Joseph Campbell's Hero's Journey
My 3210 students turned in their essays today, and I’m really interested to see how they turn out. I would love to build some kind of mechanism in so that they can take another shot and fix these essays up, but I’m not quite sure how to make that happen yet.
Anyway, now we are moving on to talk about the short story. We spent the day yesterday talking about what is probably the most important literary principle I have ever learned: the Hero’s Journey. I say that it is the most important because it was only after I learned about this theory that I started really being able to analyze pieces of literature and to see patterns. It is something that can be taught relatively quickly and the payoff for students is huge. It can truly change your life because once you learn to identify the pattern, you will see it everywhere. Films, TV shows, and books will never be the same.
So what is the hero’s journey?
There are lots of variations of this, but the most complete description is found in Joseph Campbell’s The Hero With a Thousand Faces. Campbell, who was a student of the great Carl Jung, was fascinated by the similarities between stories across time and across cultures. As he studied every story he could get his hands on, he began to see a pattern emerge. His analysis of that pattern became The Hero of a Thousand Faces, in which he describes a process or structure for stories that he calls the hero’s journey.
Campbell goes into remarkable detail. I like to keep my version a bit more simple.
Status Quo: The hero starts out as a regular person in a regular world. They might be bored with their existence (Luke Skywalker), or somewhat downtrodden (Jean Valjean), or just dissatisfied (Belle).
Call to Adventure: Along comes a herald that calls the hero on an adventure. This could be a letter (Harry Potter), or a tornado (the Wizard of Oz), or a starship captain who challenges the hero to join Starfleet (Star Trek).
Departure: The hero leaves his boring or oppressive world and strikes out on the adventure.
Threshold: At some point the hero crosses a boundary or border that clearly separates his world from some other special world. In theory there is just one threshold, but in reality we often see lots of them. Sam stops Frodo in The Fellowship of the Ring and tells him that if he takes one more step he will be the farthest from home that he has ever been. But then later they have to cross the Brandywine bridge. Then even later they leave their friends behind and cross the lake in order to strike out on their own. Then they cross a threshold into Mordor. Then they cross another threshold at Mount Doom! Each threshold takes them into a land that is darker and scarier than the one before.
Challenges, Friends, Mentors: Along the way on this journey (sometimes before the first threshold, sometimes after it, sometimes as part of crossing it), the hero encounters challenges, but is also joined by friends and mentors who help him on his way. Harry meets Ron and Hermione after crossing the first threshold (platform 9 3/4), but Bilbo meets the dwarves before he leaves on his adventure. Frodo has Sam and (to a certain extent) Gandalf before he leaves, but the fellowship of the ring is formed only after he reaches Rivendell. Katniss Everdeen doesn’t get her mentor, Haymitch, until after she has left home and crossed the threshold into the big city (but before she crosses another threshold and enters the arena).
Descent: Much of the first part of the hero’s journey can be thought of as a descent. This might not always be the case, but symbolically the hero has to reach some (usually) dark, (often) cold, and (frequently) wet place. So Luke Skywalker ends up in a garbage dump in Star Wars but then in The Empire Strikes Back (an entire film dedicated to the descent) he starts on an icy planet, gets thawed out in a tank of water, then ends up going to Degoba, a swampy, dark, mucky world … interesting. Jim Kirk in the new Star Trek film is an interesting case. His call to adventure looks like an ascent into space. But his real descent starts when young Spock kicks him off the Enterprise and he ends up on (what!?) an icy planet. But then he has a series of descents on that planet in order to end up at his lowest point in an icy cave where he meets old Spock (a mentor) who will teach him how to ascend again.
Crisis/Death/Mystical Union: When the hero reaches their lowest point, they have to die — at least symbolically. This VERY often means that they drown or nearly drown in some way (Pinocchio), or they face and kill their father (who is really a version of themselves) (Star Wars), or they might end up making out with an opera ghost (Phantom of the Opera). If you are ever watching a movie, and they film a scene in the rain, you can usually bet that you are watching some kind of crisis (Batman getting torched by Scarecrow in Batman Begins, or The Battle of Helm’s Deep in The Two Towers), or a mystical union (the rainy kiss in Spiderman or the kiss-while-standing-in-the-underground-watery-dungeon in Phantom of the Opera).
Resurrection: After the crisis and death (or near-death) there has to be a resurrection. Maybe someone finds some magical blood that they can inject in a certain starship captain, or maybe the opera ghost decides that he won’t kill your boyfriend, or maybe you don’t actually have to end up taking the poison berries.
Ascent: The hero, who has now completed the mission and been renewed somehow, begins the journey home. Maybe a giant eagle picks him up and takes him home, or maybe she gets back on a train home, or maybe she clicks her heels and ends up home.
Return: When the hero gets back everything is the same but somehow different. The hero has some new skills (Jedi, warrior, wizard) or some new knowledge (“there’s no place like home”), and they are usually able to make their world better. They are illuminated and they are able to illuminate the world.
So that’s the hero’s journey. If you are new at picking this stuff up, I suggest that you pay attention to two very common symbols:
Water: Think about it. Filming in water is never an accident. It takes time and a lot of money because the equipment is in danger of getting wet. Most directors, if given a choice, would wait out a storm and film when the sun is shining. If you are watching a scene and people are getting wet, ask yourself if this might not be a scene about descent or crisis/death/near-death.
Trains, Planes, Boats, etc.: Harry, Tris, and Katniss all ride trains. Jack Sparrow takes a boat. Jim Kirk uses a space ship. These vehicles move people from one world to the next.
If you are interested in learning more about this, you search “hero’s journey” on YouTube and you will find LOADS of videos with clips showing how it all works.
Now that my students are familiar with the pattern, they are going to have to write a short story about a character that follows the hero’s journey. I’m really looking forward to these.