A key component of this analysis is Campbell's cross-referencing of different myths of different cultures and historical eras, which clearly demonstrate the parallels between them - parallels that, Campbell contends, prove that the human experience is universal. The main body of the book is made up of Campbell's detailed analysis of the various stages of the Hero's Quest, the various stages of his journey. One of the main ways this happens, according to Campbell, is in the narrative of the Hero's Journey - the story of a mystically, physically powerful individual on a physical quest to retrieve some object or person, a story that is in fact a mythic, symbolic metaphor for the spiritual quest for union (re-union) with the spiritual. Campbell also indicates in the prologue that the purpose of the book is to explore the nature of that spiritual world, the ways in which it manifests in the physical world, and the ways in which myth illuminates those manifestations. That theory is that there are three central truths at the core of the spiritual and psychological belief systems of all cultures in all times and in all places: that there is a spiritual world existing in parallel with the physical that the ultimate goal of physical existence is to connect with that spiritual world and that truth is both explored and defined through the universal human experience of myth. The book begins with a prologue, in which the author, noted mythologist Joseph Campbell, outlines both his core theory and the literary/analytical process he uses in the book to illuminate it.
As part of that exploration, the author develops themes relating to the universality of human experience, the nature of duality and harmony, and the function of symbolism in both story and life. The author, a noted mythologist whom some would call a philosopher, uses the archetypal story of the adventurous hero's journey as a springboard to explore essential human truths.
This book, published in the late 1940s, is an enlightening evocation of the power of myth and meaning to transcend time, place, culture, gender and spiritual perspective.
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