Accountants – 'know thyself'

This paper examines the concept of the 'self' of an accountant through psychology, philosophy and literature. It looks at what Marx and Jung read to see how that influenced their own writings. We are interested in the concept of self and attempt to illustrate how a person maybe influenced consciously or unconsciously by what they read. We suggest that if accountants and accounting educators took the time to read widely and possibly some of the texts we mention, including Goethe, Gogol, Kafka, Tchehov, Rousseau and Sartre, they may develop a further understanding of their self.