Joseph Campbell, who died on October 31, 1987, was the world's foremost authority on mythology, a preeminent scholar, writer, and teacher whose work has had a profound influence on millions. To him, mythology was "the song of the universe, the music of the spheres."
In The Power of Myth, he and distinguished journalist Bill Moyers offer a brilliant combination of wisdom and wit in conversations that range from modern marriage ("Marriage is a relationship. When you make the sacrifice in marriage, you're sacrificing not to each other but to unity in a relationship") to virgin births, from savior figures to heroic figures such as Luke Skywalker from Star Wars ("...By overcoming the dark passions, the hero symbolizes our ability to control the irrational savages within us.")
The Power of Myth is a great summing up of Joseph Campbell's work, sure to stand alongside his two celebrated classics The Hero With a Thousand Faces and The Masks of God and his recent The Atlas of World Mythology.
It’s been a few years since I read this but there is just as much great stuff in here this time through. I think this book, these ideas, shaped my brain more than I ever realized. So many of these ideas are just second nature now.
Idealistic and/or swampy in parts but so provoking, challenging, and valuable.
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