The Hero with a Thousand Faces — Joseph Campbell
“The image of man within is not to be confounded with the garments.”
Start — 11/22/16 Finish — 12/1/16
Thoughts:
I actually haven’t struggled reading something denser than I’m used to for a while. The last book I read with a similar level of poetic prose was probably The Sympathizer, but even that was a bit more palatable than Campbell’s The Hero with a Thousand Faces. This is less of a complaint and more of a dissatisfaction on my end for not being able to take all of this rich information in on a first read. The book is really brimming with insight and meaning in every chapter. Campbell reaches into hundreds of different myths and folktales to make his points and show how certain symbols have become forever etched into this human story-telling formula over generations and across the world. It really makes me want to reread some older pieces of fiction and try to pick up on the symbols that I’ve inevitably glossed over in my ignorance. I guess that’s why Nabokov said “one cannot read a book; one can only reread it.”
I enjoyed the book overall, but I have to admit it was a slog to get through. If I lost focus for a second, I’d find myself in stranded in the middle of one of Campbell’s extravagant descriptions of the hero soul, at which point a small part of my brain would melt for a moment. Combine that with my incessant need to take full notes on what I’m reading for later reference, and all of a sudden you have a slightly uncomfortable reading experience. At times I wished there would be end of chapter summaries (like they like to use in those pop-science books these days) in which Campbell would throw away all the flourishes and tell me what I needed to know in layman’s terms. But I suppose that would suck the beauty out of all of it.
Ultimately, this was an incredibly insightful read, and I think it can have a large impact on how you interpret and understand stories and fiction going forward.
Score: 7/10
Notes:
· The Monomyth
o The hero is the man or woman who has been able to battle past his personal and local historical limitations to the generally valid, normally human forms; such a one’s visions, ideas, and inspirations “come pristine from the primary springs of human life and thought”
o The hero’s second task is then to return to us, reborn, and teach the lesson he has learned of life renewed
o Motifs of perils, obstacles, and good fortunes of the hero’s path will be everlastingly recurrent from tale to tale
· Tragedy and Comedy
o Tragedy is the shattering of the forms and of our attachment to the forms; comedy, the wide and careless, inexhaustible joy of life invincible
o The two are terms of a single mythological them and experience: the down-going and the up-coming, which together constitute the totality of the revelation that is life… and must be known if one is to go through catharsis
o So the stories of tragedies and comedies are much less about an individual doing this or that, but rather a fundamentally inward journey that all can identify with
· The Hero and the God
o The standard path:
§ Separation: a hero ventures forth from the world of common day into a region of supernatural wonder
§ Initiation: forces are there encountered and a decisive victory is won
§ Return: the hero comes back from this adventure with the power to bestow boons on his fellow man
o Whether presented in the vast images of the Orient (Buddha), in the vigorous narratives of the Greeks (Prometheus), or in the legends of the Bible (Moses), the adventure of the hero normally follows the pattern of the standard path
o The morphology of the adventure varies very little beyond surface changes (ex: microcosmic triump v. macrocosmic triumph, small v. large symbolic deficiencies in the environment, returning for the sake of one group v. society at large…); if one basic element of the pattern is omitted, it is bound to be somehow or other implied
o “The great deed of the supreme hero is to come to the knowledge of this unity in multiplicity and then to make it known.”
· The World Navel
o The effect of the successful adventure of the hero is the unlocking and release again of the flow of life into the body of the world (either represented through God’s grace, food substance, or energy)
o This life force pours from a specific source, the point of entry being the center of the symbolic circle of the universe
o These centers are usually marked and sanctified (sometimes as temples and sanctuaries), sometimes being where a hero was born or has accomplished a great deed, in order to serve as a support for fruitful meditation others
o The Navel is ubiquitous and yields the world’s abundance of both good and evil — it is only when the hero’s virtue quells the self-centered ego that he can achieve a transpersonal centeredness
· The Call to Adventure
o The adventure can start in a variety of ways — sometimes by accident or blunder — but many of these ways are the result of suppressed desires and conflicts
o These powers often manifest themselves as “the herald” character, and the crisis of his appearance is the “call to adventure”; whether the call is small or great or whatever stage of life involved, the call rings up the curtain on a certain mystery
o The familiar life horizon has officially been outgrown: old concepts, ideals, and emotional patterns no longer fit, which means the hero must now pass through some threshold
o There is always an atmosphere of irresistible fascination about the figure that appears suddenly as guide, marking a new stage; this stage that has to be faced is very familiar to the unconscious and all of its unknown
· Refusal of the Call
o The refusal is usually a desire to not give up what one takes to be one’s own interest, including the hero’s current value systems and goals
o What refusals represent is an impotence to put off the infantile ego, with its sphere of emotional relationships and ideals; the hero is fearful of both punishment or the journey to a world in flux
o The refusal of a new way of life on part of the hero usually results in some sort of punishment or exile, which is then only relieved with some sort of outside aid
· Supernatural Aid
o For those who have not refused the call, the first encounter of the journey is with a protective figure who provides the adventurer with some “amulets” against the forces he is about to face
o The helpful crone or fairy godmother is a familiar feature of European fairy lore, while in Christian legends the role is commonly played by the Virgin; whatever their appearance, they represent the benign, protecting power of destiny
o These guides, teachers, and helpers also often represent the hero’s ambiguous unconscious, which serves to initiate the adventure without the hero’s conscious will
· The Crossing of the First Threshold
o The hero moves forward until he comes to the threshold guardian, standing for the limits of the hero’s present sphere and guarding the entrance to the realm of the unknown
o The regions of the unknown reflect back unconscious content in the form of threats of violence and fancied dangerous delight (ex: ogres, sirens, forest women
o While the guardian has a protective aspect, it is only by advancing beyond those bounds, provoking the destructive aspect of the same power, that the individual passes into a new zone of experience
o The terrors of this passing generally recede before a genuine psychological readiness, courage, and competence
· The Belly of the Whale
o Instead of conquering or conciliating the power of the threshold, the hero is swallowed into the unknown — sometimes appearing to have died
o This popular motif of being swallowed by some type of monster (other times simply entering a temple interior) emphasizes that passage of the threshold is a form of self-annihilation; instead of passing outward, the hero goes inward in order to be born again
o Throughout the world, men whose function it has been to make visible the life-fructifying mystery of crossing the threshold have enacted upon their own bodies the symbolic act of scattering their flesh
Initiation
· The Road of Trials
o Having traversed the threshold, the hero moves in a dream landscape where he must survive a succession of trials — sometimes covertly aided by advice/amulets or a benign power everywhere supporting him
o The hero (man or woman, figure of myth or dreamer) discovers and assimilates his opposite either by swallowing it or by being swallowed; pride, virtue, beauty, life must all be put aside
o The ordeal will determine whether the hero can destroy his ego and embrace/submit to all opposites — there will be many preliminary victories and illuminations along the way
· The Meeting with the Goddess
o When all barriers and monsters have been overcome, the ultimate adventure is usually represented as a mystical marriage of the hero-soul and the Queen Goddess of the World
o This goddess takes many forms: she can be mother, sister, mistress or bride, so long as she represents a paragon of beauty, the reply to all desire, or the bliss-bestowing goal of every hero’s quest (not necessarily benign, however)
o These goddess/mother characters usually at once represent two aspects — good and bad — which the hero is to contemplate with equal equanimity; through this exercise his spirit is purged of its infantile sentimentalities and resentments
o This dualism can take physical form, such that the goddess will appear ugly or disgusting to those with either the still infantile mindset or an ungentle heart; only the kind and understanding hero can embrace her in this state
· Woman as the Temptress
o Soon after embrace with the Goddess, the hero usually realizes some sort of revulsion to the world, the body, and the woman above all — they become symbols no longer of victory but of defeat
o The female character turns into a physical embodiment of sin and distraction, something the hero must repel if he is to move forward in his quest
· Atonement with the Father
o In most mythologies, the images of mercy and grace of the father/god figure are rendered as vividly as those of justice and wrath, so that a balance is maintained
o Atonement consists of the abandonment of the self-generated double monster — the dragon thought to be God (super ego) and the dragon thought to be Sin (repressed id)
o The hero will usually derive hope and assurance from the helpful female figure first, by whose magic he is protected through all the frightening experiences of the father’s ego-shattering initiation
o Whether he knows it or not, and no matter what his position in society, the father is the initiating priest through whom the young hero passes on into the larger world
· Apotheosis
o When the envelopment of consciousness has been annihilated, then the hero becomes free of all fear, beyond the reach of change; this is the release potential within us all, which anyone can attain through hero-hood
o The biblical Adam and Eve story is a version of a myth known to many: it represents one of the basic ways of symbolizing the mystery of creation — the development of eternity into time, one into the many, and new life through the re-conjunction of the two
o The hero must work past the prejudices of his provincially limited ecclesiastical, tribal, or national rendition of the world archetypes in order to understand that the supreme initiation is not that of the local motherly fathers, but something much greater
· The Ultimate Boon
o The hero of fairy tales, upon becoming a superior man, faces an easy adventure after his trial; this is distinguished from legends of incarnate gods, where the hero may still have to face a test
o The motif of the inexhaustible dish, symbolizing the perpetual life-giving powers of the universal source, is a fairy-tale counterpart to the cornucopia
o The gods and goddesses are to be understood as embodiments and custodians of the elixir of the Imperishable Being, but not themselves the ultimate boon in its primary state; the hero seeks not the gods themselves, but their grace, or the power of their sustaining substance
o However, the gods may be oversevere, overcautious, in which case the hero must trick them of their treasure (ex: Prometheus)
o The boon bestowed on the worshipper is always scaled to his stature and to the nature of his dominant desire; while the hero may ask for the boon of enlightenment, what he generally seeks are longevity, weapons to slay his neighbor, or the health of his child
Return
· Refusal of the Return
o When the quest has been accomplished, the adventurer must still return with his life-transmuting trophy to the kingdom of humanity; however, the responsibility has been frequently refused (ex: Buddha not believing the message could be communicated)
· The Magic Flight
o If the trophy has been attained against the opposition of its guardian, or if the hero’s wish to return to the world has been resented by gods/demons, then the last stage of the myth becomes a lively and sometimes comical pursuit
o A popular variety of the flight is that in which objects are left behind to speak for the fugitive and thus delay pursuit; another involves the wildly fleeing hero tossing obstacles behind to delay his pursuer
· Rescue from Without
o The hero may have to be brought back from his supernatural adventure by assistance from without
o Some heroes know the power of the zone into which they are entering so well that they take precaution to have themselves saved if something bad happens
o Instead of holding to and saving his ego, as in the pattern of the magic flight, he loses it, and yet, through grace is returned
· The Cross of the Return Threshold
o The hero’s difficulty upon return is teaching something that has been taught correctly and incorrectly learned a thousand times, throughout the millennia of mankind’s folly
o Crossing the threshold once more forces the hero to confront earthly matters, pains, and disillusionment once again; sometimes the hero will shield himself through some sort of insulation, like a horse that separates him from the ground or some particular garb that sets him apart
· Master of the Two Worlds
o Freedom to pass back and forth across the world division, not contaminating the principles of the one with those of the other (but permitting the mind to know both), is the talent of the master
o The individual, through prolonged psychological disciplines, gives up completely all attachment to his personal limitations, hopes and fears, no longer resists the self-annihilation that is prerequisite to rebirth… and so becomes ripe for the at-one-ment
· Keys
o In the later stages of many mythologies, the key images hide among the secondary anecdote and rationalization; for when a civilization has passed from a mythological to a secular point of view, the older images are no longer felt or quite approved
o “Wherever the poetry of myth is interpreted as biography, history, or science, it is killed. The living images become only remote facts of a distant time or sky.”
Emanations
· From Psychology to Metaphysics
o It is through these wondrous tales which pretend to describe the lives of legendary heroes that symbolic expression is given to the unconscious desires, fears, and tensions that underlie the conscious patterns of human behavior
o Mythology is psychology misread as biography, history, and cosmology
o While myths share many common features with dreams, we must remember their constant patterns are consciously controlled, and their function is to serve as a powerful picture language to communicate traditional wisdom
· The Universal Round
o The cosmogonic cycle — the passage of universal consciousness from the deep sleep zone of the unmanifest, through dream, to the full day of waking with energy replenished, and then back again — is representative of the actual experience of every living being
o Myth remains within this ceaseless cycle, but represents it as surrounded and permeated by the silence (God Eternal, which is uninvolved in the opening-and-closings of the round)
· World Formation
o The first effect of the cosmogonic emanations (from the initial void) is the framing of the world stage of space; the second is the production of life within the frame
o The process is often represented in the form of the cosmic egg — the egg being the world frame, while the fertile seed-power within typifies the life dynamism of nature
o The paradox of myth is of its dual focus; just as at the opening of the cosmogonic cycle it was possible to say “God is not involved,” but at the same time “God is creator-preserver-destroyer,” so now where the One breaks into the many, destiny “happens,” but at the same time is “brought about”
The Virgin Birth
· Mother Universe
o The world-generating spirit of the father passes into the manifold of earthly experience through the transforming medium of the mother of the world (space, time, causality — the shell of the cosmic egg)
· Womb of Redemption
o Much after world creation, the world of human life becomes the problem; the field of consciousness so contracts from its initial vast state that society lapses into mistake and disaster
o A woman will be born who will maintain herself undefiled of the fashionable errors of her generation; her womb will be the one to bear the hero-savior who will redeem the world from its nadir (or in some cases a world-annihilating demon)
Transformations of the Hero
· The Primordial Hero
o At this stage in the cosmogonic cycle, we move from metaphysics and world creation to prehistory and legend; the heroes over time become less and less fabulous, until the legends open into the common daylight of recorded time
o In earlier times, the emperor was the carrier of a special world-creating and world-sustaining power, very much greater than that represented in the normal human physique
o Later, the work was to be done by man in his normal form — through control of the passions, exploration of the arts, elaboration of the economic and cultural institutions of the state
· The Childhood of the Human Hero
o The tendency has always been to endow the hero with extraordinary power from the moment of birth or conception — this is in accordance with the idea that herohood is predestined
o Most biographies of legend exhibit the variously rationalized theme of the infant exile and return; folktales commonly support or replace this theme of exile with that of the despised one (the abused youngest sibling, the orphan, stepchild, ugly duckling, or low ranking squire)
o The child of destiny generally has to face a long period of obscurity, danger, or disgrace in order to learn some lesson which resides just beyond the sphere of the normal world; all of this requires strength, cleverness, and wisdom
o The conclusion of the cycle is the return or recognition of the hero, when his true character is revealed (many times after a considerable crisis)
· The Hero as Warrior
o The hero of myth is the champion not of things become but of things becoming; the dragon to be slain by him is precisely the monster of the status quo
o The hero of human form similarly has tyrants to slay, usually in the form of monsters remaining from primeval times or tyrants of human breed — the elementary deeds of this hero are those of clearing the field
o The hero can also take form as emperor (who brings wisdom back to humanity), tyrant (the emperor who has lost his way and no longer mediates between the two worlds), world redeemer (basically the physical incarnation of the father, and the saint (one who renounces the world upon attaining enlightenment)
· Departure
o Death holds for the hero no terror, but sometimes he resists death or postpones it for a certain time
Dissolutions
· End of the Microcosm
o The individual hero soul then comes to the fullness of its stature and power through assimilating the deities that formerly had been thought to be separate from and outside of it; they are projections of its own being, and thus as it returns to its true state they are all reassumed
· End of the Macrocosm
o As the created form of the individual must dissolve, so that of the universe also; the end of the cosmogonic cycle yields an all-engulfing cataclysm of sorts
Phrases/Quotes:
· It has always been the prime function of mythology and rite to supply the symbols that carry the human spirit forward, in counteraction to those constant human fantasies that tend to tie it back.
· And where we had thought to find an abomination, we shall find a god; where we had thought to slay another, we shall slay ourselves; where we had thought to travel outward, we shall come to the center of our own existence; where we had thought to be alone, we shall be with all the world.
· “I feel myself driven towards an end that I do not know. As soon as I shall have reached it, as soon as I shall become unnecessary, an atom will suffice to shatter me. Till then, not all the forces of mankind can do anything against me.”
· There can be no question: the psychological dangers which earlier generations were guided by the symbols and spiritual exercises of their mythological and religious inheritance, we today must face alone, or, at best, with only tentative, impromptu, and not often very effective guidance. This is our problem as modern, “enlightened” individuals, for whom all gods and devils have been rationalized out of existence.
· Such comparatively trivial matters as the remaining details of the credo, the techniques of worship, and devices of episcopal organization, are merely pedantic snares, unless kept ancillary to the major teaching.
· It is obvious that the infantile fantasies which we all cherish still in the unconscious play continually into myth, fairy tale, and the teachings of the church, as symbols of indestructible being. This is helpful, for the mind feels at home with the images, and seems to be remembering something already known. But the circumstance is obstructive too, for the feelings come to rest in the symbols and resist passionately every effort to go beyond.
· The agony of breaking through personal limitations Is the agony of spiritual growth. Art, literature, myth and cult, philosophy, and ascetic disciplines are instruments to help the individual past his limiting horizons into spheres of ever-expanding realization. As he crosses threshold after threshold, conquering dragon after dragon, the stature of the divinity that he summons to his highest wish increases, until it subsumes the cosmos.
· As dreams that were momentous by night may seem simply silly in the light of day, so the poet and the prophet can discover themselves playing the idiot before a jury of sober eyes.
· Symbols are only the vehicles of communication; they must not be mistaken for the final term, the tenor, of their reference. No matter how attractive of impressive they may seem, they remain but convenient means, accommodated to the understanding. Hence the personality of God or personalities of God… no one should attempt to read or interpret as the final thing. Mistaking a vehicle for its tenor may lead to the spilling not only of valueless ink, but of valuable blood.
· Myth is but the penultimate; the ultimate is openness into which the mind must plunge alone and be dissolved. Therefore, God and the gods are only convenient means — themselves of the nature of the world of names and forms, through eloquent of, and ultimately conducive to, the ineffable. They are mere symbols to move and awaken the mind, and to call it past themselves.
· The whole society becomes visible to itself as an imperishable living unit. Generations of individuals pass, like anonymous cells from a living body; but the sustaining, timeless form remains. By an enlargement of vision to embrace this superindividual, each discovers himself enhanced, enriched, supported, and magnified. His role, however unimpressive, is seen to be intrinsic to the beautiful festival-image of man — the image, potential yet necessarily inhibited, within himself.
· The image of man within is not to be confounded with the garments.
