Home : Book details : Book description

Description of  The Flight of the Wild Gander: Explorations in the Mythological Dimension

In The Flight of the Wild Gander, renowned mythologist Joseph Campbell explores the individual and geographical origins of myth, outlining the full range of mythology from Grimms fairy tales to Native American legends. Originally published in 1969, this first collection of Campbells essays describes the symbolic content of stories: how they are linked to human experience and how theyalong with our experienceshave changed over time. Throughout, Campbell explores the function of mythology in everyday life and the forms it may take in the future. Included are two of Campbells first groundbreaking essays: Bios and Mythos and Primitive Man As Metaphysician, both of which examine the biological basis and necessity for story and mythology, and establish mythology as a basic function or fact of human nature. Campbell explores how the myth was born, as well as the personal experiences of the visionary medicine man through whose memory the myth was preserved.