The Power of Myth: Programs 1-6
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The Power of Myth: Programs 1-6 Audible Audiobook – Original recording

Joseph Campbell (Author, Narrator), Bill Moyers (Author, Narrator), HighBridge, a division of Recorded Books (Publisher)
4.7 4.7 out of 5 stars 3,759 ratings
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An exhilarating journey into the mind and spirit of a remarkable man, a legendary teacher, and a masterful storyteller, conducted by TV journalist Bill Moyers for their acclaimed PBS series.

Program One: "The Hero's Adventure"
Program Two: "The Message of the Myth"
Program Three: "The First Storytellers"
Program Four: "Sacrifice and Bliss"
Program Five: "Love and the Goddess"
Program Six: "Masks of Eternity"

Previous page
  1. Listening Length
    5 hours and 33 minutes
  2. Author
    Joseph Campbell, see all
  3. Narrator
    Joseph Campbell, see all
  4. Audible release date
    February 21, 2007
  5. Language
    English
  6. Publisher
    HighBridge, a division of Recorded Books
  7. ASIN
    B000NOIWGW
  8. Version
    Original recording
  9. Program Type
    Audiobook
  10. See all details
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Product details

Listening Length 5 hours and 33 minutes
Author Joseph Campbell, Bill Moyers
Narrator Joseph Campbell, Bill Moyers
Audible.com Release Date February 21, 2007
Publisher HighBridge, a division of Recorded Books
Program Type Audiobook
Version Original recording
Language English
ASIN B000NOIWGW
Best Sellers Rank #52,052 in Audible Books & Originals (See Top 100 in Audible Books & Originals)
#353 in World History (Audible Books & Originals)
#1,325 in Social Sciences (Audible Books & Originals)
#3,628 in World History (Books)

Customer reviews

4.7 out of 5 stars
4.7 out of 5
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Dropping Knowledge, Rest easy Men 🇺🇸 of Benghazi, You Are NEVER Forgotten!
5 Stars
Dropping Knowledge, Rest easy Men 🇺🇸 of Benghazi, You Are NEVER Forgotten!
13HRS ...Enlighten Me Boon: All the God's, All The Heavens , All the HELLS are within YOU. Great book btw, Pretty Enlightening All Movie 🎥 References aside. 😉☘️
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Top reviews from the United States

Kindle Customer
5.0 out of 5 stars Good read
Reviewed in the United States on April 5, 2024
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Thought provoking in expression. My journey changed in 1994 with what I refer to as a new birth of a faith that has evolved so CD that moment in time. I enjoy Joseph Campbell's perspectives.
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Robin Landry
5.0 out of 5 stars Making the genius of Campbell easy to understand
Reviewed in the United States on March 18, 2015
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Without their story, a culture has not future, or something like that. Joseph Campbell spent his life giving us our 'story'. Who are we, why did we come here and where are we going. We are all on a hero's journey to test if we are worthy of our home on the other side, or at least that's what Campbell found as he waded through the mass of confusing, and sometimes childlike myths that have followed us through the centuries.

I love this particular book because it's an interview between to really gifted men who respect each other, and seem to have a wonderful time just talking about what they love. It's much easier to grasp some of Campbell's concepts because frankly, he can make your head spin with his theories and concepts. This book is like being a fly on the wall while two men talk over dinner. Most of it I can understand, but I have to admit, sometimes things get a little over my head.

They were talking about life in general and Campbell says this: "I will participate in the game. It is a wonderful, wonderful opera--except that it hurts". page 81 I don't know how you can sum up life any better than that. Life is wonderful and it does hurt.

Then Campbell talks about the 'hero' which everyone one of us is. "The hero is the one who comes to participate in life courageously and decently, in the way of nature, not in the way of personal rancor, disappointment, or revenge." page 82. There you have it. To do life right, you need to be the hero and you need to be courageous and decent. Campbell wrote the book Hero With A Thousand Faces, a compilation of the mythology of the world and this is what he came up with. Screen writers use Campbell's work to outline movies because it's journey we all recognize either on the surface or down in our subconscious, and we know that we are the hero of our own journey.

"So Jesus says, Judge not that you may not be judged. That is to say, put yourself back in the position of Paradise before you thought in terms of good and evil. You don't hear this much from the pulpits. But one of the great challenges of life is to say "yea" that that person or that act or that condition which in your mind is most abominable." page 32. What I grasp from this statement is that Campbell is trying to say that we need to look at things from a higher level. A poisonous snake is not evil it just is. When you kill it to save someone, you're saying no to the situation, you're not saying that the snake is evil.

I love the genius of Joseph Campbell and this is an easy(comparatively) book to understand him and what he's trying to say without your head exploding. His opening up the world of myth makes him a hero in my book.
15 people found this helpful
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C.L.
5.0 out of 5 stars Transformative work
Reviewed in the United States on December 27, 2023
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I've read this book a few times and each time I take away something new. Joseph Campbell helps you to look past the obvious and see the metaphors all around us. To see that which connects all of us. I love feeling more connected to humanity when I read his stories. What an amazing man and storyteller (and Bill Moyers too)!
6 people found this helpful
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Umer Vakil
4.0 out of 5 stars Accessible read, keep an open mind and enjoy! Relatable to everyone by virtue of being human.
Reviewed in the United States on January 20, 2014
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I was never really interested in mythology in school, coming from a far more mathematical/analytical frame of mind. Alas, I was fortunate to have two wonderful teachers teach me in undergraduate courses in NYU and make me dive into a completely alien subject two years ago. I felt that Joseph Campbell is very clear (and not to mention original!) in explaining the different conceptions of life that altogether constitute mythology. In the interview, he said that his autodidactism came from a ready access to books - and this is very evident from the large length and depth of literature he has studied.

It is pointless to go into the content of the book because that is what reading it is for. By reading this book, it helps you understand (or reaffirm) beliefs like viewing comparative mythology as a road to uniting tales and legends common to many cultures into a theoretical framework. Incredibly, you can find that most narratives created by human cultures have very common underlying themes: the most prevalent example is the idea of the 'hero', an ordinary person who lives in confusion, is met with an opportunity where he is forced to go on a journey that ultimately results in an inner reawakening leading him to return to his previous tribe and change it - a common theme in historical epics and religious texts. He mentions different conceptions of the hero, but this interview is a repetition of his ideas written with more detail in  The Hero with a Thousand Faces (The Collected Works of Joseph Campbell) '.

Campbell mentions instances from a large range of traditions, not only the large dominant ones but the smaller ones including those found in tribes isolated from civilization. For someone like me who is not well versed at all in this subject, the book's accessibility came to me as a great relief. He mentions great points about how the decline of classical education leads to a lack of spiritual reference point to self-reflect in the western world. Some ideas made me understand a few religious concepts far more clearly, such as the idea that people associate Jesus with love because he is more relatable as a human and not a perfect and overbearing figure like God.

However, the brilliance of his work is how doesn't dwell excessively on the grandiose and transcendent and instead focuses on the day-to-day challenges faced by us. He talks wonderfully about marriage and the importance of rituals. This same importance is why despite not being a particularly religious person, I keep all my fasts during the month of Ramadan - purely due to the experience itself and not due to the perceived validity of it. Campbell brilliantly expresses how a lack of myth results in spiritual bankruptcy as all cultures (including the scientific worldview that trace our descent from Darwinian forces) use narratives to create moral justifications: A Muslim would say that incest is wrong because it is prohibited by scripture, a person who holds a Darwinian view would say that our repulsion towards incest comes from cultural programming that survived because rules that prohibited inbreeding allowed for a reduction in the possibility of hereditary problems - allowing those subscribers to survive and carry on the tradition through a memetic process.

After all, myths are something that we live and die for regardless of our philosophical inclinations. An interesting comparison is how myths drive people towards the idea of sacrifice - letting go of the ego and possessions to integrate into the larger community, the family, then the tribe, country and against all possible odds, perhaps into humanity itself (e.g. Mandela, Abraham when ordered to sacrifice his son). Some of his ideas bare great resemblance to recent history, such as the anarchy created when modernity is imposed at a rapid pace on primitive (or rather less developed countries) by colonial powers - threatening people's myths and by extension their very identities. I think this book is a treasure and it is a good defense against the Dawkins-like Atheists who reject religion altogether by focusing on religions lack of epistemological basis while ignoring the fact that religion has survived for so long because it is an integral part of the human experience and carries useful heuristics ("don't take on debts") . Furthermore, the ideas in this book by extension challenge the view that the modern secular worldview relies on pure objective analysis of morality and social relations - after all, even modern cultures have a belief in some myth, be it progress, liberalism, futurism or the ability for economics to secure human happiness. I am not disregarding the validity of any of this philosophical viewpoints - simply that no culture can exist with the complete absence of a narrative that drives the community. It unveils the irony of atheist groups that reject mythology and group into their own cults, giving credence to the very ideas they claim to reject.

Campbell deals with a couple of other interesting ideas including the understanding that "the myth is a public dream and the dream is the private myth". For him, when the union of these two ideas is disturbed when one's private myth is not compatible with the larger mythology of a culture - it results in the birth of a 'hero' that reawakens a culture by molding his culture in accordance to his newfound personal convictions. This is the dramatic explanation of how cultural innovation is thought to take place and why tracing a tradition's history of itself, its birth comes from the journey of a hero. (Muhammad meditating in his cave, Moses seeing God in a tree in the Sinai desert during his exile).

Campbell also tackles a central tenet of mythology, the use of language to express the transcendental. He talks about how language stimulates the imagination despite its limitations of being reductive, powerfully reducing incredible inexpressible experiences into short tales and stories. However, the ambiguity of language could mean that it captures the metaphysical with astounding beauty by virtue of the use of abstract words, or not meaning anything at all in the first place. Someone with an analytical background might say that mythology has no epistemological bases and while mythologists might say that science itself doesn't have the power to determine morality and meaning. Both sides have their virtues and it wouldn't be wise to disregard either view without first pondering on both sides of the arguments.

Finally, let me start with my criticisms of the book or rather mythology in general. I don't like how Campbell always talks about dreams as meaningful experiences, not emphasizing the possibility that they don't mean anything at all. Yes, dreams are very important to fables, tales, stories and legends but while scientific method is testable through experiment, mythological explanations can be attributed in hindsight to nearly any narrative. Despite this, I firmly believe that the knowledge of common narratives and patterns can be used as an important mental tool. Again, the use of vague and overbearing language and terms often means that anything and nothing can be interpreted in mythological terms - hence making it unfalsifiable. However, giving credit to Campbell - he doesn't seem to believe in hippy or new age mish-mash and simply gives metaphor the importance it deserves. Lastly, I feel that Campbell should have openly taken the stance that while people may use experiences like drugs to journey into consciousness, these attempts are rather futile because self-knowledge arises from years and years of challenges and by immersing into knowledge and not through the hedonistic urge to consume a substance.

However, altogether I loved this book and it was a great read.
Kudo's to anyone who understands rather than rejects!

_____

PS: As a childhood Star Wars fan, I was intrigued to see that George Lucas actually took advice from Campbell while filming the movie, that not too surprising as I could not help but notice that mythological elements in the character of Anakin Skywalker myself.
80 people found this helpful
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James G.
5.0 out of 5 stars Wake up, people.
Reviewed in the United States on April 22, 2024
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You are not who you think. Our languages are inadequate to deal with Mr. Campbell's world.
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Gail
5.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating read
Reviewed in the United States on January 28, 2024
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I’m loving the info in this book. A great read!
One person found this helpful
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william groesbeck
5.0 out of 5 stars Item showed up in good condition
Reviewed in the United States on March 1, 2024
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The CDs were in good condition and as advertised, it was very satisfied with this product
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Natalia
5.0 out of 5 stars Joya de libro
Reviewed in Mexico on April 25, 2024
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Este libro es una joya si estás en tu camino de autodescubrimiento, reconstrucción de ti mismo, cuestionamientos existenciales, espirituales y filosóficos. Recomendable para toda persona con mente abierta y flexible a cuestionarse cosas aprendidas a lo largo del tiempo en nuestras sociedades, culturas y mundo actual.
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Pedro Paramo
5.0 out of 5 stars Fast shipping and good quality!
Reviewed in the Netherlands on January 23, 2024
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Fast shipping and good quality!
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Eden Hazard 10
5.0 out of 5 stars Beautifil must read
Reviewed in India on October 8, 2022
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If you read on spirituality, philosophy, personal development and such themes.
This is a great book to read.
And the author is a genius and full of wisdom.

But book print quality could have been better.
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jordi
5.0 out of 5 stars wisdom
Reviewed in Spain on August 13, 2021
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I absolutely adore joseph campbell. he's been a teacher for me with his books, but this interview takes you to heaven and leaves you in awe.
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Lizzie
5.0 out of 5 stars Follow your bliss - a lesson for everyone
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on June 21, 2020
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This is possibly the fifth time that I have bought this book. I first came across it, and Joseph Campbell, in the late 1980s when his interview with Bill Moyers was televised. At the time, I was in my twenties, living in a very isolated house without mains water, electricity or a road, and in a bit of a mess. I watched this programme and as soon as I heard Joseph Campbell’s voice I knew that he was a teacher, in the true sense of the word, and that I would learn from him.
The interviews spanned, what seemed to be, all of human experience and belief and I suddenly felt connected to something fundamental and true, explained by someone with compassion and intelligence. Reading it is certainly an experience of standing on the shoulders of giants and Campbell is a colossus. I remember being left with this sense after the programmes had finished being aired but, due to my circumstances, I couldn’t find out any more about them or the man who had been at the centre of them. Then, to my relief, a friend found this book which is the transcripts of those conversations. I have had a copy of the book since then, read it regularly and have given it to friends. As an artefact, it is a good book to hold and look at as there are illustrations carefully chosen to support the important points.
I recently bought a copy for my son who was born 10 years later after I first came across it. He will no doubt find his own message within it and is already talking about the chapter about the hero’s adventure. When I talk with him about it and listen to the thoughts he has, I remember that all of us should be supported and encouraged to ‘follow our bliss’. Thank you, Joseph Campbell.
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