Hong’s Cave

Whew… That took long…

Ever since I heard about the term “Campbellian Myth” (in the way of “Star Wars”), I’ve been meaning to read some of Joseph Campbell’s works.

In The Hero with a Thousand Faces, it seems that Campbell looked at various myths from all over the world and found some commonalities and patterns among a large class of myths. The book contains various stories from Roman, Greek, Hindu, Arabic, African, and Polynesian myths and more.

If my understanding is correct, Campbell himself is calling this type of myth, a monomyth. Although the book didn’t explain exactly where the term came from, but I am assuming that it is because this class of myths deal mostly with a hero, an individual. The hero, unknownst to himself, will be lured or forced into a journey, often guided or helped by an elder. The hero will then go through adventures or tasks and obtain a special power, knowledge, or a prize. The hero will eventually come back to where he started and benefit the world, by overthrowing a tyrant or helping out the people in other ways.

One interesting twist that some of the stories had was that after the hero has done his/her work and overcame the evil, he/she will eventually become the establishment that the next generation of heroes will rise against. I thought some cultures were more in tune with the cyclic completeness of the world.

I say “a class” of myths since Campbell didn’t seem to quote much from the myths of Far East. I can think of may stories (from Korea and China, mostly) that would fall into the monomyth frame, but I can think of many core myths that don’t quite fit with what the book was describing.

It was an interesting, but not an easy reading. The way I read (only about 10~20 minutes a day), it was just taking way too long. I have a couple more of Campbell’s books, and a bit wary of starting another. :p