Vilnius pedagogical university faculty of foreign languages department of english philology

In these novels, ritual serves to fulfill the great desire of capturing the past, to make the present meaningful through connection with the past, to overcome death, and to grasp immortality. For John Updike, ritual leads to resurrection, to a foretaste of eternal life. In a decadent society, however, in a society that has lost all sense of the transcendent, ritual degenerates into an empty form, to fill the void with meaningless, unthinking activity. Or it must discover new patterns, new myths, new ways to reintegrate man and to celebrate his vital yearning for the transcendent. (Rainstorms and Fire, p. 27)

4. 
   JOSEPH CAMPBELL’S VISION OF MYTH
   

Joseph Campbell (1904-1987) was, perhaps, the most influential and extraordinary mythologist of the twentieth century. In his introduction to the book The Power of Myth Bill Moyers calles Joseph Campbell “one of the world’s leading scholars of mythology and one of the most exciting teachers of our time; it was said that ‘he could make the bones of folklore and anthropology live.’” (p. xv) Campbell presented the most universal studies of myth, for that reason this paper is based on his theory.
Campbell was not an ordinary academic, for he established a close relationship with the public; he transformed mythology from an inaccessible study into a popular “path” leading to a better understanding of ourselves and our world. Campbell relied on the texts of Carl Jung but he did not agree with every issue brought up by this psychiatrist. For instance, Campbell did not believe in astrology as Jung did. He was mostly interested in symbolism.
His approach to mythology was as original as it was radical. In the introduction to the book The Hero’s Journey Phil Cousineau writes:


Campbell’s comparative historical approach to mythology, religion, and literature, in contrast to the conventional scholar’s emphasis on cultural differences, concentrated on similarities. He was convinced that the common themes or archetypes in our sacred stories and images transcended the variations or cultural manifestations. (p. xi-xii)

Hence it can be said that in his early stage of career Campbell already came to a thought that there are remarkable parallels in our world’s mythological heritage. Besides, a very interesting idea came to his mind that at the heart of the nature, at the very core of all existence there is a fundamental unity. So, he started the search for that unifying theory which could explain everything existing on our planet. According to Phil Cousineau,

To synthesize the constant truths of history became the burning point of his life; to bridge the abyss between science and religion, mind and body, East and West, with the timeless linkage of myths became his task of tasks.” (The Hero’s Journey, p. xi)

Campbell believed that all religions of the world, all the myths, rituals and deities are the “masks” of the same transcendent truth. He often quoted Vedas: “Truth is one; the stages speak of it by many names.” Campbell believed that none of the religions is right but every of them is searching for the same truth, same answer.

What makes Campbell’s theory differ from others is the idea of “monomyth”. When he became intensely interested in Joyce and his works, he approached Joyce’s publisher, Sylvia Beach, who explained to him the writer’s idea of the “monomyth”. This concept means that, according to James Joyce, there is the only one overriding story that everybody lives out. This story is a single one for every individual despite the fact that every man may be of a different race, status, culture, etc. In other words, “monomyth” means that all myths originate from a common source: the communal past of the human race. This thought found its reflections in his best seller The Hero with a Thousand Faces (1949). In this book the mythologist described the hero’s myth and explained that all story-telling, consciously or not, follows the ancient patterns of myth; and that all of them can be understood in terms of the hero myth. Moreover, the book states that all the stories of the world begin in a universal source of the collective unconscious and reflect universal concerns.
Campbell’s quote: “Follow your bliss” has already become the maxim, a catch-phrase. The mythologist believed that at the heart of every hero myth was just that message. By it
Campbell intended that everyone should follow his or her own way, that there is a path for everyone and the thing is just to find it and follow it.
Campbell had a unique vision of myth. He wrote that “Myth is the secret opening through which the inexhaustible energies of the cosmos pour into human manifestation.” (The Hero with a Thousand faces, p. 3) According to the scholar, myths are the ‘masks’ of God through which people seek to relate themselves to the wonders of existence. To Campbell, mythology is “an interior map of experience, drawn by people who have traveled it”, “the song of the universe”, and “the music of the spheres.” (Quoted by Moyers, p. xvi) According to Campbell, myths enrich one’s personality; fill it with purpose and spirit, make people think about their souls and not of “the news of the day and the problems of the hour.” (The Power of Myth, p. 3) His view may be, obviously, best illustrated by his own words: