The Hero with a Thousand Faces - wikipedia The Hero with a Thousand Faces The Hero with a Thousand Faces Cover of the first edition Author Joseph Campbell Country United States Language English Subject Mythology Published 1949 ( Pantheon Books ) 1968 ( 2nd ed. ) 2008 ( 3rd ed. ) Media type Print ( Hardcover and Paperback ) ISBN 978 - 1 - 57731 - 593 - 3 OCLC 224442464 Dewey Decimal 201 /. 3 22 LC Class BL313. C28 2008 The Hero with a Thousand Faces ( first published in 1949 ) is a work of comparative mythology by American mythologist Joseph Campbell. In this book, Campbell discusses his theory of the journey of the archetypal hero found in world mythologies. Since publication of The Hero with a Thousand Faces, Campbell 's theory has been consciously applied by a wide variety of modern writers and artists. The best known is perhaps George Lucas, who has acknowledged Campbell 's influence on the Star Wars films. The Joseph Campbell Foundation and New World Library issued a new edition of The Hero with a Thousand Faces in July 2008 as part of the Collected Works of Joseph Campbell series of books, audio and video recordings. In 2011, Time placed the book in its list of the 100 best and most influential books written in English since the magazine was founded in 1923. Contents 1 Summary 2 Background 2.1 Publishing history 3 The hero 's journey and women 4 Artists influenced by the work 4.1 Influences on artists 4.1. 1 In film 4.1. 2 In games 4.1. 3 In literature 4.1. 4 In television 5 See also 6 Footnotes 7 References 8 External links Summary Campbell explores the theory that important myths from around the world which have survived for thousands of years all share a fundamental structure, which Campbell called the monomyth. In a well - known quote from the introduction to The Hero with a Thousand Faces, Campbell summarized the monomyth : A hero ventures forth from the world of common day into a region of supernatural wonder : fabulous forces are there encountered and a decisive victory is won : the hero comes back from this mysterious adventure with the power to bestow boons on his fellow man. In laying out the monomyth, Campbell describes a number of stages or steps along this journey. The hero starts in the ordinary world, and receives a call to enter an unusual world of strange powers and events ( a call to adventure ). If the hero accepts the call to enter this strange world, the hero must face tasks and trials ( a road of trials ), and may have to face these trials alone, or may have assistance. At its most intense, the hero must survive a severe challenge, often with help earned along the journey. If the hero survives, the hero may achieve a great gift ( the goal or `` boon '' ), which often results in the discovery of important self - knowledge. The hero must then decide whether to return with this boon ( the return to the ordinary world ), often facing challenges on the return journey. If the hero is successful in returning, the boon or gift may be used to improve the world ( the application of the boon ). Very few myths contain all of these stages -- some myths contain many of the stages, while others contain only a few ; some myths may have as a focus only one of the stages, while other myths may deal with the stages in a somewhat different order. These stages may be organized in a number of ways, including division into three sections : Departure ( sometimes called Separation ), Initiation and Return. `` Departure '' deals with the hero venturing forth on the quest, `` Initiation '' deals with the hero 's various adventures along the way, and `` Return '' deals with the hero 's return home with knowledge and powers acquired on the journey. The classic examples of the monomyth relied upon by Campbell and other scholars include the stories of Osiris, Prometheus, the Buddha, Moses, Mohammed, and Jesus, although Campbell cites many other classic myths from many cultures which rely upon this basic structure. The alleged similarities between these shared hero legends is one of the basic arguments of the Christ myth theory. While Campbell offers a discussion of the hero 's journey by using the Freudian concepts popular in the 1940s and 1950s, the monomythic structure is not tied to these concepts. Similarly, Campbell uses a mixture of Jungian archetypes, unconscious forces, and Arnold van Gennep 's structuring of rites of passage rituals to provide some illumination. However, this pattern of the hero 's journey influences artists and intellectuals worldwide, suggesting a basic usefulness for Campbell 's insights not tied to academic categories and mid-20th century forms of analysis. Background Campbell used the work of early 20th century theorists to develop his model of the hero ( see also structuralism ), including Freud ( particularly the Oedipus complex ), Carl Jung ( archetypal figures and the collective unconscious ), and Arnold Van Gennep ( the three stages of The Rites of Passage, translated by Campbell into Separation, Initiation and Return ). Campbell also looked to the work of ethnographers James George Frazer and Franz Boas and psychologist Otto Rank. Campbell called this journey of the hero the monomyth. Campbell was a noted scholar of James Joyce ( in 1944 he co-authored A Skeleton Key to Finnegans Wake with Henry Morton Robinson ), and Campbell borrowed the term monomyth from Joyce 's Finnegans Wake. In addition, Joyce 's Ulysses was also highly influential in the structuring of The Hero with a Thousand Faces. Publishing history Cover of reprints of the book, featuring Mark Hamill as Luke Skywalker The book was originally published by the Bollingen Foundation through Pantheon Press as the seventeenth title in the Bollingen Series. This series was taken over by Princeton University Press, who published The Hero through 2006. Originally issued in 1949 and revised by Campbell in 1968, The Hero with a Thousand Faces has been reprinted a number of times. Reprints issued after the release of Star Wars in 1977 used the image of Mark Hamill as Luke Skywalker on the cover. Princeton University Press issued a commemorative printing of the second edition in 2004 on the occasion of the joint centennial of Campbell 's birth and the Press 's founding with an added foreword by Clarissa Pinkola Estés. A third edition, compiled by the Joseph Campbell Foundation and published by New World Library, was released as the twelfth title in the Collected Works of Joseph Campbell series in July 2008. The Hero with a Thousand Faces has been translated into over twenty languages, including Spanish, Portuguese, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Chinese ( simplified and traditional ), Turkish, Dutch, Greek, Danish, Norwegian, Persian, Polish, Czech, Croatian, Serbian, Slovenian, Russian, Hungarian, Bulgarian and Hebrew, and has sold well over a million copies worldwide. The Hero 's journey and women One of the criticisms that has been raised about the way that Campbell laid out the monomyth of the hero 's journey in Hero with a Thousand Faces was that it focused on the masculine journey. Although this was not altogether true -- the princess of the Grimms ' `` The Frog Prince '' tale and the saga of the hero - goddess Inanna 's descent into the underworld feature prominently in Campbell 's schema -- it was, nonetheless, a criticism that has been raised about the book since its publication. Late in his life, Campbell had this to say : `` All of the great mythologies and much of the mythic story - telling of the world are from the male point of view. When I was writing The Hero with a Thousand Faces and wanted to bring female heroes in, I had to go to the fairy tales. These were told by women to children, you know, and you get a different perspective. It was the men who got involved in spinning most of the great myths. The women were too busy ; they had too damn much to do to sit around thinking about stories. (... ) In the Odyssey, you 'll see three journeys. One is that of Telemachus, the son, going in quest of his father. The second is that of the father, Odysseus, becoming reconciled and related to the female principle in the sense of male - female relationship, rather than the male mastery of the female that was at the center of the Iliad. And the third is of Penelope herself, whose journey is (... ) endurance. Out in Nantucket, you see all those cottages with the widow 's walk up on the roof : when my husband comes back from the sea. Two journeys through space and one through time. '' Artists influenced by the work Main article : Monomyth In Pathways to Bliss : Mythology and Personal Transformation, a book drawn from Campbell 's late lectures and workshops, he says about artists and the monomyth : `` Artists are magical elfs. Evoking symbols and motifs that connect us to our deeper selves, they can help us along the heroic journey of our own lives. (... ) The artist is meant to put the objects of this world together in such a way that through them you will experience that light, that radiance which is the light of our consciousness and which all things both hide and, when properly looked upon, reveal. The hero journey is one of the universal patterns through which that radiance shows brightly. What I think is that a good life is one hero journey after another. Over and over again, you are called to the realm of adventure, you are called to new horizons. Each time, there is the same problem : do I dare ? And then if you do dare, the dangers are there, and the help also, and the fulfillment or the fiasco. There 's always the possibility of a fiasco. But there 's also the possibility of bliss. '' -- Joseph Campbell, Influences on artists The Hero with a Thousand Faces has influenced a number of artists, filmmakers, musicians, and poets, such as Bob Dylan, George Lucas, and Jim Morrison. Additionally, Mickey Hart, Bob Weir, and Jerry Garcia of the Grateful Dead had long noted Campbell 's influence and agreed to participate in a seminar with him in 1986, entitled `` From Ritual to Rapture ''. In film Stanley Kubrick introduced Arthur C. Clarke to the book during the writing of 2001 : A Space Odyssey. George Lucas ' deliberate use of Campbell 's theory of the monomyth in the making of the Star Wars movies is well documented. On the DVD release of the famous colloquy between Campbell and Bill Moyers, filmed at Lucas ' Skywalker Ranch and broadcast in 1988 on PBS as The Power of Myth, Campbell and Moyers discussed Lucas 's use of The Hero with a Thousand Faces in making his films. Lucas himself discussed how Campbell 's work affected his approach to storytelling and film - making. In games Jenova Chen, lead designer at thatgamecompany, also cites `` The Hero 's Journey '' as the primary inspiration for the PlayStation 3 game Journey ( 2012 ). Mark Rosewater, head designer of the Magic : The Gathering trading card game, cites `` The Hero 's Journey '' as a major inspiration for `` The Weatherlight Saga '', an epic storyarc that went from 1997 to 2001, and spanned multiple cardsets, comic books, and novels. In Literature Christopher Vogler, a Hollywood film producer and writer, wrote a memo for Disney Studios on the use of The Hero with a Thousand Faces as a guide for scriptwriters ; this memo influenced the creation of such films as Aladdin ( 1992 ), The Lion King ( 1994 ), and Beauty and the Beast ( 1991 ). Vogler later expanded the memo and published it as the book The Writer 's Journey : Mythic Structure For Writers, which became the inspiration for a number of successful Hollywood films and is believed to have been used in the development of the Matrix series. Novelist Richard Adams acknowledges a debt to Campbell 's work, and specifically to the concept of the monomyth. In his best known work, Watership Down, Adams uses extracts from The Hero with a Thousand Faces as chapter epigrams. Author Neil Gaiman, whose work is frequently seen as exemplifying the monomyth structure, says that he started The Hero with a Thousand Faces but refused to finish it : `` I think I got about half way through The Hero with a Thousand Faces and found myself thinking if this is true -- I do n't want to know. I really would rather not know this stuff. I 'd rather do it because it 's true and because I accidentally wind up creating something that falls into this pattern than be told what the pattern is. '' Many scholars and reviewers have noted how closely J.K. Rowling 's popular Harry Potter books hewed to the monomyth schema. In television Dan Harmon, the creator of the TV show Community, has stated that he has used the monomyth as inspiration for his work. The sixth and final season of Lost recognizes Campbell 's theories on the hero. During one of the bonus features, the makers of the series discuss the journey of the main characters and how each is a hero in their own way. Before each little segment of this particular feature, they quote Campbell and then expound on that particular quote by discussing the various characters. See also Mythology portal The Golden Bough The Iron Dream The Seven Basic Plots Vladimir Propp Aarne -- Thompson classification systems Bildungsroman Otto Rank Save The Cat ! The Last Book on Screenwriting You 'll Ever Need Footnotes Jump up ^ Joseph Campbell, The Hero 's Journey : Joseph Campbell on His Life and Work, 3rd edition, Phil Cousineau, editor. Novato, California : New World Library, 2003, pp. 186 - 187. Jump up ^ `` Ideas : The Hero with a Thousand Faces by Joseph Campbell ''. Time. August 30, 2011. Jump up ^ Joseph Campbell. The Hero with a Thousand Faces. Princeton : Princeton University Press, 1968, p. 30 / Novato, California : New World Library, 2008, p. 23. Jump up ^ Since the late 1960s, with the introduction of post-structuralism, theories such as the monomyth ( to the extent they are based in structuralism ) have lost ground in the academic world. Nonetheless, the resonance of this theory and of Campbell 's schema remains ; every year, The Hero with a Thousand Faces is used as a text - book in thousands of university courses worldwide. Source : Joseph Campbell Foundation website. Jump up ^ Source of term monomyth. Archived January 16, 2009, at the Wayback Machine. Jump up ^ The Complete Works of Joseph Campbell data base on the Joseph Campbell Foundation website, accessed July 2, 2010. Jump up ^ -- Joseph Campbell, Pathways to Bliss : Mythology and Personal Transformation, Edited by David Kudler. Novato, California : New World Library, 2004, pp. 145, 159. Jump up ^ Pathways to Bliss : Mythology and Personal Transformation, Edited by David Kudler. Novato, California : New World Library, 2004, pp. 132, 133. Jump up ^ `` Joseph Campbell Timeline ''. Pacifica Graduate Institute. Archived from the original on April 30, 2011. Jump up ^ `` The Kubrick Site : Clarke 's 2001 Diary ( excerpts ) ''. visual-memory.co.uk. Retrieved March 2, 2015. Jump up ^ `` Joseph Campbell and the Power of Myth - Season 1, Episode 1 : The Hero 's Adventure - TV.com ''. TV.com. CBS Interactive. Retrieved March 2, 2015. Jump up ^ Joseph Campbell, The Hero 's Journey, loc. cit. Jump up ^ Kevin O'Hannessian, GAME DESIGNER JENOVA CHEN ON THE ART BEHIND HIS `` JOURNEY '' ; CoCreate Magazine Jump up ^ Bridgman, Joan ( August 2000 ). `` Richard Adams at Eighty ''. The Contemporary Review ( The Contemporary Review Company Limited ) 277.1615 : 108. ISSN 0010 - 7565. Jump up ^ Richard Adams, Watership Down. Scribner, 2005, p. 225. ISBN 978 - 0 - 7432 - 7770 - 9 Jump up ^ See Stephen Rauch, Neil Gaiman 's The Sandman and Joseph Campbell : In Search of the Modern Myth, Wildside Press, 2003 Jump up ^ `` Myth, Magic, and the Mind of Neil Gaiman - Wild River Review ''. wildriverreview.com. Retrieved March 2, 2015. Jump up ^ Sharon Black, `` The Magic of Harry Potter : Symbols and Heroes of Fantasy, '' Children 's Literature in Education, Springer Netherlands, Volume 34, Number 3 / September, 2003, pp. 237 -- 247, ISSN 0045 - 6713 ; Patrick Shannon, `` Harry Potter as Classic Myth '' ; Deborah De Rosa, `` Wizardly Challenges to, and Affirmations of the Initiation Paradigm in Harry Potter, '' Critical Perspectives on Harry Potter, Elizabeth Heileman, ed. Routledge, 2002, pp 163 -- 183 -- there are numerous similar references. Jump up ^ A Sense of Community : Essays on the Television Series and Its Fandom. ( McFarland, 2014 ) p. 24. ISBN 1476615713 References Campbell, Joseph. The Hero 's Journey : Joseph Campbell on His Life and Work. Edited and with an Introduction by Phil Cousineau. Forward by Stuart L. Brown, Executive Editor. New York : Harper and Row, 1990. Campbell, Joseph and Henry Morton Robinson. A Skeleton Key to Finnegans Wake, 1944. Campbell, Joseph. The Hero with a Thousand Faces. 1st edition, Bollingen Foundation, 1949. 2nd edition, Princeton University Press. 3rd edition, New World Library, 2008. Campbell, Joseph. Pathways to Bliss : Mythology and Personal Transformation. Edited by David Kudler. Novato, California : New World Library, 2004. Ford, Clyde W. The Hero with an African Face. New York : Bantam, 2000. Henderson, Mary. Star Wars : The Magic of Myth. Companion volume to the exhibition at the National Air and Space Museum of the Smithsonian Institution. New York : Bantam, 1997. Larsen, Stephen and Robin Larsen. Joseph Campbell : A Fire in the Mind. Rochester, Vermont : Inner Traditions, 2002. Manganaro, Marc. Myth, Rhetoric, and the Voice of Authority : A Critique of Frazer, Eliot, Frye, and Campbell. New Haven : Yale, 1992. Moyers, Bill and Joseph Campbell. The Power of Myth. Anchor : Reissue edition, 1991. ISBN 0 - 385 - 41886 - 8 Pearson, Carol and Katherine Pope. The Female Hero in American and British Literature. New York : R.R. Bowker, 1981. Vogler, Christopher. The Writer 's Journey : Mythic Structure For Writers. Studio City, CA : Michael Wiese Productions, 1998. External links Information on the 2008 third edition from the Joseph Campbell Foundation Monomyth from UC Berkeley ( archived ) The Archetype of the Hero 's Journey from Web English Teacher A Practical Guide to The Hero With a Thousand Faces at the Wayback Machine ( archived February 19, 2009 ) The Hero Cycle as seen in the Star Wars saga Star Wars Origins - Joseph Campbell The Matrix - Joseph Campbell Monomyth on YouTube Joseph Campbell Books Where the Two Came to Their Father : A Navaho War Ceremonial ( 1943 ). with Jeff King and Maud Oakes A Skeleton Key to Finnegans Wake ( 1944 ). with Henry Morton Robinson The Hero with a Thousand Faces ( 1949 ). The Masks of God ( 1959 -- 1968 ) Volume 1, Primitive Mythology ( 1959 ) Volume 2, Oriental Mythology ( 1962 ) Volume 3, Occidental Mythology ( 1964 ) Volume 4, Creative Mythology ( 1968 ) ) The Flight of the Wild Gander : Explorations in the Mythological Dimension ( 1968 ) Myths to Live By ( 1972 ) Erotic irony and mythic forms in the art of Thomas Mann ( 1973 ) The Mythic Image ( 1974 ) The Inner Reaches of Outer Space : Metaphor As Myth and As Religion ( 1986 ) Historical Atlas of World Mythology ( 1983 -- 1989 ) Volume I : The Way of the Animal Powers ( 1983 ) ( reprint in two parts : Part 1 : Mythologies of the Primitive Hunters and Gatherers ( 1988 ) ; Part 2 : Mythologies of the Great Hunt ( 1988 ) ) Volume II : The Way of the Seeded Earth ( Part 1 : The Sacrifice ( 1988 ) ; Part 2 : Mythologies of the Primitive Planters : The North Americas ( 1989 ) ; Part 3 : Mythologies of the Primitive Planters : The Middle and Southern Americas ( 1989 ) ) Transformations of Myth Through Time ( 1990 ) A Joseph Campbell Companion : Reflections on the Art of Living ( 1991 ). editor Diane K. Osbon Mythic Worlds, Modern Words : On the Art of James Joyce ( 1993 ). editor Edmund L. Epstein The Mythic Dimension : Selected Essays ( 1959 -- 1987 ) ( 1993 ). editor Anthony Van Couvering Baksheesh & Brahman : Indian Journals ( 1954 -- 1955 ) ( 1995 ). editors Robin / Stephen Larsen & Anthony Van Couvering Thou Art That : Transforming Religious Metaphor ( 2001 ). editor Eugene Kennedy Sake & Satori : Asian Journals - Japan ( 2002 ). editor David Kudler Myths of Light : Eastern Metaphors of the Eternal ( 2003 ). editor David Kudler Pathways to Bliss : Mythology and Personal Transformation ( 2004 ). editor David Kudler The Mythic Imagination : Collected Short Fiction ( 2012 ), editors David Kudler and Robert Walter Goddesses : Mysteries of the Feminine Divine ( 2013 ), editor Safron Rossi Romance of the Grail : The Magic and Mystery of Arthurian Myth ( 2015 ), editor Evans Lansing Smith Books based upon interviews The Power of Myth ( 1988 ). with Bill Moyers and editor Betty Sue Flowers An Open Life : Joseph Campbell in Conversation with Michael Toms ( 1989 ). editors John Maher and Dennie Briggs, forward by Jean Erdman Campbell This business of the gods : Interview with Fraser Boa ( 1989 ) The Hero 's Journey : Joseph Campbell on His Life and Work ( 1990 ). editor Phil Cousineau Audio recordings The Power of Myth ( With Bill Moyers ) ( 1987 ) Transformation of Myth through Time Volume 1 - 3 ( 1989 ) The Hero with a Thousand Faces : The Cosmogonic Cycle ( Read by Ralph Blum ) ( 1990 ) The Way of Art ( 1990 -- unlicensed ) The Lost Teachings of Joseph Campbell Volume 1 - 9 ( With Michael Toms ) ( 1993 ) On the Wings of Art : Joseph Campbell ; Joseph Campbell on the Art of James Joyce ( 1995 ) The Wisdom of Joseph Campbell ( With Michael Toms ) ( 1997 ) The Collected Lectures of Joseph Campbell Volume I. 1 : Mythology and the Individual ( 1997 ) Volume I. 2 : The Inward Journey ( 1997 ) Volume I. 3 : The Eastern Way ( 1997 ) Volume I. 4 : Man and Myth ( 1997 ) Volume I. 5 : The Myths and Masks of God ( 1997 ) Volume I. 6 : The Western Quest ( 1997 ) Volume II. 1 : A Brief History of World Mythology ( 2009 -- 2011 ) Volume II. 2 : Perspectives on Creative Mythology ( 2012 -- 2013 ) Volume II. 3 : Christian Symbols & Ideas ( 2014 ) Myth and Metaphor in Society ( With Jamake Highwater ) ( abridged ) ( 2002 ) Video / DVDs Psyche & Symbol ( 13 part KQED / PBS video series : Executive Producer : Aaron Miller ; Director : Diane Dowling ) ( 1976 ) Transformations of Myth Through Time ( 1989 ) Mythos ( 1987 / 1998 ) Joseph Campbell and the Power of Myth ( 1988 ) The Hero 's Journey : The World of Joseph Campbell ( 1987 ) ( Phil Cousineau ) Myth and Metaphor in Society ( With Jamake Highwater ) ( 1993 ) Sukhavati ( 2005 ) Books edited Gupta, Mahendranath. The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna ( 1942 ) ( translation from Bengali by Swami Nikhilananda ; Joseph Campbell and Margaret Woodrow Wilson, translation assistants - see preface ; foreword by Aldous Huxley ) Myths and Symbols in Indian Art and Civilization. Heinrich Zimmer ( 1946 ) The King and the Corpse : Tales of the Soul 's Conquest of Evil. Heinrich Zimmer ( 1948 ) Philosophies of India. Heinrich Zimmer ( 1951 ) The Portable Arabian Nights ( 1951 ) The Art of Indian Asia. Heinrich Zimmer ( 1955 ) Man and Time : Papers from the Eranos Yearbooks. Various authors ( 1954 -- 1969 ) Man and Transformation : Papers from the Eranos Yearbooks. Various authors ( 1954 -- 1969 ) The Mysteries : Papers from the Eranos Yearbooks. Various authors ( 1954 -- 1969 ) The Mystic Vision : Papers from the Eranos Yearbooks. Various authors ( 1954 -- 1969 ) Spirit and Nature : Papers from the Eranos Yearbooks. Various authors ( 1954 -- 1969 ) Spiritual Disciplines : Papers from the Eranos Yearbooks. Various authors ( 1954 -- 1969 ) Myths, Dreams, Religion. Various authors ( 1970 ) The Portable Jung. Carl Jung ( 1971 ) See also Monomyth Mythos Joseph Campbell Foundation Jean Erdman Wikiquote Retrieved from `` https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_Hero_with_a_Thousand_Faces&oldid=815672378 '' Categories : Books by Joseph Campbell Comparative mythology 1949 books Mythology books Religious studies books Philosophy books Sociology books Pantheon Books books Hidden categories : Webarchive template wayback links Use mdy dates from October 2014 Pages to import images to Wikidata All articles with unsourced statements Articles with unsourced statements from October 2015 Articles with attributed pull quotes Articles with unsourced statements from March 2016 Talk Contents About Wikipedia Български Català Deutsch Español Français Norsk Polski Português Русский Edit links This page was last edited on 16 December 2017, at 09 : 06. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution - ShareAlike License ; additional terms may apply. By using this site, you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Wikipedia ® is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., a non-profit organization. About Wikipedia

Question: when was the hero with a thousand faces published
Answer: 1949