On Reading Several Books At One Time

I just completed Arthur Miller's "double" biography of Wolfgang Pauli and Carl Jung.

I mentioned earlier that it is remarkable that in just a few pages someone can "explain" Carl Jung and Sigmund Freud in language I can understand. Although it was just a brief overview of their writings and their philosophy, it is interesting how much it has helped me.

I am now reading Diane Wood Middlebrook's biography of Anne Sexton.

She [Anne Sexton] appears to have made a friend who directed her to a number of books she mentioned in therapy: Freud on the Oedipus complex, on the theory of the superego, and on "Creative Writers and Daydreaming"; Jung on the notion of the self conversing with the self; a book about women's sexuality; a book arguing in favor of silence on the part of the analyst." -- p. 53.

Had I not recently read Miller's biography of Pauli/Jung, I am not so sure I would have appreciated that passage as much.

This is just one more example of how reading several books on broad range of subjects takes one places one would never expect. (When I say "broad range," of course that has to be taken in context. To most, I would assume, my reading choices are in a narrow band, something perhaps to talk about later.)