Monomyth

The monomyth (often referred to as the Hero's Journey) is the cyclical journey undertaken by the standard mythological hero, as described by Joseph Campbell in his book The Hero with a Thousand Faces (1948) or the journey called Haft-kh?n (Seven Stages) undertaken by the Persian hero Rustam in the monumental epos Shahnama. The core concept of the monomyth is: "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 men."

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The pattern of the monomyth, which Campbell claimed literally every hero myth exhibited to some degree, can be found in contemporary mythology as well. The pattern was followed by George Lucas in the original Star Wars trilogy (and followed more loosely in the prequel trilogy.) Other examples of the monomyth cycle are Disney's The Lion King in 1994 and the Wachowski brothers' The Matrix in the 2000s. The Harry Potter series uses a monomyth structure for each installment, and many contemporary Hollywood superhero films more or less deliberately conform to the general architecture.

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Campbell's account of the monomyth explains its ubiquity through a mixture of Jungian Archetypes, unconscious forces of mind from the Freudian conception, and profound narrative symbolism that may be consciously registered. Since these accounts of psychology have been largely discredited, no one has offered any alternate explanations for the power of the monomyth, and Campbell's works, despite owing much to seemingly fallacious psychological models, nonetheless uniquely stand on their own.

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Mythological: redirect mythology...

Hero: :This article is about the type of character. For other meanings, see Hero (disambiguation)....

Joseph Campbell: Joseph Campbell (New York City, March 26, 1904 - Honolulu, October 30, 1987) was an American professor, writer, and orator best known for his work in the fields of comparative mythology and comparative religion....