The Hero with a Thousand Faces

This book is basically just Campbell making an assertion and then 50 pages of quotes that supposedly back up his claim. There's basically no interpretation of them whatsoever.

You're better off just looking at some hero's journey chart and then reading the myths.

no
yes & no, the quotes that campbell includes are essential and his interpretation lies in the assertion they are cited to reinforce- how are you getting this wrong?

the book is written to be accessible so you're most likely stupid.

campbell is not a good author in that he makes references to other texts containing a "center of the world over [a] serpents head" as a means of quickly referencing yet more evidence of his claims when really the evidence is unnecessary. reading "hero" is good if you want to get better at plot analysis or character analysis

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>t. midwit who treats the creation of art as a trade and not a sacred science meant to save humanity
if you're lucky you'll peak at writing network sitcoms

If you're that much of a brainlet just watch the lecture series with the introduction by susan sarandon.

bump

>Frye

what´s his first name?

philip

stop bullshitting, i want the name of the book

lmgtfy.com/?q=frye literary scholar

impressive, very nice

It's funny you would say that, since star wars was directly inspired by campbells work.

ampbell's main thesis is that all of the hero myths in human history are merely expressions of a single "monomyth" that transcends culture. The trouble is that Campbel achieves this "monomyth" by the simple expedient of including every possible variation into his definition. A hero is called to quest, does or does not accept, is or is not helped by a wise guide, is or is not granted supernatural aid, does or does not fight an enemy who may or may not have supernatural attributes, does or does not survive and does or does not return home. To dilute things even more, Campbell includes an array of other, sundry possibilities in order to be able to encompass as many mythological stories as possible. And yet, despite having crafted a thesis that appears to be so broad as to be almost meaningless, Campbell still has to stretch some of the stories he cites beyond all recognition to fit them under the umbrella. In short, most hero myths probably are part of the Campbellian monomyth simply because Campbell made the monomyth such a big tent that almost any story could fit under it. While this makes his thesis more or less true, it also makes it pretty much completely worthless.

By his own admission he wrote it for artists

Joseph Campbell is Freud of Mythology. In several meaning.

The man was great at picking out quotes, though. Here's the first one I have flagged in my copy:
"'I had to climb a mountain. There were all kinds of obstacles in the way. I had now to jump over a ditch, now to get over a hedge, and finally to stand still because I had lost my breath.' This was the dream of a stutterer."

He's a dirty, dirty Platonist

This too

friendly reminder that Campbell only wrote this because he read Finnegans Wake. the "monomyth" is literally FW.

I think that it still has value in that case, if only because now people can reference and think of other and older works when they make their own work. It's not like humans have changed their biology, the patterns in the language, technology/culture steer us towards chaotic interpretations of meaning(i.e. nothing has value) while our instincts are to ceaselessly inscribe value through meaning(youtube videos about crack theories of old cartoons/movies).

It's not so much that a 'monomyth' is true or not so much as people desire simplicity of human experience. As long as you offer an explanation for what humans do and why, and act like you know what you are talking about, then you'll get attention because people want to believe you're right, not because you're actually right.

Myths to Live By>The Hero with a Thousand Faces