I have just finished watching this extremely powerful DVD set, amazing is only one word I would use for it. Joseph Campbell is a truly insightful man and his knowledge is widespread as is his understanding of the world around us.
Being a writer and viewing this is a wonderful excusion into the realm of knowledge and beliefs about the world we live in. Giving lots of ideas as jump off points to write from. Beginning the process in our minds of how our legends and myths about how we got here, why we are here, and where we are going.
I really enjoyed watching this interview because I have read about Joseph Campbell a few years ago and was wondering what he looked like and sounded like. Also this is knowledge to me that is forgotten in our daily work a day lives.
We tend to forget about where we came from and the legends and myths that mould each one of us day in and day out. We have ideas and thoughts of our own but also the ones that are passed down to us, from our parents, and from their parents and society as a whole.
All of what we are now came from what our beliefs were then. Our myths, stories, our deep seated knowing, we seem to have forgotten about that. and this set of videos bring it to us again.
Our humble beginnings.
It will be the best six hours you have ever spent.
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Article comments
1 - Lono
This is indeed the best 6 hours of television ever produced. I used to watch this on PBS pledge drives for years, so my wife finally got me a copy (VHS). Joseph Campbell is an amazing teacher than I have really benefited from. He helped me understand that the rule of religion means nothing (which I always suspected), but to look at what is being taught in the stories. Those are what can teach us about ourselves and our past. At a recent company outing, we were all asked if we could have lunch with anyone in history, who would it be? My choice was Joseph Campbell. Sadly though, aside from my wife, no one knew who I was talking about.
Thanks for bringing me some joy today. I have been concentrating WAY too much on politics recently.
Lono
2 - Harry Forbes
I enjoyed listening to Joseph Campbell in this series very much, except for that sanctimonious sniveling suck-up Bill Moyers, who kept spoiling it by yapping himself and nodding like a bobble-head doll.
3 - Brave Kelso
The Moyers interviews make Campbell look good. He was a charimatic teacher, an imaginative thinker. He seems to have been a follower of Jung. The series has some moving stuff, and if we could keep metaphor and truth separate, sometimes useful stuff. I don't like how this has all spun out. "Follow your bliss" has become a mantra for people who are afraid to be atheists (remember Moyers talking about his own beliefs - he wasn't pushing Eastern religion or New Age cults) but are too egotistical to go to a conventional church.