Tracking the Gods: The Place of Myth in Modern Life (Studies in Jungian Psychology By Jungian Analysts)

318 Pages·1995·1.05 MB·English

by  James Hollis

Tracking the Gods : The Place of Myth in
title: Modern Life Studies in Jungian Psychology
; 68
author: Hollis, James.
publisher: Inner City Books
isbn10 | asin: 0919123694
print isbn13: 9780919123694
ebook isbn13: 9780585177014
language: English
Jung, C. G.--(Carl Gustav),--1875-1961,
subject
Myth--Psychological aspects.
publication date: 1995
lcc: BL313.H64 1995eb
ddc: 809.3
Jung, C. G.--(Carl Gustav),--1875-1961,
subject:
Myth--Psychological aspects.
Page 1
Tracking the Gods
Page 2
Marie-Louise von Franz, Honorary Patron
Studies in Jungian Psychology
by Jungian Analysts
Daryl Sharp, General Editor
Page 3
Tracking the Gods
The Place of Myth in Modern Life
JAMES HOLLIS
Page 4
For Jill, whose love for me,
and whose secure sense of self,
allows and supports me
to do these things which are necessary.
For Taryn and Tim, Jonah and Seah,
children always present.
And for "Terry," who tried to eat the sun . . .
Canadian Cataloguing in Publication Data
Hollis, James, 1940-
Tracking the Gods: the place of myth in modern life
(Studies in Jungian psychology by Jungian analysts; 68)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-919123-69-4
1. Myth Psychological aspects.
2. Jung, C.G. (Carl Gustav), 1875-1961.
I. Title. II. Series.
BL313.H65 1995 291.1'3'019 C95-930074-0
Copyright © 1995 by James Hollis.
All rights reserved.
INNER CITY BOOKS
Box 1271, Station Q, Toronto, Canada M4T 2P4
Telephone [phone]
FAX [phone]
Honorary Patron: Marie-Louise von Franz.
Publisher and General Editor: Daryl Sharp.
Senior Editor: Victoria Cowan.
INNER CITY BOOKS was founded in 1980 to promote the
understanding and practical application of the work of C.G. Jung.
Cover: "Oracle," acrylic on canvas, by Vicki Cowan (© 1994).
Index by Daryl Sharp
Printed and bound in Canada by
University of Toronto Press Incorporated
Page 5
Contents
Introduction: Because Being Here Amounts to So Much 7
The Services of Myth 13
The cosmological question 13
The metaphysical question 14
The sociological question 15
The psychological question 17
Differing Approaches to Myth 17
1 24
The Rag-and-Bone Shop of the Heart
The Mythos of Modernism 24
The Modern Sensibility 29
How Faust became "Faustian" 30
The underground man 38
In the heart of darkness 45
Czech mate 47
After the Fall 49
2 53
The Eternal Return and the Heroic Quest
Eternal Return: Sacrifice, Death and Rebirth 54
The Journey of the Hero 65
The heroic journey 71
The psychological meaning of the journey 72
3 79
Eating the Sun
The Spontaneous Generation of Myth 79
The Iron Butterfly 85
In a dark wood 87
Eating the sun 90
4 97
Tracking the Gods
The Mystery We Call God 101
Adrift on the Cosmic Sea 108
Page 6
5 116
The Gods Astir: A Mythic Interlude
Liebestod Variations 117
Admetus and Alcestis 118
Philemon and Baucis 119
Dido and Aeneas 120
Glaucus 122
Idomeneus 122
Marsyas 123
6 126
Mystic Chords of Memory
The Better Angels of Our Nature 126
Individuation and Relationship 138
Afterword: Heart-Work on All of the Images 146
Bibliography 150
Index 155
Page 7
Introduction
Because Being Here Amounts To So Much
Why . . . have a yearning for destiny? . . . because being here amounts to so
much, because all this Here and Now, so fleeting, seems to require us and
strangely concerns us. Us the most fleeting of all . . . . Having been once on
earth can it ever be canceled?
Rainer Maria Rilke, "The Ninth Duino Elegy."
Wherever they first gathered, from swirling desert sands to frost-
caked tundra, from great oceans to primeval forests and high plateaus,
the questions were there with them: Who are we? How did we get
here? Where are we going? repeated in tongues, scratched on walls of
caves and hides of beasts, enacted in recurrent patterns attending the
passage of seasons, the solemn rites of birth and death, war and love-
making. Always the questions were there.
Today, these questions haunt us still. If there is anything that
distinguishes the human species from others, it is the endurance of
such questions, our power to ask them, and our need to locate
ourselves in the great rhythms of change and continuity.
Jungian writers are sometimes puzzling to general readers, not to
mention their colleagues in other schools of psychology, because of
their references to myth. They frequently borrow from legend, and
while there may be some aesthetic appeal in those stories, why they
would be helpful to us psychologically may remain obscure. At best
Jungians, and their interest in myth, are tolerated; at worst they are
considered fuzzy brained and, gasp, crypto-mystics. This book is an
effort to explain why Jungian psychology has so frequently been
nourished by myth and, more important, why the study of myth is
critical for us as individuals and as citizens of our age.