Through fantasy books, films and games, good and bad, the same main character- "the chosen one". Where did this image come from, what function is it intended to perform in world culture, can the chosen one fail or take the side of evil? Joseph Campbell's book The Hero with a Thousand Faces will help us answer these questions.

Our hero

Who is the chosen one, everyone knows. For many, this is a faded stamp, now mercilessly ridiculed. Of course, the crude exploitation of a character who, after leaving the village, saves the world, gets half the kingdom with the princess and personally overthrows the main villain, deserves ridicule. But the best incarnations of the chosen one, whether it's Neo from The Matrix, Frodo from The Lord of the Rings, or Luke Skywalker from Star Wars' are becoming cult. Why? "Classics
can"? But many of these classics live in the present.

To understand the chosen one, let's turn to Joseph Campbell's research in the field of myth and fairy tales - the book "The Hero with a Thousand Faces".

Joseph Campbell

American scholar of mythology and religion. He developed the theory of monomyth, which reveals the common features of the mythological-religious and fairy-tale world heritage. He became widely known thanks to the book The Hero with a Thousand Faces, published in 1949. It was she who was guided by George Lucas when creating Star Wars.

Coming from eternity

The "stamp" about the chosen one arose in the nth millennium BC, almost simultaneously with the appearance of myths as such. Even Campbell does not undertake to argue where the myths about the formation of the Hero came from. But all peoples and tribes have such legends, including the islanders isolated from the whole world.

Based on the psychoanalysis of Sigmund Freud and the analytical psychology of Carl Jung, Campbell comes to the conclusion that stories about the formation of a hero and the salvation of the world are formed by the very psyche of a person under the influence of images of universal symbolism - archetypes.

A simplified (and fun) model of the hero's journey. Artist Esbjorn Jorsater (Wikimedia Commons)

The Chosen Ones also live in science fiction, but their true homeland is not even fantasy, but legends and fairy tales. Vladimir Propp, who devoted his life to the study of the fairy-tale heritage, argued that the fairy tale is a degraded myth. Myths, in turn, are the remnants of ancient religions that have not survived to this day. Once upon a time, their task was to give a person instructions leading to spiritual development. George Lucas put it this way:

Myths tell old stories without threatening us. They are an imaginary place where you are safe. But they contain real truths that need to be spoken about. Sometimes these truths are so painful that fictional stories become the only way to perceive them.

The edifications in question are not necessarily religious. The messages of myths and fairy tales are often aimed at helping to overcome the crisis associated with growing up or moral growth. As they say, a fairy tale is a lie, but there is a hint in it - a lesson for good fellows. And the lesson cannot be explained on the fingers - examples are needed. Here comes the turn of our hero.

George Lucas: the most famous fan Campbell. He even arranged for his favorite culturologist a personal screening of Star Wars.

The true chosen one is the one who has time to mature and develop. If we have a fairy tale before us, he must part with childhood and enter into adult life, full of difficulties (they are monsters and feats). If a myth or a religious text - rise above the ordinary, grow spiritually and morally. And if fantasy ... the ideological load remains on the conscience of the author. As well as the mission to tell the eternal story to their contemporaries in a new way. On this occasion, the same Lucas noted:

I'm retelling an old myth in a new way. Each society knows this myth and retells it in its own way, depending on the environment in which it lives. The idea is the same everywhere. The only difference is how it is localized.

Campbell singled out the stages of the wanderings of the eternal hero that are universal for myths and fairy tales and outlined the meaning of each of them. By examples contemporary stories we see that the ancient mechanism is still working today.

Stage 1: Exodus

The hero does not have to be a peasant or an introvert teenager, which is abused by writers and screenwriters, focusing on the average representative of the target audience. To fit into the framework outlined by Campbell, you can be anything from an animated plush toy to a great king or a god of medium size. "Level" does not matter, even a "pumped" character can take the path of the chosen one. All the same, according to the laws of the genre, he will have a hard time.

First calls

If you haven't received a letter from Hogwarts at the age of eleven...

The “call to wander” reaches the ears of the hero. It can be Morpheus's insinuating voice: "Wake up, Neo", or Gandalf, who appeared on the threshold of Bilbo, or a letter from Hogwarts. The methods are different, but the essence is the same: something pushes the hero to leave the beaten paths of life. The center of gravity is transferred from the ordinary to the area of ​​the unknown.

Gravity is meant precisely spiritual, because all subsequent events and miracles will become a symbolic reflection of the spiritual path of the hero. In any case, this was the case at a time when the dragon, for example, was considered the keeper of secret knowledge, and not just a fire-breathing dinosaur on a pile of gold.

Let someone else

... wait until fifty years, suddenly Gandalf will come for you personally

The future hero brushes off the call. This is natural, because everything new scares and repels. Wanderings symbolize growing up or serious changes in life and worldview. It is not easy to even get up off the couch, let alone get off the beaten path of life. And who will believe the first old man you meet that he is a Jedi, a wizard and a mage who has come to see you off to a magical world that needs to be saved?

Fate is knocking at the door

Despite the hitch, the rejected call, according to the law of myth, is growing. Its amplification can be expressed directly, "on the forehead" - for example, when a stream of letters bursts into the Dursley family's chimney, knocking Uncle Vernon to the delight of Harry, and the dwarves furiously pound on Bilbo's door. Or the hero is given a revelation, he learns something about himself or about the world and decides to take the path of wandering.

The hero can also be "helped" in liberation from everyday life. But it's not always pleasant - remember Luke's burned down house in A New Hope.

Challenge accepted!

So, the hero accepts the call and gets ready to go.

There is also an option when he still rejects the invitation to self-development. In this case, the hero is cursed and becomes a passive anti-hero. The fate of such people is unenviable, they vegetate in everyday life and bury their potential in the ground - if the forces of fate do not immediately destroy them.

But if everything is according to the rules, then the hero receives the blessing of the forces that chose him, acquires a companion-teacher (an elder, a magician, a guide, a mentor) and an amulet for solving problems (a sword, a ring, a ball of Ariadne - depending on the upcoming quest).

No entrance for unauthorized people

However, this is not the beginning of a great adventure. Just like that, no one managed to escape from the everyday world. The hero must fight the guardian of the hidden world, he is also the guardian of the boundaries of the ordinary world.

Very ironically, this episode was conveyed by Neil Gaiman in Stardust, where Tristan approaches the gate to the magical world, and the watchman uncle gives him a kick

The guard encourages to abandon the venture with an adventure. He can appear in different guises. It may be the temptation of a hollow woman leading away, or a promised horror that turns out to be fiction. Evil forces can deceive the hero by pointing the wrong direction, or try to bribe him by offering a lot of money for the amulet. And no one canceled the kicks - Neo had to endure a lot before disconnecting from the Matrix.

So, overcoming the gravity of the familiar world (pleasure) and the rejection of the new world (suffering), the hero shows a combination of courage, perseverance, intelligence and nobility. And there is a breakthrough into the hidden world of adventure.

Usually this is accompanied by a change of scenery (flight to another planet, going beyond the borders of native lands, diving into the abyss), and sometimes a figurative rebirth. Making the transition, the hero remains naked, giving up his ego. Remember Neo, who woke up in a capsule - naked, bald and covered in slime. Great adventures begin!

Stage 2: Initiation

Neo's initiation in The Matrix is ​​reminiscent of rebirth

This is the main part where the hero will fulfill his mission or fail, and his victory or defeat will become a lesson for future generations. Ahead of a series of adventures and mysterious events. This is the most variable stage, it changes in accordance with the idea and the world of the work. There may be dubious victories, secret helpers, mystical inspirations of the hero.

Closer to the light - blacker shadow

An important stable motive that lives in contemporary works, - the hero's collision with his own " dark side or its personification. Carl Jung called this archetype the Shadow. This is the inner embodiment of evil, which has absorbed all the shameful, ugly and disgusting features of the hero himself. Ignoring and misunderstanding of one's Shadow, according to Jung, leads to personality mismatch and possible psychoses.

The hero will have to face his Shadow face to face. But a straightforward victory over the Shadow is one's own defeat, even when the Shadow is represented by a separate character. After all, in an internal conflict, you play for both sides. civil war not be solved by atomic bombing.

The hero must realize his unity with the Shadow and accept that he himself is not deprived dark side. A clear example of such unity is the vision of Luke Skywalker after Yoda's lessons, when he meets Darth Vader in a cave, blows his head off with a sword and sees his own face.

Luke's vision in Yoda's cave is an example of the hero's unity with the Shadow

Next, the hero absorbs his Shadow or lets it absorb him. In the second case, he becomes an active antagonist, chooses the path of evil. This option is well shown by Anakin Skywalker when he becomes Darth Vader. But if the Shadow is absorbed, the hero moves on - spiritually more experienced, morally grown.

Apotheosis

We come to the climax of the plot and highest point hero trials. Here the laws of myth offer two symbolic concepts to choose from (although a combination is possible). The spiritual growth of the hero is expressed in reconciliation with the mother-goddess or father-god. At least, these are the formulations that Campbell, a staunch Freudian, cites.

Reconciliation with the mother goddess is associated with the Oedipus complex. That's just the sexual interpretation of the image will just become the failure of the hero. So Actaeon was punished and turned into a deer, who saw in the bathing Artemis only an object of desire. The hero must rise above sexual desire and selfish understanding of the world. The time has come to discard children's ideas, according to which everything pleasant and interesting is considered good, and everything unpleasant and difficult is considered evil, and comprehend the laws of the world.

The simplest interpretation of the image of the mother goddess is nature. This is well illustrated in the film Avatar, where Marine Jake Sully ceases to see the deified nature as a source of resources and accepts new rules of life.

"Avatar" shows the reconciliation of the hero with mother nature

In the case of the god-father, the hero has to become worthy of his father's strength. To do this, you will first have to get to your father, then prove that you are not a self-proclaimed son (perhaps a duel or a riddle will solve this). This is followed by reconciliation with the father and gaining his power. This can be expressed not only in strength as such, but also in the acceptance of heritage, experience, knowledge, the discovery of one's own blocked abilities. Divine duties can also be taken over, such as driving the sun across the sky in the father's chariot - this is what a parent got.

We again see a vivid episode of reconciliation with a powerful father in the finale of Star Wars.

Reward

The great quest is completed, the hero has passed the test and deserves a reward. This is something necessary and important for him personally: half the kingdom with the princess, Frodo's departure to Valinor, a new body for Sally or Neo's superpowers.

The main thing is that now the hero is not the same as before. He knows the hidden, knows the supernatural and possesses the magical. As a rule, this reflects his spiritual transformation and the knowledge he acquired. But this is not the end - the way back is ahead.

Stage 3: Return

Unfortunately, the film adaptation of The Lord of the Rings did not include the chapter "The Devastation of the Shire". But this is a whole stage of the hero's journey!

Returning does not mean degradation back to the layman. To return to where you came from means to bring the acquired knowledge to people. In fairy tales and myths, the brought object often becomes a salvation for the hero's homeland - a village, nation, state or the whole world.

Sometimes the plot of the myth is based on the theft of the desired artifact. At the level of the symbol, everything remains the same: confrontation for the sake of obtaining a coveted item. In such a case, the return turns into a "fairy escape" when the robbed evil forces pursue the plundering hero. Sometimes the forces that guided him help the hero - for example, the eagles carry Frodo away from Mordor. If the item was received as a reward, then the forces themselves magically help the hero return to the boundaries of everyday life.

But sometimes the hero decides not to return and stays in the hidden world. In spiritual terms, this means seclusion. Having gained knowledge, the hero realizes that he will not be able to pass it on to his people. This motif is often repeated in Far Eastern myths. At the same time, the hero does not become a villain - this is still a victory, although not complete. The only hope for the world is that the hero will someday become the mentor of the new chosen one...

In this sense, Luke in the new trilogy exactly follows Campbell

If the hero finds the strength not only to acquire knowledge, but also to convey it to people, he solves old everyday problems in one fell swoop - loan debts, hooligans, old love. The blessings brought lead his people to prosperity. At this point, he completes the round-trip voyage, passing through the figurative stages of birth, naming, growing up and dying. A new chapter has been written in the endless book of exploits.

The stages of the hero's wanderings can be distorted, reduced, and overgrown with details. And some myths and fairy tales, due to brevity, can cover only a few episodes from the above scheme. But the essence remains the same. There is always a chosen one who decides to go beyond the boundaries of everyday life and go the hard way of improvement. He steps on the path, and higher powers help him. He fights dragons, dark lords and himself. He achieves the goal, finds happiness and shares it with people.

Only "the chosen one" is an inappropriate name for our hero. After all, he chooses himself. And we hear the call to travel every time we read or watch good fantasy.

Joseph Campbell

THOUSAND-FACED HERO

THE HERO WITH A THOUSAND FACES

BOLLINGEN SERIES XVII

PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS

Myth in the modern world

In today's rational and pragmatic world, perhaps precisely because of this, interest in mythology is growing and deepening. Like centuries ago, myths enchant, they are mysterious and mysterious, antediluvian stories turn out to be unexpectedly relevant, humanity continues to find food for the soul and mind in them. O. Ranka, D. Hilman shows the unconscious foundations of mythological symbolism, explains the origin of the grotesque characters of myths, the origins of their extraordinary adventures and amazing destinies. However, being scientifically “disenchanted”, myths and legends have not lost their meaning for us at all - on the contrary, reading special works allows us to re-evaluate the unsurpassed combination of naive charm and great wisdom of the most unpretentious legend or fairy tale.

The Hero with a Thousand Faces is one of the most fascinating works of comparative mythology. This is a study of the psychological basis of the heroic myths of various times and peoples, based on a huge amount of factual material. Joseph Campbell, with rare skill, is able to combine a poetic presentation and a scientific view of the problem. Fairy tales and fairy tales in the author's retelling not only do not lose their charm, but acquire a new sound - thanks to a subtle analysis of the deep sides of the human psyche, allegorically presented in plots and individual episodes of myths and legends.

Campbell's work is dedicated to the most common mythological plot - the story of the hero of his miraculous birth, heroic deeds, marriage to a beauty, wise rule and mysterious, mysterious death. The folklore of many nations tells about the life of such characters among the Sumerians it was Gilgamesh, among the Jews - Moses and Joseph the Beautiful, among the Greeks - Theseus, Hercules, Jason, Odysseus, among the Scandinavians and Germans - Sigurd - Siegfried, among the Celts - King Arthur, among the Irish - the strongman Kuchulin and the valiant Diarmuid, the French - Roland and Charlemagne, the Yugoslavs - Marco - Yunak, the Moldavians - sunny Fat - Frumos, the Russians - a whole galaxy of "powerful heroes". This list can be continued indefinitely. Why are hero stories so popular?

Campbell, like other authors (Claudio Naranjo, Alexander Pyatigorsky, Geza Roheim Victor Turner Mircea Eliade), believes that the heroic myth is based on symbolic forms of expression of the two most important events for the collective and individual human history - the creation of the world and the formation of personality. In other words, in the heroic epic before us cosmogonic myth And initiation ritual. The birth of the hero and his wanderings correspond to the symbolism of initiation (rites of passage), and exploits, accomplishments and death correspond to the world order, the creation of the Cosmos (order) from the universal Chaos. Both of these processes are to some extent the same, and the initiation itself often has the character of a cosmogonic act - for example, in the Caucasian legends about heroes - narmax, or in Campbell's own myths about Krishna and Buddha.

The first part of the book is devoted to the individual history of the thousand-faced hero. The general scheme of his adventures corresponds to the main stages of the initiation process and reproduces the various forms of rites of passage. (rites de passage). The famous folklorist Arnold van Gennep identified three such stages - separative, consisting in the detachment of the individual from the group in which he was a member before; liminal or the stage of "being on the edge" and restorative (reintegrative). A change in social or other status, which is the main goal of initiatory tests, involves a “way out” of the previous state, the rejection of cultural functions, the destruction social role. In myth, this is symbolized by the literal departure, flight, wanderings and wanderings of the hero. Before that, he hears a call, often accompanied by a warning of mortal danger, threats - or, conversely, promises of an unprecedented good. Whether the hero heeds the call or refuses it - this is always the beginning of the path of separation from everything that was familiar and familiar. A typical form of appeal is embodied in the famous epic-fairy tale: “If you go to the right, you will find a wife; if you go to the left, you will take wealth; if you go straight, you will lay down your violent head.”

The liminal stage is represented by the crossing of boundaries (thresholds: limen literally means "threshold"), being in an unusual, intermediate state. Lack of status is marked by blindness, invisibility, nakedness, ridiculous attire (cane hat, donkey skin, caftan turned inside out), dirt, silence, prohibitions (which relate to sleep, laughter, food, drink, etc.). “Liminal beings, for example, neophytes in rites of initiation or coming of age,” points out W. Turner, “can be presented as not owning anything. They may dress up as monsters, wear only rags, or even go about naked, demonstrating a lack of status, possessions, insignia, worldly clothing indicating their place or role, position in the kinship system - in short, anything that could distinguish them from other neophytes. or initiated. Their behavior is usually passive or humiliated; they must unquestioningly obey their mentors or accept unjust punishment without complaint.”

Liminality can be combined with being in other world(dungeon, the belly of a whale or other monster, at the bottom of the sea).

The hero is in the realm of death, this is a living dead man, who will have a new birth and transformation.

The content of the third stage of rebirth (transfiguration, salvation, magical flight) ends with the apotheosis of the power and power of the hero. He acquires extraordinary strength, magical skills, beauty, royal dignity, marries a princess, becomes a god. The main conquest of the hero in the myth is called "freedom to live" by Campbell:

Powerful in his insight, cold-blooded and free in his actions, rejoicing at the fact that his hand will be moved by the benevolence of Viracocha, the hero becomes a conscious instrument of the great and terrible Law, whether his deeds are the actions of a butcher, a jester or a king (p. 236).

However, the adventures of the hero are not limited to his apotheosis or death. The individual fate of the divine hero is closely connected with the fate of the world, its emergence and renewal. The very birth of the hero, Campbell points out, takes place in the sacred center of the world (this is the so-called "Navel of the Earth"), sometimes such a point becomes, on the contrary, the place of burial (the legend that Golgotha, the place of the crucifixion of Christ, hides the skull of Adam). Creation begins from this center, and the material for it is often the flesh of a hero or the body of a giant killed by him, a serpent, a chthonic monster. The victory of Indra over the dragon Vritra, the killing of the terrible Tiamat by Marduk, the creation of the world of people and gods from the body of the giant Ymir - these and other examples are discussed in detail in the book.

The creation of the world as a heroic deed is not a single, but a repeatedly repeated act. “What was called to life in the act of creation,” writes V.N. Toporov, “became a condition of existence and was perceived as a blessing. But by the end of each cycle, it fell into decay, decreased, “erased” and, in order to continue its former existence, needed restoration, renewal, and strengthening. The possibilities of the ritual in this regard were determined by the fact that it was, as it were, co-natural to the act of creation, reproduced it with its structure and meaning, and revived anew what arose in the act of creation.

The hero, who reproduced the actions of the demiurge - the creator, was this creator and all subsequent ones - the events of the myth and its participants repeat the cosmogonic act again and again, they are its various variations - "all-events" and "allogeroes". Thus arose and eternally walks the earth a hero in thousands of faces.

A reduced, partially desacralized version of the heroic myth is represented by a fairy tale. Campbell's book does not draw strict boundaries between myth and fairy tale - in fact, they are just different genres of the same plot. Parsing in a similar way fairy tale V.Ya.Propp singled out similar functions fairy tale hero- Absence, prohibition and its violation (“do not climb the carved porch, do not leave the golden tower”), misfortune or shortage (the decrepit king needs rejuvenating apples and living water), exile, flight and persecution, tests of courage, stamina and strength, finding a magical remedy or a magical assistant, a mysterious forest, grateful animals, a trip to another kingdom (in the form of an animal, on a horse, a bird, on a tree or stairs, falling into an abyss), fighting a snake (a snake is associated with mountains or water, acts as kidnapper, absorber, requisitions of a snake - “every month he took and devoured a young girl”), crossing a fiery river, conquering a princess, difficult tasks (often in response to matchmaking), magical flight, a false hero and recognition of the true, transformation and accession of a hero.

Not so long ago (and solely thanks to Narratorics (lj , twitter , VK group)) I came across a simple statement in its essence: “Each good story written according to the same algorithm. As if in the noosphere of the Earth, from time to time, a procedural generator was launched, producing masterpieces. , neither I nor my colleagues could pass by such a gift of fate. Therefore, it is quite natural that as part of the next one, we began to study the work of Joseph Campbell "The Hero with a Thousand Faces". Below you will find a summary of the reading, interspersed with the personal conclusions of my colleagues.

Very short summary of the book

Like many other researchers of myths, legends, fairy tales, parables and other literary creations of different times and peoples, J. Campbell noticed that there is a certain commonality in their structure. And if we renounce the manifestations of specific literary forms and national coloring, then we can observe that in general terms, all legends and myths have three essentially similar structural elements - or three stages of development. Namely:

1. Solitude (or alienation) - when the hero decides to reject his everyday life and, leaving the familiar environment (it does not matter whether it is his home, city, country, or the earthly firmament in general), goes to a previously unknown area where other laws reign, where the familiar becomes strange, and life takes on new meanings. So, for example, the legendary Prometheus ascends to heaven, and Aeneas, on the contrary, descends into the underworld.
2. Initiation - when the hero is involved in the brightest and most intense part of his adventure: he travels through an unknown world, solves the tasks facing him, overcomes serious and not too obstacles, meets, fights and defeats the most incredible and strong opponents, and finally achieves his goal - he gets that , for which he went on this fantastic journey. So, for example, Jason, having defeated the dragon by cunning, receives the Golden Fleece.
3. Return - when the hero with a victory (having received what he went for or having received something different, but no less important) returns to his usual environment in order to share the acquired good with others.

These three steps, according to J. Campbell, are nothing more than a projection onto the myths of those psychological processes that occur to each of us in the course of the growth and development of our consciousness. In particular, the three-act structure of legends shows us the typical phases characteristic of transitional states during crises of psychological maturation and self-awareness.

Such a crisis, for example, may arise when a young man tries to free himself from his natural subconscious sexual attachment to his mother. In this case, the beginning of his journey - the decision to alienate from the mother - will mark the phase of solitude, followed by his own struggle with fears, expected and real consequences - this phase of initiation. The end of the path will be gaining independence and returning to a calm and even relationship with loved ones, from which everyone will benefit, and, first of all, the hero-boy.

According to K. Jung, on whose theoretical research the author relies, there is a kind of collective unconscious - archetypes that dominate each of us, regardless of our desire. That is why, according to Campbell, regardless of nationality, period of history and religious trend, all myths as projections of this unconscious have the above-described expressed general structure, which he called “monomyth” (this term Campbell borrowed from Joyce).

So, the Hero's Path certainly follows a three-act scheme, each of the stages of development of which may contain certain common, albeit differently expressed elements.

Reading the book gave me a powerful impulse to expand my memory to a lot of forgotten, pleasant and powerful things like professional fiction, in which the plot is just one aspect of dozens. I really haven't thought about this in a long time. And although Campbell's work "Hero with a thousand faces ami” of a literary analysis of myths (which is much closer and more understandable to me than psychoanalysis) is much less than an elegant, literary-florid, frankly, hard-to-reach, presentation of facts and assumptions, I could not help but feel the intellectual power and significance of this work, which can easily collide from the place of the block and turn people to the feats that they once dreamed of. Nikita Prokhorov

Elements of the stage of seclusion

This is the first step in the development of the plot of the myth. It is the forerunner of the actual adventure that the hero will experience in the next step. At this stage, everything happens that somehow contributes to the onset of the next one.

When we talk about the typical path of the hero of myths, we mean that the next stage will definitely come, but if we mean crises in the formation of a personality, then it is natural that even the strongest prerequisites are not always able to lead to overcoming the crisis or even to the desire to overcome it. In this case, the next stage simply does not come: the young man does not overcome dependence on his mother, Ilya Muromets does not get up from his stove - the hero does not work.

What are the prerequisites forcing the future hero to go his own way in order to earn the right to bear this proud title, Campbell distinguishes in his work.

1. Call

The beginning of the adventure is the call to him. Usually it comes from a harbinger. The image of this herald of future accomplishments can be very specific - it can be a person, an animal (a frog, for example), an unknown voice from above, or something else that gives a certain sign to the future hero.

The signs that the harbinger gives, the call and the requests with which he addresses the hero, may be no less specific than the harbingers themselves, and therefore the hero will not always be able to immediately accept or recognize the importance of the call. The fact is that what the harbinger calls for does not always look like a heroic deed in its typical sense (for example, a call to marry a frog).

Harbingers can call to life, or, at a later point in the life path, to death, to religious humility, to battles ... Nevertheless, if you look at it from the point of view of psychology and accept the hero's path as overcoming oneself, expanding one's consciousness and opening of your self, then marrying a frog and killing a dragon are the same thing: overcoming your inner subconscious fears.

The call may or may not be accepted by the hero. In the second case, the heroic adventure will not only not take place, but will turn into its opposite. The life of a failed hero becomes “…meaningless — even though, like King Minos, thanks to titanic efforts, he can succeed in creating a glorious empire. Whatever house he builds, it will be the house of death: a labyrinth with colossal walls designed to hide his Minotaur from him.”

From the point of view of psychology, this means that a person who has not allowed himself to fight with his fears and has not overcome the internal crisis, despite any external well-being, will not be able to be happy and will ultimately be defeated by life itself, becoming a victim of this permanent subconscious crisis.

Campbell's book is controversial. On the one hand, this is a fairly high-quality analysis of a large number of myths with the allocation of a common structure for them, which can be considered the “golden section” for any works in the genre “ heroic epic". On the other hand, Freud's far-fetched psychological analysis, which even in psychology is not an unambiguous authority. The book is unambiguously useful in screenwriting, however, Freud's teaching, in my opinion, is an unnecessary, annoying factor in analysis. With the same success it would be possible to “prove” the scenario common for myths from the point of view of literature, archeology, mathematics and physics - the result would be the same, and the division into phases would not change. Andrey Murenko

2. Protector

If the hero did not reject the call, then now is the time for him to meet with his protector. Most often it will be an ancient old woman or an old man, although often the figures of patrons in myths and fairy tales appear before us in no less bizarre images than the images of those who call. The patrons of the hero can be great gods and goddesses, animals, parents, wise mentors and spirits ... By the way, those who at the previous stage appealed to us, offering to embark on a heroic adventure, can also act as protectors.

Patrons, as a rule, are engaged in supplying the hero with amulets, magic pipes, magic tools, or, at worst, valuable advice that the hero can use when overcoming obstacles on the next step.

Sometimes the defenders are not limited to magical gifts, but they themselves accompany the hero on his journey, personally helping him if necessary.

Thus, in personal or indirect accompaniment by his defenders, the hero moves further along his heroic path and reaches a certain “threshold”, overcoming which promises him a transition to the next step.

A huge amount of water and beautiful literary turns. In the course of reading, it is easy to lose the thread of the narrative and the meaning that the author was trying to put in. Useful information has to be sought out and isolated in endless examples from psychology and introspection. The very device about the “life” of the hero can really be useful when writing a plot, and if we consider modern cinema and books through the prism of this device, it turns out that it has been used for a long time. Vyacheslav Zolotovsky

3. Overcoming the threshold or the belly of the whale

The threshold in psychology is this certain line, having crossed which you will no longer be able to return back to your ordinary and familiar world as before, regardless of whether you win or lose your heroic adventure. Overcoming this psychological boundary always means going beyond a certain comfort line and therefore sometimes requires high determination.

In myths, the threshold between the old and the new is usually represented materially: a closed gate, a dark cave, an open mouth... Associatively, this threshold often causes a feeling of danger - you never know what awaits the hero beyond the boundaries of his consciousness. “Always and everywhere adventure is a passage beyond the veil that separates the known from the unknown; the forces that stand on the frontier are dangerous; dealing with them is risky; however, before anyone who has confidence and courage, this danger recedes.

gate to new world often guarded by unknown creatures, they determine the existing horizon of the hero's life, and it is with these creatures that the hero will have to fight in order to discover new - different horizons. Battles can wear different character: sometimes you need to defeat the gatekeeper with cunning, sometimes with strength, kindness or courage. If the hero overcomes this test with honor, he will be where he will perform all his heroic deeds.

Often the belly of a whale or some other mythical creature is the legendary symbol of the threshold or boundary between worlds. The hero is swallowed by this creature, which symbolizes the extreme degree of uncertainty that awaits the hero - such uncertainty borders on the uncertainty of death itself, which emphasizes the importance of this stage on the hero's path and symbolizes the final break with the hero's past.

The threshold is another point, without going beyond which the hero will not perform his heroic deeds, and the person will not go beyond his current state. “The average person is more than satisfied that he remains within the specified boundaries, he is even proud of it, and public opinion gives him every reason to fear the slightest step into the unknown.” But just as a child who has never taken an independent step will never learn to walk independently, just as a member of a tribe who has not broken away from him and has not gone on a long journey will not be able to open new lands for his fellow tribesmen, so the hero will not be able to perform his heroic actions, if it does not go beyond familiar images and states.

The book teaches to attract the reader / viewer / player. It teaches how to write a plot in such a way that each person finds something close to himself in a hero who goes through certain stages of life that are not alien to any of us.

Myths are not fiction, they are in any case based on some events, the fate of representatives certain people. And the fate of people who lived a thousand or more years ago on any continent is not much different from the vicissitudes of fate modern man. And the hero experiencing this or that event from the set listed by the author will cause sympathy, sympathy, understanding on the part of the player (in our case).

I would like to say about the author's style: in my opinion, it is somewhat difficult to understand - a lot of references and references, long quotes. Nevertheless, some chapters of the book were read with genuine interest, despite the complexity of the language of presentation. In particular, the chapter "Myth and dream". In my opinion, it was not by chance that the author began with this particular chapter - it interested me, the reader, "hooked" it precisely by the fact that most people dream. They excite us, we search in them deep meaning we're trying to figure it out. This chapter just plays on it. Tatiana Shkuro

Elements of the initiation stage (adventure)

This part of the hero's journey (favorite for most readers) is filled with the brightest and most significant events - it is here that he performs his heroic deeds: he defeats dragons, fights hordes of enemies, completes the most unimaginable tasks and enters into an argument with the gods themselves. And although we, as readers, like to follow the hero's journey, we understand that the interest is caused precisely by the fact that now the hero is in real danger: each adventure throws him to the brink of life and death - the forces that are sent to counter him can crush him, as insect. Overcoming their resistance is an act truly worthy of a hero. At this stage, the hero can repeatedly fall into the abyss of misfortune - lose loved ones, friends, but, reluctantly, move forward along his path.

From a psychological point of view, it is in this part of overcoming the crisis of growth that we encounter the most serious hidden fears from our subconscious. Having taken a step beyond the boundaries of our comfort, we have stirred up a hornet's nest - and not somewhere, but in our souls. The danger of failing to endure, of failing to pass one's path to the end is indeed great.

Thus, the main component of this stage of the monomyth are tests.

In overcoming trials, the hero is helped by the very magic items or advice given by the patrons, or the hero is under the protection of the patrons themselves.

Trials can be very different, they can be very many - or very few, they can be more difficult to overcome - or simpler, they may or may not differ in variety ... But, one way or another, in each of these tests, according to Campbell, any subconscious fear is embodied.

How successfully and in what ways the hero overcomes trials shows his strengths and, conversely, his weaknesses.

In his work, Campbell explored just a huge amount of materials. He was able to identify common features in the myths various peoples developed in different corners world and never communicated with each other, to explain why people care so much about such things. This is really useful information that can be successfully used in writing game plots, however, most of the book space is just examples proving the author’s thoughts, which makes the book quite difficult to read. Alexander Malkov

Among the types of tests that J. Campbell describes in his work, the following can be distinguished:

• temptress woman(these tests, appealing to secret desires that, for one reason or another, have not been realized before; as a rule, these are base passions that prevent overcoming obstacles; in the vast majority of cases, such desires are associated with sex and women and therefore are also represented in myths by female images );
• rival father(trials, as a rule, are connected with overcoming the oedipal complex - successful overcoming symbolizes moral and psychological maturation, an increase in one's own self-esteem and the establishment of an even and independent relationship between father and son);
• goddess(as a rule, it completes a series of trials with a test of whether the hero is able to earn the greatest good - love; the sacred union with a woman is a symbol of life itself and the continuation of the family: “... triumph can be represented as a marriage union with the mother - the goddess of the world (sacred marriage ) the embodiment of life”);

Although, as J. Campbell points out, the interpretation of tests can actually be very different. The main thing to understand for yourself is that each test is associated with one or another fear or weakness of the hero, which can be embodied in a variety of personalities.

The last stage of the initiation stage is getting what you want - it can be the benefits already listed above related to reuniting with your father or concluding a sacred marriage, it can be receiving a magical item or symbol, for which the hero went beyond the “threshold”, this can be religious enlightenment or an apotheosis associated with the recognition of the hero as a divine essence.

One way or another, at the end of the test, the hero who has overcome all obstacles will receive a well-deserved reward.

The whole essence of the book can be fit on a couple of pages, if you isolate from it the methodology traced in it (the hero's adventure through the steppes). This technique is also applicable in game design, it can be used to write epic adventure stories or use certain steps in other scenarios (although this technique has been used for so long). Denis Gurbik

Elements of the return stage

J. Campbell notes that even despite the triumphant overcoming of trials, their end does not mean the end of the hero's journey. And this can be due to a variety of factors.

The first thing that makes the hero continue his path is the need to return and bring the good he went for to those who needed it.

And although this may be perceived as something secondary, but in fact this moment is very important both from the point of view of the myth (the hero must again overcome the threshold, but in the reverse order, which is often associated with special difficulties, the resistance of the gods and the elements, etc. .), and from the point of view of the final stage of the psychological crisis (a person must stop breaking spears and enter the usual course of life, but with a new, expanded and changed consciousness and an understanding of the world and behavior corresponding to it).

The return of the hero can proceed in very different ways. “If the hero in his victory obtained the blessing of a goddess or god, and then was explicitly authorized to return to the world with some panacea for the salvation of society, then at the final stage of the adventure he is supported by all the forces of his supernatural patron. And vice versa, if the trophy was obtained against the will of the guardians of the treasure, or the gods or demons oppose the hero’s desire to return to the world, then the last stage of the mythological circle turns into a lively, often comical chase. This escape is overgrown with details - all sorts of miracles of magical obstacles and tricks ... "

“... whether they save him from the outside, whether we drive him from the inside, or slowly move forward, guided by the gods, he has yet to re-enter, along with his acquisition, into a long-forgotten environment where people, being particles, consider themselves whole. He has yet to confront society with his ego-destroying and life-saving elixir and be hit back by perfectly reasonable questions, implacable indignation and inability to good people understand him…”

Thus, the main difficulties of the hero associated with the return may be as follows:

• the temptation to stay "beyond the threshold" if the magical world promises greater benefits than returning back to the past reality;
• persecution by hostile forces magical world, who do not want to release the boon received by the hero beyond the “threshold”;
• the hero is unable to cross the threshold back without the help of patrons who left him at the last stages of the test;
• in everyday life, which dictates its own laws, it is difficult for the hero to preserve or use the good received in trials for its intended purpose.

Let's start with the pain! The book "Hero with a Thousand Faces" by Joseph Campbell turned out to be quite difficult to master. The text is written in a complex language, filled with a huge number of difficult terms and different concepts, which can be known only with a special education - philosophy, philology, psychology, or with a previously independently mastered baggage of knowledge from these areas. Therefore, a reader unprepared for complex academic texts may simply not wade through the abundance of all these complex terms and formulations, plus those wrapped in complex logical constructions. Or get bogged down in the text for a long time, constantly turning to various kinds of encyclopedias for explanations (as I read the book).

Now to the essence of the content. This work is good, first of all, because it contains the result of the gigantic work done to collect, read, comprehend and analyze a huge amount of factual material, namely myths, fairy tales and legends from different countries and peoples. But the main thing is that on the basis of all this material and with the use of psychoanalysis, the primary behavioral models of a person, his unconscious desires and reactions inherent in nature, which underlie the actions of the heroes in all these myths, were identified. That is, after analyzing many different sources, the author was able to isolate a certain universal metaphysical structure of human behavior on his life path in various circumstances, formed on the basis of archetypal human behavior and characteristic of all representatives of our species. Therefore, this structure of the heroic myth is seen among many peoples, independently of each other.

In addition, the book is filled to the brim with retellings of these fascinating myths from different peoples from different parts of our world, which are read with great interest. At the same time, everything is accompanied by analysis, and allows you to see and understand why in a particular myth or situation the hero acts exactly the way he does, what symbolism stands behind this, and how it is reflected in human psychology.

The only thing is that I have to take the author’s word for it, because I personally have not read the works to which he refers, and it is not possible to verify this or that statement based on reading tens and hundreds of myths (this would require all these myths and books reread). Although, if you look at almost any modern film or book (in the “heroic” genre), then the hero there, one way or another, but follows the path described by Campbell, which only confirms the conclusions made by the author.

As for the usefulness of labor in the context of game design, a summary based on this book, with a brief outline of the structure of the hero’s path and his motivations along this path, may well come in handy as a cheat sheet in which you can always look at time-tested, and, most importantly, underlying deep human psychology, plot moves and twists. That is what iron works.Alexander Atamanchuk

Conclusion

Having explained the general structure of the myth and his interpretation of its internal components, Campbell explains why, despite the persistence of the relevance of the influence of the subconscious on human behavioral motives, despite the fact that myths still symbolically reflect the processes of formation, development and overcoming, why today myth is not a way reflection of existing reality.
And the thing is that the development of mankind is only a reflection of the process of development of each individual. It goes through the same crises and the same periods of growth, and each of these periods is characterized by its own special “handwriting”. We have surpassed the symbolism of myths and religious parables, but have not yet learned to write our lives in other colors. We have gone beyond the egocentric “I”, but have not grown up to the “You”, which can accept, understand and reflect “the divine existence, wonderful in its diversity, which is life in each of us.”

Today we are new heroes, and the task of each and everyone today is to find new symbols that can “… convey to people who insist on the exclusivity of the evidence of their feelings, the message of the all-generating emptiness.”

Different peoples have their own myths, which touch upon important life issues, themes of good and evil. There are a great many mythological heroes, but is there anything in common between them? In the first half of the 20th century, Joseph Campbell researched a large number of myths, and then wrote a voluminous work, The Hero with a Thousand Faces, in which he reflected everything that he was able to uncover. The book was not immediately accepted, but subsequently it had a great influence on the plots of films, now Campbell's ideas are taken into account when creating all films that have a mythological component.

The author of the book believes that all myths have a common structure, and their heroes can be combined into one archetypal image. This explains the title of the book, in which many faces are assigned to one hero. The book is an unusual combination of mythology and psychology. Joseph Campbell in his research relies on the teachings of famous psychologists such as Sigmund Freud, Carl Jung.

The first part of the book is dedicated to the main character of myths, tells about his image and path. The author believes that in the life of each hero, three stages can be distinguished, when he realizes his essence, proves it with heroic deeds, and then returns to the world of ordinary people, however, difficulties may arise at the final stage. In the second part, Campbell speaks through this image not only about the path of the hero, but also about the existence of everything in the world.

The book allows you to form a general idea of ​​both mythology and the world as a whole, about the perception of people and their attitude to the images of heroes. At the same time, it makes it possible to take some part of it and study it in more detail, since the research material is very extensive.

The work belongs to the genre Psychology. It was published in 2008 by ACT, Reflbook, Wackler. The book is part of the "Masters of Psychology (Peter)" series. On our site you can download the book "Hero with a Thousand Faces" in fb2, rtf, epub, pdf, txt format or read online. The rating of the book is 3.63 out of 5. Here, before reading, you can also refer to the reviews of readers who are already familiar with the book and find out their opinion. In the online store of our partner you can buy and read the book in paper form.

One day the world will die and plunge into darkness.
Time will shrink to a point, putting an end to everything.
The immortal spirit learns what "not to be" means.
I know it - it's time to leave!

My reality began to oppress me here.
I need a world in which you can change something,
Where every step is mine, the gesture will change the vector of times,
One hero, but so many names.

Whom to be born - I did not choose.
To be Him - the one I respect -
I played.

I did what I knew and what I knew how to do.
I saw what is and what I wanted to see.
And in the past I am nobody, now for many an idol:
With my game, I destroyed your world.

I tore reality with the light of hundreds of lightning bolts.
In my worlds, I was a hero with a thousand faces.
I became a legend, a myth that comes in dreams.
I will live forever in these worlds.
I didn't know how to live and think without playing.
Whom to be born - I did not choose.
But to be Him - the one I respect -
I played. one day the world will die and sink into the darkness.
Time shrinks to a point , putting the whole point .
Immortal spirit finds that such " not to be ".
I know - it's time to leave!

My reality began to oppress me here.
I want a world in which you can change something,
Where each step my gesture to change the vector times,
One hero, but so many names.

That they should be - those whom I respect -
I played.

I did what I knew and what could do.
I have seen that there are some things that would like to see.
And in the past I have one now for many idols:
Its a trick I pulled down your world.

I tore the reality of hundreds of lightning light .
In their worlds I was the hero with a thousand faces.
I became a legend, a myth, coming in dreams.
I will forever live in these worlds.
I do not know how to live and think without playing .
Someone born - I didn't choose.
But that they should be - those whom I respect -
I played.