The Masks of God: Creative Mythology

Creative Mythology is the fourth and last volume in Masks of God. Up to this book, I thought the work had become stronger with each volume. The first book, Primitive Mythology published in 1959 by and large dealt with the pre-historic era Campbell sees at the root of world culture, and so relied quite a bit on archeology and the speculations of such psychologists as Freud. It was very dry and I suspected, dated. The second volume, Oriental Mythology, primarily examined Egypt, India and China--and certainly made me want to read more--and reread Confucius and Lao Tzu in light of what I'd learned. In Occidental Mythology, Campbell examined the religious/mythological heritage of the West, both of the Greco-Roman classical world and the show more Levant as expressed in the scripture of Zoroasterism, Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

Creative Mythology examines something quite different. Not the dogma found in scripture nor indigenous ritual and artifacts. Rather it examines the "living mythology" of literature, music and paintings. Campbell sees in the Renaissance the "dawning day and civilization of the individual" who seeks to be "not coercive, but evocative." Grounded in individualism, this new ethos is expressed both in the rise, or given classical culture, the return, of the idea of reason in the sciences but also in the ideal of romantic love found in the troubadours and Arthurian legends. Campbell also examines modern users and makers of mythos such as Wagner, Picasso, Thomas Mann--and giving in my opinion far too much space to James Joyce, but then I'm not a fan. I read Joyce's Ulysses only three months ago, so it, and how much I detested it, is fresh in my mind. With the previous volumes there was no doubt in my mind about the centrality and importance of the texts and artifacts Campbell was examining and Campbell was at his fascinating best making connections between them. But in this volume where Campbell mostly plays literary critic, I found him at his most dull, tedious, repetitive and impenetrable. So though I gave the first volume 3 stars as worth reading, the next 4 stars as something I learned much from and the next one after that 5 stars for some amazing connections, insights and arguments, this last volume only gets two stars from me--and I'm being generous. show less

In this, the culmination of his master work, Campbell displays the marvelous beauty of the spiritual fabric mankind has draped itself with. He guides us through the weaving of the fabric and explains the origin of the yarn. He allows us to perceive the imperfections and gently come to terms with our own deeply rooted faiths. Unlike Dawkins, who tears the fabric to shreds and shoves it up our asses, Campbell, steeped in Jungian thought, maintains the development of fuller consciousness through dream, myth, and realization. Campbell is subtle and unassuming. He comes and goes within our intellectual circles, but this is in accord with our growing comprehension of his work. He is years ahead of us, and farther out than most of us wish to show more travel. Better to browse through a Bullfinch and stay in your comfort zone, than drown in Campbell and tread the long lonely road of the spiritual warrior.
Until you have read this work, do not pretend to know him through the Power Of Myth with Bill Moyers. This is a monumental achievement and deserves the many long quiet nights you need to invest in it. show less

OKAY. For as much as I generally love Campbell for his scholarship and his breadth and depth of knowledge on all things religious, mythical, and anthropological, I have to say he goes rather overboard in a DIFFERENT direction for this book.

What direction, you ask?

Living culture. And I'm not really talking about modern culture so much as I'm referring to the scope of the Dark Ages through Thomas Mann and James Joyce. He does the literary analysis thing. In spades. Want Beowulf? Check. Want tons of Parcival, Gawain, and even the tragic love story of Adelard and Heloise? Check. Want the erudite traditions, influences, mythological connections and cultural transformations laid out? You got it.

But wait, that's not all! We get some of the show more best and fully explained nastiness of the truth behind chastity in Christianity and the best visceral descriptions I've ever read that makes me UNDERSTAND why the whole Romantic Love thing took off so HARD back at the opening days of the Rennaisance. Grail Legend? Chivalry? The whole love thing was bucking the Church and Society HARD. Trubadors were the punk bands of the day. :)

We get the influence of Alchemy and Science in poetry, music, and opera. We get dozens of traditions, a great analysis that shows just how much Islamic thought is slathered throughout the Divine Comedy, and so much more.

So what's my problem?

It feels like half the book was devoted to fanboying over Thomas Mann and James Joyce.

I mean, sure, these guys were like a wet dream for mythographers and sociologists and Jungian analysts and they wrote some fine fiction, too, but I would have been JUST FINE with... a slightly abbreviated analysis.

Don't get me wrong! I'm now interested as hell in reading more of Thomas Mann and I may go ahead and revisit Joyce soon, but BY NO MEANS is this very good reading if you're not at least slightly interested in either author.

Of course, if you're prepping yourself in College for writing one hell of a great essay on Joyce (or 14 of them), then DO YOURSELF A BIG FAVOR and read this book or the relevant sections. Some of it rather blew me away. :)


Is this the best stuff Campbell ever wrote? Hell, no. It's very learned and I learned TONS, but it was almost nothing like what I had come to expect from him. More like he had been sitting around doing a lot of reading and his brilliant mind came up with fantastic random crap that sooner or later coalesced into a huge coherent literary epiphany. I think that's great and all but damn... I wanted the world, not fiction, THIS TIME. :) show less

This was a great wrap-up to Joseph Campbell's The Masks of God 4-book series. The first 3 books in the series focus on how all of the mythologies in the world connect. This last book, though, focuses on how mythologies from different countries/areas are unique. For a series that focuses on the similarities of the world's mythologies, this last book initially seems a bit disjointed. However, I think that this was a good move on Campbell's part. It's specifically because the first three books focus on the similarities that it was beneficial to focus on the differences as well. As with the other three books, there were a few parts that seemed a bit slow and dragged on a bit too long. I did enjoy this book, though, and I do recommend the show more series. (Although it's not necessary to read every book in this series to read one.) show less

Contents: Ancient vine: Experience and authority -- World transformed -- Word behind words -- Wasteland: Love-death -- Phoenix fire -- Balance -- Way and the life: Crucified -- Paraclete -- New wine: Death of "God" -- Earthly paradise. Source: UCLA Santa Cruz Online Library Catalogue

Gerald Sykes said of this work, "[Joseph Campbell] says things here that have not been said anywhere else--though every good artist has implied them--and he says them with urgency, breadth, and some of the most impressive scholarship of our time."

Deel IV uit de beroemde serie The Masks of God. Over nieuwe mythologieën in de literatuur en kunst van de moderne wereld. Heel interessant!