolved by analysis, in one case a creative person will emerge, in another a timid little boy who would rather have hidden behind his mother all his life. In the first case the mother complex is unreal, in the other it is real.

With collegial regards,

Yours sincerely,