Critical Essay | Critical Essay by Robert A. Segal

Critical Essay by Robert A. Segal

SOURCE: Segal, Robert A. “Joseph Campbell's Mythology: A Review Essay.” Southern Humanities Review 25, no. 3 (summer 1991): 267-75.

In the following essay, Segal underscores the significance of mythology to Campbell's oeuvre.

No one in this generation did more to revive popular interest in myth than Joseph Campbell. He preached myth the way others preach religion. He even opposed myth to religion. For him, myth alone has saving power. Whoever has myth is contented, and whoever does not is forlorn. Campbell beseeched humanity to “live by” myth. Because living by myth requires understanding myth, Campbell not only amassed myths but, even more, analyzed them. He regarded himself as a theorist of myth, not merely as a teller of myths.

I. the Power of Myth

Campbell had been popular ever since his first book, The Hero with a Thousand Faces (1949), but the 1988 public television interviews with Bill Moyers made him legendary. The Power of...
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