TECH: The Writer's Journey by Christopher Vogler (Book Review)

[mbarker.livejournal.com]

Original posting: Fri, 23 May 1997 12:46:18 EDT

The Writer's Journey: Mythic Structure for Storytellers and
Screenwriters by Christopher Vogler
ISBN 0-941188-13-2

Who would benefit from reading this? Anyone who wants to draw on the strength and models of the oldest storytelling traditions of humanity may find this a useful summary of one abstraction from that rich field.

Vogler provides a vocabulary for writers based on observations drawn from The Hero with A Thousand Faces by Joseph Campbell. Specifically, he lays out archtypes of:

• the hero
• the mentor
• threshold guardian
• herald
• shapeshifter
• shadow
• trickster

describing their psychological function(s), dramatic function(s), and various types. He also describes the Journey in terms of:

1. ordinary world
2. call to adventure
3. refusal of the call
4. meeting the mentor
5. crossing the first threshold
6. tests, allies, and enemies
7. approach to the innermost cave
8. supreme ordeal
9. reward (seizing the sword)
10. the road back
11. resurrection
12. return with the elixir

What use are these archtypes and the pattern of the Hero's Journey? Let me quote from Vogler:

(p. 265) "First, Caveat Scriptor! (Let the writer beware!) The Hero's Journey model is a guideline. It's not a cookbook recipe or a methematical formula to be applied rigidly to every story. To be effective, a story doesn't have to concur with this or any other school, paradigm, or method of analysis. The ultimate measure of a story's success or excellence is not its compliance with any established patterns, but its lasting popularity and effect on the audience. To force a story to conform to a structural model is putting the cart before the horse."

and

(p. 266) "The pattern of the Hero's Journey is but one metaphor for what goes on in a story or a human life. ... Work out a different metaphor or several of them, if it helps you understand storytelling better."

"It's probably best to acquaint yourself with the Hero's Journey ideas and then forget about them as you sit down to write."

[he doesn't say whether you have to be wearing clothes or not...just sit down and write...:]