Frazer and the Association of Ideas

[There are two articles about J. G. Frazer's work already on this site. This article combines the argument of both of these, and illustrates an approach to ancient and primitive thought which must inevitably miss the target.  Thomas Yaeger, October 3, 2017].

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In the 1980s, I read the two-volume version of The Golden Bough, miraculously reduced from thirteen volumes by the expedient of removing all the footnotes, and was struck by the absence of any discussion of a relationship between m...