Bracken's Reviews > The Hero With a Thousand Faces

I was very excited to read this work because of its potential to teach me a great deal about mythology, but found that it was a total piece of tripe. I felt like Campbell was trying too hard to prove his knowledge, which was apparent in the great diversity of myths referenced in the work, but he failed to logically plan the layout of the text. I can understand the overall layout of the text, but it didn't work on the chapter/section scale. It was so disorganized that I often felt like a member of a disaster cleanup team assigned to salvage and rebuild a town. Horribly hacked and detached bits of myth were scattered all over the place seemingly stochastically. If he would have picked a few myths and analyzed each using his methods and arguments, the book would have flowed much better and I would have enjoyed it much more.

I found myself wondering, “Who is the audience of the book?” At times, it was written for colleges and students of mythology and philosophy, but in other passages it was written for those with a rudimentary knowledge of mythology.

Another complaint I had was that Campbell often cited dreams in his arguments about the “monomyth,” but did little to tie those dreams to the myths or topics he was discussing in the section. It seemed like he felt obliged to include psychoanalytical elements to stay cool with his contemporaries.

Overall, like a very painful endurance race, I feel like a better man having read it. I did glean out some mythology tidbits and was able to follow where Campbell was trying to lead me. Unfortunately, the experience hurt needlessly.

While I’m still on my soapbox, I would just like to mention how lame it is when authors add figures to their work, but don’t reference (or even mention) them in their text.