[drewie]

Hey Norland and the rest,

I am just gonna go with the flow.

I see this problem of “personal mythology” in contemporary cinema a lot. That is of an ideology trying to pass as mythology or something archetypal. Trying to sneak feminist messages or racial sensitivities. It just doesn’t work. Which is why I believe the latest Star Wars was a flop. I honestly couldn’t finish the last episodes. It is one thing to fight for equality and against racism and it is another to try to force it into a mythology.

So in the same way I think myth and history should never be confused. How this is done is another question. The Maya example you give is a nice example of a time this used to work. This idea of myth and history coexisting is a primitive idea when the conscious and the unconscious was one and the same. Kind of hard for me to see Christ as both historical and mythological. A pretty raw and straight forward example but maybe it is more complicated. Nonetheless, it is good to have this awareness of the distinction and of the unity of myth and history.

You say:

As with the psychotherapy of the individual so it is with entire nations; the problem is not so much the “creation of a new myth” but the elimination of repressive elements that block the spontaneous outpouring of mytho-historic truth.

This got my attention if you wanna talk more how to eliminate those repressive elements.

Kudos for the essay. Subtle.