Bill’s Reading List

This fascinating, scholarly hodgepodge spotlights the feminist underpinnings of myth, religion, and culture. Before being lionized as zaftig Norse angels who guided strong warriors to Valhalla, Valkyries may have offered rebirth through cannibalization. "Little Red Riding Hood" was based on Diana, goddess of the hunt. Marriage was once considered a sin, not a sacred union: St. Bernard once proclaimed "it was easier for a man to bring the dead back to life than to live with a woman without endangering his soul." A few of the other topics expounded upon are the Milky Way, Cinderella, the moon, and males giving birth. While some of the references put a cranky feminist spin on words that might in context have different meaning – St. Paul's oft-quoted "better to marry than to burn," for example – much in this vast tome will dazzle dabblers and intellectuals alike.

Until cloning becomes the order of the day, the author contends that each human is unique. Every person faces the danger of losing this humanness to mechanized surroundings. Is the human species becoming dehumanized by the condition of his environment? This book addresses this concern.

Anthropologist and naturalist Loren Eiseley blends scientific knowledge and imaginative vision in this story of man. This is a work about the wonders of life and the rewards from spending time alone in the natural world and the ephemeral nature of all existence.

Joseph Epes Brown explains what it means and takes to be an American Indian. Searching out 'commonalities' that form and elucidate Indian spiritual beliefs, Mr. Brown shows them in crucial need of revaluation by other Americans and demonstrates how much poorer the nation will be if it continues destroying the richness of tribal life and thought.—The New York Times

This book offers fascinating insights into the world of the pre-reservation Indians. It is a collection of classic essays that examines the universal characteristics of American Indian culture and tradition. This new edition also offers a personal view of Dr. Brown's life and research through his private correspondence from his time on the reservation and sheds insights into his relationship with old time Indian leaders including the legendary Sioux Medicine Man Black Elk.

In this remarkable work, Hoffer concentrates on the active phase of mass movements where the true believer has real influence. He cautions that although mass movements share many traits this does not imply that they're equally toxic or beneficent. The work tries to understand and explain, not pass judgment. Their appeal derives from the promise in their materialistic, religious, nationalist or mixed natures. Intense, infectious emotion is the fuel. Hoffer analyses the various causes of the desire for change; discontent alone is not enough. Other factors are needed to activate it, like a sense of power and the ability to spread a vision of hope.—From a review on Amazon.com

This is Mark Twain at his satirical best. Funny, pithy and insightful in an appropriately condescending way. A cynic's favorite muse.—From a review on Amazon.com

This evocative and thought-provoking selection from the writings of Laurens van der Post distills the essence of the writer, thinker, philosopher, and man of action. It takes the reader on a trail of discovery through the themes and patterns, the ideas and passionate concerns which have informed his life and his work, from his childhood in Africa and his experiences in wartime Japan, to this thoughts on war and forgiveness, the Bushman, and the storyteller, Jung and the dreamer, the endangered planet, history and memory, masculine and feminine, "the wonder and the mystery."

In his follow-up to Full Catastrophe Living – a book in which he presented basic meditation techniques as a way of reducing stress and healing from illness – here Jon Kabat-Zinn goes much more deeply into the practice of meditation for its own sake. To Kabat-Zinn, meditation is important because it brings about a state of "mindfulness," a condition of "being" rather than "doing" during which you pay attention to the moment rather than the past, the future, or the multitudinous distractions of modern life. In brief, rather poetic chapters, he describes different meditative practices and what they can do for the practitioner. The idea that meditation is "spiritual" is often confusing to people, Kabat-Zinn writes; he prefers to think of it as what you might call a workout for your consciousness. This book makes learning meditation remarkably easy and it also makes it seem infinitely appealing.—Review from Amazon.com

Fans of Joseph Campbell's books on comparative myth and religion will enjoy this amalgam of interviews, speeches and conversations, a spin-off of a film documentary of the same title produced by Cousineau. A spiritual autobiography of sorts, the book ranges widely, from Cro-Magnon art to Arthurian legend to marriage as a "sacrificial field," as it follows Campbell from his Catholic boyhood and early interest in American Indians to his years in Paris and Munich, through his travels and teaching at Sarah Lawrence. We watch as he discusses poetry with Robert Bly and meets Jung, who explains to him the meaning of the Hindu syllable "Om." Campbell's comments are quotable: "If marriage isn't a first priority in your life, you're not married." His prompting to "follow your bliss" here takes on the meaning of working out one's inner myths to gain a sense of direction.—From Publishers Weekly

Developed from a memorable series of lectures delivered in San Francisco, which included a legendary symposium at the Palace of Fine Arts with astronaut Rusty Schweickart, Joseph Campbell’s last book explores the space age. Campbell posits that the newly discovered laws of outer space are actually at work within human beings as well and that a new mythology is implicit in this realization. He examines the new mythology and other questions in these essays which he described as "a broadly shared spiritual adventure."

Since its release in 1949, The Hero with a Thousand Faces has influenced millions of readers by combining the insights of modern psychology with Joseph Campbell’s revolutionary understanding of comparative mythology. In these pages, Campbell outlines the Hero’s Journey, a universal motif of adventure and transformation that runs through virtually all of the world’s mythic traditions. He also explores the Cosmogonic Cycle, the mythic pattern of world creation and destruction.

As part of the Joseph Campbell Foundation’s Collected Works of Joseph Campbell, this third edition features expanded illustrations, a comprehensive bibliography, and more accessible sidebars.

As relevant today as when it was first published, The Hero with a Thousand Faces continues to find new audiences in fields ranging from religion and anthropology to literature and film studies. The book has also profoundly influenced creative artists—including authors, songwriters, game designers, and filmmakers—and continues to inspire all those interested in the inherent human need to tell stories.

Celebrated scholar Joseph Campbell shares his intimate and inspiring reflections on the art of living in this beautifully packaged book, part of a new series to be based on his unpublished writings.

To hear the speech of the real America, to smell the grass and the trees, to see the colors and the light—these were John Steinbeck's goals as he set out, at the age of fifty-eight, to rediscover the country he had been writing about for so many years. With Charley, his French poodle, Steinbeck drives the interstates and the country roads, dines with truckers, encounters bears at Yellowstone and old friends in San Francisco. And he reflects on the American character, racial hostility, on a particular form of American loneliness he finds almost everywhere, and on the unexpected kindness of strangers that is also a very real part of our national identity.—Review by Barnes & Noble

In these essays, Joseph Campbell explores the origins of myth and their role in everyday life — from Grimm's fairy tales to Native American legends. He explains how the symbolic content of myth is linked to universal human experience and how myths and experiences change over time. Included is his acclaimed essay “Mythogenesis,” which examines the rise and fall of a Native American legend. “Campbell has become one of the rarest of intellectuals...a serious thinker who has been embraced by the popular culture.”—Review by Newsweek

Joseph Campbell, author of The Hero with a Thousand Faces, a scholar who achieved legendary status as an explicator of myths, is reverently profiled in this documentary that encompasses his long life and career. During his childhood in New York City, Campbell was taken to see “Buffalo Bill” Cody’s Wild West Show at Madison Square Garden. Young Campbell was fascinated by the Native Americans in Cody’s performing troupe and eventually became obsessed with mythology. As he came to realize that myths worldwide had the same underpinnings, he also discovered his life’s work. This documentary mentions Campbell’s affinity for the writings of James Joyce and Carl Jung, and there is ample footage of Campbell, casual in flannel shirts, giving lectures salted with references to Buddhism, Christianity, classical mythology, St. Augustine, and the rituals of plains Indians. In later life, Campbell is seen being honored at a banquet at which George Lucas rises to give him credit for helping to inspire the writing of Star Wars. After Campbell’s death in 1987, heated controversies arose about his work, but this documentary is an overwhelmingly positive look at his writings, lectures, and personality.—Robert J. McNamara, Review by Amazon.com

PUBLISHER'S DESCRIPTION:
“And so Galahad decided that it would be a disgrace to set off on a quest with the other knights. Alone he would enter the dark forest where there was no path. This is the myth of the Hero’s Journey.” – Joseph Campbell.

One of the greatest storytellers of our time, and arguably the greatest mythologist, Joseph Campbell spent most of his long, rich career explaining how ancient myths like the Hero’s Journey are relevant to modern life. In understanding the importance of myth as a vital, vibrant source of “mankind’s one great story,” Campbell inspired others to embark on a quest for the meaning of myth in their own lives. This biographical portrait, filmed shortly before his death in 1987, follows Campbell’s personal quest—a pathless journey of questioning, discovery, and ultimately of delight and joy in a life to which he said, “Yes.”