Monomyths

No

But I'm guessing the idea of the monomyth is derived from comparing hero stories and finding similar elements that cross them and ignoring when some stories lack those elements

However I'm not sure I entirely agree since from what I know about mythological studies only a few ancient cultures are classified as actually having a heroic age and thus a massive wealth of heroes to draw on- most others only have a few heroes- such as Sumeria having Gilgamesh. The majority of these cultures are also Indo-European in origin, so being able to compare the similarities of Cuchulainn and Hercules and Beowulf and see that they have a lot of elements in common isn't really surprising.

Other ancient cultures like Egypt aren't really big on the "mortal goes around doing tons of heroic shit" type of myth but instead have a much stronger religious culture centered around their gods. I'm just speculating but this might be because it didn't really serve the purposes of the god-kings of Egypt to have random half-gods in myth running around doing stuff, since that would undermine the divinity of the pharoah.

Yeah it's an interesting theory and a good read. Best to take it with a pinch of salt, as anyone's ideas though.

>The title is some variation of "The [character] with/who/that ..."

That's a dead giveaway on how shit its going to be.

>>8755602
Campbell based his ideas on Jung, so that does make me skeptical if all his ideas are valid. I was interested in it, but would rather just read a contemporary and plain anthropological textbook that deals with myth.
I am curious how new findings in psychology match with myths and myth making.

If anyone knows a good (text)book that deals with it, please let me know.

>>8755642
>I'm fucking retarded: The post

>>8755611
This is incorrect. Campbell specifically focuses on Egyptian mythology to emphasize similarities with Zoroastrian, Jewish, and Ancient greek myths, such as the Journey to and back from the underworld by Osiris, the virgin birth and savior/messianic elements of Horus, the ancient cosmology of the sky deity coming down to embrace the earth and create from unity a universe of opposites, etc. He draws parallels between folk tales of African trickster gods and those of Ancient Greek and Roman mythology, finds through lines of the hero quest in tales from ancient American indians, east asian, and indo-european tribal groups that seem to convincingly enforce his thesis of the monomyth.

However, most of his thought is staunchly Freudian and Jungian, and if you don't agree with the notion of universal faculties of the human unconscious or the interpretive power of psychoanalysis, you may not find much here other than a survey of folk myths with some considerable similarities. It's also possible that he has ignored folk myths without these facets of the monomyth that he advocates in order to selectively bolster his thesis. I haven't read a ton of comparative anthropologists so I don't know what the pervading accepted academic theory is, but I've also read Levi-Strauss who advocates similar universality of the mythic structure

>>8755697
I can tell you that there is a theory that myths share common ancestory. Note nothing like the Jung or Freud stuff.

>>8755751
I believe that it's also not crazy to think that different people in different times had similar thoughts

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>>8755602
Jungian pseudo mystic bullshit

I refer to any serious thinkers interested in the topic to pic related

>>8755787
Do they directly address and criticize Jung's collective unconscious?

>>8755810
No Jung isn't worth their time. What they do address is the reasons for the similarities in the developement of mythological traditions in different cultures over time.

>>8755813
shit dude sounds interesting. You wouldn't be able to give me a super quick and dirty that'll whet my whistle up until I can get my hands on the book would ya?

>>8755787
>Frankfurt School

I'll pass

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>>8755820
Its all available online at a simple google search

http://www.contrib.andrew.cmu.edu/~randall/Readings%20W2/Horkheimer_Max_Adorno_Theodor_W_Dialectic_of_Enlightenment_Philosophical_Fragments.pdf

>>8755820
don't read it, it's trash

>>8755843
Why do you say that?
Without using the words Jews or Cultural Marxism

>>8755841
oh wicked, thanks

>>8755851
Just as it assumes contemporary understanding of myths are based off of bourgeois interpretation that morphs everything into a hero journey of conquest with the adjusted male at the center, they in turn interpret everything through the lexicon of class struggle.

They miss the humor inherent in the fact that all interpretations of history do so through contemporary agenda-specific lenses

>>8755867
They don't miss any such notion however, thats the entire point of a dialectic.
Its a conscious reworking through history through the perspective in which its end is contained in its beginning. In fact what you describe is predominantly what the work investigates

>>8755834
what's wrong with Frankfurt school

>Campbell'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.

>>8755618
>Yeah it's an interesting theory and a good read. Best to take it with a pinch of salt, as anyone's ideas though.
Please never post again

>>8755896
It's a sausage fest

>>8755915
Kek

>>8755642
>>8755666
Ironically, the best counter to this is The Man Without Qualities.

>>8755930
How is that ironic

>>8755911
What is this from?

>>8755948
Because many of the titles that would fit the category anon referred to follow the formula, "The [Person] with the [Quality]". E.g. Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Man with the Golden Arm, Girl with the Golden Eyes, Man with the Compound Eyes.

>>8756554
Thats not the question. Its why that book in particular is ironically a counter

>>8756562
It's a good book, and possibly the only one titled by that formula. And yet...

>>8755930
But the book we're talking about isn't genre fiction as that poster seems to assume, not even fiction. It's an extensive academic piece.

>>8757317
Completely irrelevant, quit being autistic

>>8757845
In what way is it irrelevant?