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A Beautiful Mind

A Beautiful Mind (DreamWorks LLC and Universal, 2001)

Through eyes that read the book first

Heroes are often, as mythologist Joseph Campbell has emphasized, people who undertake a journey, face great odds, and live to tell about it. Shamans are often featured in myths, but they are usually individuals who are obligated to serve society. They have a different kind of glory. They often must accept lower standards than the rest of the group, just to be accepted, since the demands placed upon them are dire. Should they fail, they can be mocked, ridiculed, driven into exile, treated like clowns, and even killed.
Mythologists tend to look backwards in time and evaluate legends from different places and contexts. Rarely do they look at the mid-twentieth century for good source material since it is still too close to us for objectivity. If a generation is limited to thirty years, then the end of World War II (presumably 1945) occurred less than two generations ago. There was a romanti...

Posted by: Tricia F. Doyle

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