potential future research topic
The future of the hero
1. Campbell defines the hero as a figure who mediates between change and continuity:
- the hero is compelled to leave the fixed rules and norms of his birth-culture
- he is exposed a world with different rules and cultural norms (figuratively, in the form of monsters and demons, or allegorically in the form of moral challenges (the Faerie Queene loves this; to a lesser extent, Journey to the West does as well with the kingdom of women, etc)
- after he undergoes his ordeal, he returns to his people but not before being changed in some way (bearing a scar or token, or having his moral compass recalibrated)
- he must re-integrate with his birth-culture, and either share with them his new perspective or otherwise suppress the ways in which he has changed (or accept that he will never be able to return to his birth-culture).
2. In a world without borders where everyone is exposed to shifting moral compasses all the time, what is the value of a 'birth-culture', how does one leave it, and how does one return to it?
- where accessibility is universal (or nearly so), who undertakes this? is the 'hero' still capable of being an individual on behalf of his society, or is everyone venturing into the unknown alone?
- where are the frontiers for the hero to venture beyond? where are the 'safe lines' beyond which re-integration becomes difficult or impossible?
3. Assuming these frontiers cease to be geographical (putting aside the valid interpretation that they never were about geography in the first place) but instead cultural, or worse, economic or intellectual, who are the figures who are deliberately blurring the lines?
- people who by definition exist along the margins don't count, since they create pools of stability even across strata (such as subcultures)
- assuming the frontiers are intellectual, are scientists and social engineers the new pioneers?
** they are the ones uncovering new possibilities and the moral complications that arise from these options
4. Given all this, what part does the 'common person' play in the whole hero-cycle? Passive observer? Beneficiary?
blah blah, okay, this whole thing wasn't very well thought out to begin with, just putting some notes where hopefully they'll remain for me to pick up on later.
Tentative (very tentative) working titles include Beyond the Sunset, because Tennyson is awesome.
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