The Writer's Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers, Third Edition

The waves are still rolling in from the pebbles in the pond that were the original Writer's Journey and its second edition. Since almost a decade has gone by since the second edition was launched, the ideas in that volume have been strenuously tested in a number of story-making laboratories around the world. Concepts I had developed as a story consultant for the Disney company and as a teacher of story construction have been through a fresh battery of challenges in the real world that I hope have made them stronger. The new chapters of this book will, I hope, reflect some of the ideas that have continued to evolve around the Hero's Journey concept. There are new chapters on the life force operating in stories, on the mechanism of polarity that rules in storytelling, on the wisdom of the body, catharsis, and other concepts that I have developed in recent years in my lectures and in practical work in Hollywood and in Europe. I have gathered together this new material near the end of the book, in an appendix following "Looking Back on the Journey."

In the nine years since the last edition, I have traveled widely, applied my ideas to writing, publishing, and producing projects of my own, and done a few more "tours of duty" as it were for major Hollywood studios. The first of these jobs, commencing just after the publishing of the second edition, was a four-year return to 20th Century Fox, where I had been a story analyst at the beginning of my career. This time around I was operating at a slightly higher level, as a development executive for the Fox 2000 feature film label, with more responsibility and pressure. I was involved in the research and development aspects of films like Courage

Under Fire, Volcano, Anna and the King, Fight Club, and The Thin Red Line. My concepts of storytelling, shaped by the patterns of mythology and the thinking of Joseph Campbell and Carl Jung, were now being tested not only on animated features but on big-budget, live-action movies for adult audiences.

The office atmosphere of Fox 2000 was a fascinating place to study the ways of power. In the past I had been aware of places like it, but as a story analyst I had not been inside those meeting rooms where the decisions were taken about the writers, the stories, and the movies made from them. Power flows in those rooms like hot lava, and until I worked at Fox 2000 I had only heard it rumbling. Now I was standing hip deep in it.

It was the most adult environment I had ever been in, run on unspoken but rigorous principles of personal responsibility. No whining allowed, no excuses. And the same fierce intensity was applied to the stories. Every concept, every comment, every suggestion had to pass the most stringent tests of common sense, logic, and show business instinct. I had the good fortune to work with some of the best story brains in the business, foremost among them being Fox 2000's founder Laura Ziskin, but also many talented executives, writers, directors, and producers. In this exacting laboratory I learned useful techniques for analyzing stories, ways of looking at characters and describing story situations that I hope will inform the new sections of this revised edition.

Among the things I learned at Fox 2000 was to listen to my body as a judge of a story's effectiveness. I realized that the good stories were affecting the organs of my body in various ways, and the really good ones were stimulating more than one organ. An effective story grabs your gut, tightens your throat, makes your heart race and your lungs pump, brings tears to your eyes or an explosion of laughter to your lips. If I wasn't getting some kind of physiological reaction from a story, I knew it was only affecting me on an intellectual level and therefore it would probably leave audiences cold. You will find my thoughts about this in a new chapter on the wisdom of the body.

When my job at Fox 2000 came to an end, as all good things must do, I wanted to write and produce some projects of my own. I soon found myself writing the screenplay for an animated feature, the result of a lecture trip to Munich. I was approached by producer Eberhard Junkersdorf to write the script for his version of the merry adventures of Till Eulenspiegel, Europe's favorite medieval clown. I knew of Tills colorful character from stories I had read as a child and was delighted to take up the challenge. I enjoyed working with the energetic and charming Herr Junkersdorf and his international team of artists. Eberhard is so persuasive he even got me to contribute lyrics for two songs on the film s soundtrack, which really was a challenge. The film was released in Germany as Till Euknspiegel, and I am hopeful it will be released in English one day under its English title, Jester Till The experience taught me a multitude of lessons that I have tried to incorporate into the present edition.

Next up, I got involved as an executive producer of an independent feature, PS. Your Cat Is Dead, actor/director/writer Steve Guttenberg s adaptation of the play and novel by James Kirkwood. This took me deep into the editing room for a period of months, another of the sacred temples of the movie business and for me, a place of intense joy. I loved sitting in the dark staring at images all day long and making the pictures dance. I called it going into the submarine, a blissful world of concentration that called on every cell of my creativity and forced me to articulate my ideas in order to communicate with my creative partners. I could see many ways in which the editing process echoes the writing process, and imagined new possibilities for combining the two. I learned new principles and gave the old theories a good workout.

The process of editing seemed to me to be a lot like making a wooden boat, like one of those sleek dragon-ships the Vikings made. The spine of the story is like the keel, the major plot points are the ribs, and the individual scenes and lines of dialogue are the planks and rigging that complete the vessel, a vehicle for your vision that you hope will sail on the seas of public attention.

Another insight from the editing room was a greater appreciation of the importance of focus. I realized that focused attention is one of the rarest things in the world, and that an audience is giving a lot when they devote their full attention to your work for two hours. There is only so much focus available in a given work, and it seems the more elements you take out of a composition, the more focus is poured into those that remain. Cutting lines, pauses, and entire scenes sharpened the focus on the elements that were left, as if a large number of diffuse spotlights had been concentrated into a few bright beams aimed at select important points.

PS. Your Cat Is Dead enjoyed a brief theatrical run and then was distributed on DVD. After that adventure I concentrated for a time on traveling to give seminars for various international cinema and television training programs. Most recently I have gone back to the Hollywood studio world with a tour of duty at Paramount Pictures and a number of consulting jobs for other studios. I tried my hand at a new form, writing the first installment of Ravenskull, a story for a "manga," a highly stylized kind of comic book from Japan. This is a highly cinematic form, much like writing a screenplay and with a great deal of emphasis on the visual.

I hope something of what I have learned from collaborating with artists has found its way into this latest edition. It has been an intense pleasure to work with my artist friends Michele Montez and Fritz Springmeyer, whose illustrations provide the chapter headings in this volume.

And while I'm cataloguing the influences of recent years that inform the changes in the present volume, some of my most valuable time was spent walking the beach and thinking about why things are as they are and how they got to be that way. I tried to understand how the sun and stars move across the sky and how the moon got there. I saw that it's all waves, all of the Universe, just echoes and counter-echoes of the original cosmic sound, not the Big Bang, that's the wrong sound effect. It was more like a gong, that's it, the Great Gong, the original creative vibration that rolled out from a single pinpoint of concentration and unraveled and echoed and collided to create everything that is, and the Hero's Journey is part of that. I watch the sunsets march up and down the horizon, creating my own Stonehenge from the islands and ridge peaks that mark solstice and equinox, inviting me to puzzle out the place of stories and my own place in the story of everything. I hope you find your own place in that design. For those to whom the concept is new, bon voyage, and for those who are familiar with earlier versions, I hope you find some new surprises and connections in this work, and that it serves you on your own creative journeys.

Christopher Vogler Venice, California February 26, 2007

A book goes out like a wave rolling over the surface of the sea. Ideas radiate from the authors mind and collide with other minds, triggering new waves that return to the author. These generate further thoughts and emanations, and so it goes. The concepts described in The Writer's Journey have radiated and are now echoing back interesting challenges and criticisms as well as sympathetic vibrations. This is my report on the waves that have washed back over me from publication of the book, and on the new waves I send back in response.

In this book I described the set of concepts known as "The Hero's Journey," drawn from the depth psychology of Carl G. Jung and the mythic studies of Joseph Campbell. I tried to relate those ideas to contemporary storytelling, hoping to create a writer's guide to these valuable gifts from our innermost selves and our most distant past. I came looking for the design principles of storytelling, but on the road I found something more: a set of principles for living. I came to believe that the Hero's Journey is nothing less than a handbook for life, a complete instruction manual in the art of being human.

The Hero's Journey is not an invention, but an observation. It is a recognition of a beautiful design, a set of principles that govern the conduct of life and the world of storytelling the way physics and chemistry govern the physical world. It's difficult to avoid the sensation that the Hero's Journey exists somewhere, somehow, as an eternal reality, a Platonic ideal form, a divine model. From this model, infinite and highly varied copies can be produced, each resonating with the essential spirit of the form.

The Hero's Journey is a pattern that seems to extend in many dimensions, describing more than one reality. It accurately describes, among other things, the process of making a journey, the necessary working parts of a story, the joys and despairs of being a writer, and the passage of a soul through life.

A book that explores such a pattern naturally partakes of this multi—dimensional quality. The Writer's Journey was intended as a practical guidebook for writers, but can also be read as a guide to the life lessons that have been carefully built into the stories of all times. Some people have even used it as a kind of travel guide, predicting the inevitable ups and downs of making a physical journey.

A certain number of people say the book has affected them on a level that may have nothing to do with the business of telling a story or writing a script. In the description of the Hero's Journey they might have picked up some insight about their own lives, some useful metaphor or way of looking at things, some language or principle that defines their problem and suggests a way out of it. They recognize their own problems in the ordeals of the mythic and literary heroes, and are reassured by the stories that give them abundant, time-tested strategies for survival, success, and happiness.

Other people find validation of their own observations in the book. From time to time I meet people who know the Hero's Journey well although they may never have heard it called by that name. When they read about it or hear it described, they experience the pleasurable shock of recognition as the patterns resonate with what they've seen in stories and in their own lives. I had the same reaction when I first encountered these concepts in Campbell's book, The Hero with a Thousand Faces, and heard him speak about them with passion. Campbell himself felt it when he first heard his mentor, Heinrich Zimmer, speak about mythology. In Zimmer he recognized a shared attitude about myths — that they are not abstract theories or the quaint beliefs of ancient peoples, but practical models for understanding how to live.

A PRACTICAL GUIDE

The original intent of this book was to make an accessible, down-to-earth writing manual from these high-flying mythic elements. In that practical spirit, I am gratified to hear from so many readers that the book can be a useful writing guide. Professional writers as well as novices and students report that it has been an effective design tool, validating their instincts and providing new concepts and principles to apply to their stories. Movie and television executives, producers, and directors have told me the book influenced their projects and helped them solve story problems. Novelists, playwrights, actors, and writing teachers have put the ideas to use in their work.

Happily, the book has won acceptance as one of the standard Hollywood guidebooks for the screenwriting craft. Spy magazine called it "the new industry Bible." Through the various international editions (U.K., German, French, Portuguese, Italian, Icelandic, etc.) it has radiated to greater Hollywood, the world community of storytellers. Filmmakers and students from many countries have reported their interest in the Hero's Journey idea and their appreciation for the book as a practical guide for designing and troubleshooting stories.

The Writer's Journey, meanwhile, has been put to work in many ways, not only by writers in many forms and genres, but by teachers, psychologists, advertising executives, prison counselors, video game designers, and scholars of myth and pop culture.

I am convinced the principles of the Hero's Journey have had a deep influence over the shaping of stories in the past and will reach even deeper in the future as more storytellers become consciously aware of them. Joseph Campbell's great accomplishment was to articulate clearly something that had been there all along — the life principles embedded in the structure of stories. He wrote down the unwritten rules of storytelling, and that seems to be stimulating authors to challenge, test, and embellish the Hero's Journey. I see signs that writers are playing with the ideas and even introducing "Campbellian" language and terms into their dramas.

The conscious awareness of its patterns may be a mixed blessing, for it's easy to generate thoughtless cliches and stereotypes from this matrix. The self-conscious, heavy-handed use of this model can be boring and predictable. But if writers absorb its ideas and re-create them with fresh insights and surprising combinations, they can make amazing new forms and original designs from the ancient, immutable parts.

QUESTIONS AND CRITICISMS

"It takes a great enemy to make a great airplane ."

— Air Force saying

Inevitably, aspects of the book have been questioned or criticized. I welcome this as a sign the ideas are worthy of argument. I'm sure I've learned more from the challenges than from the positive feedback. Writing a book may be, as the historian Paul Johnson says, "the only way to study a subject systematically, purposefully and retentively." Harvesting the response, both positive and negative, is part of that study.

Since the book came out in 1993 I have continued to work in the story end of the movie business, at Disney, Fox, and Paramount. I've had the chance to try out the Hero's Journey concepts with the big toys. I saw where it works but also where my understanding of it fell short and needed to be adjusted. My beliefs about what makes a good story were tested in the toughest arenas on earth — Hollywood story conferences and the world marketplace — and I hope my understanding has grown from the objections, doubts, and questions of my esteemed colleagues, and from the reaction of the audience.

At the same time, I kept up a schedule of lecturing about The Writer's Journey that took me far afield from the literal, geographic bounds of Hollywood, into the greater-world Hollywood, the international film community. I had the fortune to see how the ideas of the Hero's Journey unfold in cultures different from the one I grew up in, as I traveled to Barcelona, Maui, Berlin, Rome, London, Sydney, and so on.

Local tastes and thinking challenged many facets of the Hero's Journey idea severely. Each culture has a unique orientation to the Hero's Journey, with something in each local character resisting some terms, defining them differently, or giving them different emphasis. My theoretical framework has been shaken from every angle, and I think is the richer for it.

A FORM, NOT A FORMULA

First, I must address a significant objection about the whole idea of The Writer's Journey — the suspicion of artists and critics that it is formulaic, leading to stale repetition. We come to a great divide in theory and practice about these principles. Some professional writers don't like the idea of analyzing the creative process at all, and urge students to ignore all books and teachers and "Just do it." Some artists make the choice to avoid systematic thinking, rejecting all principles, ideals, schools of thought, theories, patterns, and designs. For them, art is an entirely intuitive process that can never be mastered by rules of thumb and should not be reduced to formula. And they aren't wrong. At the core of every artist is a sacred place where all the rules are set aside or deliberately forgotten, and nothing matters but the instinctive choices of the heart and soul of the artist.

But even that is a principle, and those who say they reject principles and theories can't avoid subscribing to a few of them: Avoid formula, distrust order and pattern, resist logic and tradition.

Artists who operate on the principle of rejecting all form are themselves dependent on form. The freshness and excitement of their work comes from its contrast to the pervasiveness of formulas and patterns in the culture. However, these artists run the risk of reaching a limited audience because most people can't relate to totally unconventional art. By definition it doesn't intersect with commonly held patterns of experience. Their work might only be appreciated by other artists, a small part of the community in any time or place. A certain amount of form is necessary to reach a wide audience. People expect it and enjoy it, so long as it's varied by some innovative combination or arrangement and doesn't fall into a completely predictable formula.

At the other extreme are the big Hollywood studios who use conventional patterns to appeal to the broadest cross-section of the public. At the Disney studios, I saw the application of simple story principles, such as making the main character a "fish out of water," that became tests of a story's power to appeal to a mass audience. The minds guiding Disney at that time believed that there were proper questions to ask of a story and its characters: Does it have conflict? Does it have a theme? Is it about something that can be expressed as a well-known statement of folk wisdom like "Don't judge a book by its cover" or "Love conquers all"? Does it present the story as a series of broad movements or acts, allowing audiences to orient and pace themselves in the narrative? Does it take viewers someplace they've never been, or make them see familiar places in new ways? Do the characters have relevant back-stories and plausible motivations to make them relatable to the audience? Do they pass through realistic stages of emotional reaction and growth (character arcs)? And so on.

Studios have to use design principles and apply some kind of standards to evaluating and developing stories, if only because they produce so many of them. The average studio or division in Hollywood has bought and is developing one hundred fifty to two hundred stories at a time. They must spend more resources evaluating thousands of potential projects submitted by agents each year. To handle the large number of stories, some of the techniques of mass production, such as standardization, have to be employed. But they should be employed sparingly and with great sensitivity for the needs of the particular story.

STANDARD LANGUAGE

A most important tool is a standardized language that makes possible the thousands of communications necessary to tell so many stories. No one dictates this language, but it becomes part of everyone's education in the unwritten rules of the business. Newcomers quickly learn the lingo, concepts, and assumptions that have been passed down by generations of storytellers and filmmakers. This provides everyone with a shorthand for the rapid communication of story ideas.

Meanwhile new terms and concepts are always being created to reflect changing conditions. Junior studio executives listen carefully for signs of insight, philosophy, or ordering principle from their bosses. People take their lead from the leader. Any terms of art, any aphorisms or rules of thumb are seized upon and passed down, becoming part of the corporate culture of that studio and the general knowledge of the industry. It's especially true when those bits of received wisdom lead to successful, popular entertainments.

The Hero's Journey language is clearly becoming part of the storytelling common knowledge and its principles have been used consciously to create hugely popular films. But there is danger in this self-awareness. Overreliance on traditional language or the latest buzzwords can lead to thoughtless, cookie-cutter products. Lazy, superficial use of Hero's Journey terms, taking this metaphorical system too literally, or arbitrarily imposing its forms on every story can be stultifying. It should be used as a form, not a formula, a reference point and a source of inspiration, not a dictatorial mandate.

CULTURAL IMPERIALISM

Another of the dangers of standardized language and methods is that local differences, the very things that add zest and spice to journeys to faraway places, will get hammered into blandness by the machinery of mass production. Artists around the world are on guard against "cultural imperialism," the aggressive export of Hollywood storytelling techniques and the squeezing out of local accents. American values and the cultural assumptions of Western society threaten to smother the unique flavors of other cultures. Many observers have remarked that American culture is becoming world culture, and what a loss it would be if the only flavorings available were sugar, salt, mustard, and ketchup.

This problem is much on the minds of European storytellers as many countries with distinct cultures are drawn into a union. They are striving to create stories that are somewhat universal, that can travel beyond their national borders, for local audiences may not be numerous enough to support the always-growing cost of production. They are up against intensely competitive American companies that aggressively courts the world market. Many are studying and applying American techniques, but they also worry that their unique regional traditions will be lost.

Is the Hero's Journey an instrument of cultural imperialism? It could be, if naively interpreted, blindly copied, or unquestioningly adopted. But it can also be a useful tool for the storyteller in any culture, if adapted thoughtfully to reflect the unique, inimitable qualities of the local geography, climate, and people.

I found that artists in Australia were acutely conscious of cultural imperialism, perhaps because that country's people have had to struggle to create their own society. They have forged something distinct from England, independent of America and Asia, influenced by all of them but uniquely Australian, and humming with the mysterious energy of the land and the Aboriginal people. They pointed out to me hidden cultural assumptions in my understanding of the Hero's Journey. While it is universal and timeless, and its workings can be found in every culture on earth, a Western or American reading of it may carry subtle biases. One instance is the Hollywood preference for happy endings and tidy resolutions, the tendency to show admirable, virtuous heroes overcoming evil by individual effort. My Australian teachers helped me see that such elements might make good stories for the world market but may not reflect the views of all cultures. They made me aware of what assumptions were being carried by Hollywood-style films, and of what was not being expressed.

In my travels I learned that Australia, Canada, and many countries in Europe subsidize their local filmmakers, in part to help preserve and celebrate local differences. Each region, department, or state operates as a small-scale movie studio, developing scripts, putting artists to work, and producing feature films and television shows. For America, I like to imagine a version of a decentralized Hollywood in which every state in the Union functions like a movie studio, evaluating the stories of its citizens and advancing money to produce regional films that represent and enhance the culture of the locality while supporting the local artists.

HEROPHOBIC CULTURES

Here and there in my travels I learned that some cultures are not entirely comfortable with the term "hero" to begin with. Australia and Germany are two cultures that seem slightly "herophobic."

The Australians distrust appeals to heroic virtue because such concepts have been used to lure generations of young Australian males into fighting Britain's battles. Australians have their heroes, of course, but they tend to be unassuming and self-effacing, and will remain reluctant for much longer than heroes in other cultures. Like most heroes, they resist calls to adventure but continue demurring and may never be comfortable with the hero mantle. In Australian culture it's unseemly to seek out leadership or the limelight, and anyone who does is a "tall poppy," quickly cut down. The most admirable hero is one who denies his heroic role as long as possible and who, like Mad Max, avoids accepting responsibility for anyone but himself.

German culture seems ambivalent about the term "hero." The hero has a long tradition of veneration in Germany, but two World Wars and the legacy of Hitler and the Nazis have tainted the concept. Nazism and German militarism manipulated and distorted the powerful symbols of the hero myth, invoking its passions to enslave, dehumanize, and destroy. Like any archetypal system, like any philosophy or creed, the heroic form can be warped and used with great effect for ill intention.

In the post-Hitler period the idea of hero has been given a rest as the culture re-evaluates itself. Dispassionate, cold-blooded anti-heroes are more in keeping with the current German spirit. A tone of unsentimental realism is more popular at present, although there will always be a strain of romanticism and love of fantasy. Germans can enjoy imaginative hero tales from other cultures but don't seem comfortable with home-grown romantic heroes for the time being.

THE HERO AS WARRIOR

More generally, the Hero's Journey has been criticized as an embodiment of a male-dominated warrior culture. Critics say it is a propaganda device invented to encourage young males to enlist in armies, a myth that glorifies death and foolish self-sacrifice. There is some truth in this charge, for many heroes of legend and story are warriors and the patterns of the Hero's Journey have certainly been used for propaganda and recruitment. However, to condemn and dismiss these patterns because they can be put to military use is shortsighted and narrow-minded. The warrior is only one of the faces of the hero, who can also be pacifist, mother, pilgrim, fool, wanderer, hermit, inventor, nurse, savior, artist, lunatic, lover, clown, king, victim, slave, worker, rebel, adventurer, tragic failure, coward, saint, monster, etc. The many creative possibilities of the form far outweigh its potential for abuse.

GENDER PROBLEMS

The Hero's Journey is sometimes critiqued as a masculine theory, cooked up by men to enforce their dominance, and with little relevance to the unique and quite different journey of womanhood. There may be some masculine bias built into the description of the hero cycle since many of its theoreticians have been male, and I freely admit it: I'm a man and can't help seeing the world through the filter of my gender. Yet I have tried to acknowledge and explore the ways in which the woman's journey is different from the man's.

I believe that much of the journey is the same for all humans, since we share many realities of birth, growth, and decay, but clearly being a woman imposes distinct cycles, rhythms, pressures, and needs. There may be a real difference in the form of men's and women's journeys. Men's journeys may be in some sense more linear, proceeding from one outward goal to the next, while women's journeys may spin or spiral inward and outward. The spiral may be a more accurate analogue for the woman's journey than a straight line or a simple circle. Another possible model might be a series of concentric rings, with the woman making a journey inward towards the center and then expanding out again. The masculine need to go out and overcome obstacles, to achieve, conquer, and possess, may be replaced in the woman's journey by the drives to preserve the family and the species, make a home, grapple with emotions, come to accord, or cultivate beauty.

Good work has been done by women to articulate these differences, and I recommend books such as Merlin Stone's When God Was a Woman, Clarissa Pinkola Estes' Women Who Run with the Wolves, Jean Shinoda Bolen's Goddesses in Everywoman, Maureen Murdock's The Heroine's Journey, and The Woman's Dictionary of Myth and Symbols as starting points for a more balanced understanding of the male and female aspects of the Hero's Journey. (Note to men: If in doubt on this point, consult the nearest woman.)

THE COMPUTER CHALLENGE

Shortly after the first edition of this book came out, a few people (threshold guardians) jumped up to say the technology of the Hero's Journey is already obsolete, thanks to the advent of the computer and its possibilities of interactivity and nonlinear narrative. According to this batch of critics, the ancient ideas of the Journey are hopelessly mired in the conventions of beginning, middle, and end, of cause and effect, of one event after another. The new wave, they said, would dethrone the old linear storyteller, empowering people to tell their own stories in any sequence they chose, leaping from point to point, weaving stories more like spider webs than linear strings of events.

It's true that exciting new possibilities are created by computers and the nonlinear thinking they encourage. However, there will always be pleasure in "Tell me a story." People will always enjoy going into a story trance and allowing themselves to be led through a tale by a masterful story weaver. It's fun to drive a car, but it can also be fun to be driven, and as passengers we might see more sights than if we were forced to concentrate on choosing what happens next.

Interactivity has always been with us — we all make many nonlinear hypertext links in our own minds even as we listen to a linear story. In fact, the Hero's Journey lends itself extremely well to the world of computer games and interactive experiences. The thousands of variations on the paradigm, worked out over the centuries, offer endless branches from which infinite webs of story can be built.

THE CYNIC'S RESPONSE

Another of my deep cultural assumptions that was challenged as I traveled is the idea that one person can make a difference, that heroes are needed to make change, and that change is generally a good thing. I encountered artists from Eastern Europe who pointed out that in their cultures, there is deep cynicism about heroic efforts to change the world. The world is as it is, any efforts to change it are a foolish waste of time, and any so-called heroes who try to change it are doomed to fail. This point of view is not necessarily an antithesis of the Hero's Journey — the pattern is flexible enough to embrace the cynical or pragmatic philosophies, and many of its principles are still operative in stories that reflect them. However, I must acknowledge that not every person or culture sees the model as optimistically as I do, and they might be right.

BUT WHAT ABOUT ...

It's exciting to see that there is no end to what can be learned from the Hero's Journey concepts. I find surprising and delightful turns of the path every time I pick up a new story, and life itself keeps teaching new angles.

My understanding of the Shadow archetype, for example, continues to evolve. I have been impressed all over again by the power of this pattern, especially as it operates within the individual as a repository for unexpressed feelings and desires. It is a force that accumulates when you fail to honor your gifts, follow the call of your muses, or live up to your principles and ideals. It has great but subtle power, operating on deep levels to communicate with you, perhaps sabotaging your efforts, upsetting your balance until you realize the message these events bring — that you must express your creativity, your true nature, or die. A car accident a few years ago taught me the rebellious power of the Shadow, showed me that I was distracted, out of harmony, heading for even greater disasters if I didn't find a way to express my personal creative side.

Occasional puzzled looks on the faces of students taught me that I hadn't completely thought through some aspects of the pattern. Some people were confused by the various turning points and ordeals of the model, particularly by the distinction between the midpoint, which I call the Ordeal, and the climax of the second act, which I call The Road Back. Trying to explain this led me to a new realization. Each act is like a movement of a symphony, with its own beginning, middle, and end, and with its own climax (the highest point of tension) coming just before the ending of the act. These act climaxes are the major turning points on the circular diagram:

Lecturing in Rome, I came upon a further development of this idea, an alternate way of graphing the Hero's Journey: not as a circle, but as a diamond. I was explaining that each act sends the hero on a certain track with a specific aim or goal, and that the climaxes of each act change the hero's direction, assigning a new goal. The hero's first act goal, for instance, might be to seek treasure, but after meeting a potential lover at the first threshold crossing, the goal might change to pursuing that love. If the ordeal at the midpoint has the villain capturing the hero and lover, the goal in the next movement could become trying to escape. And if the villain kills the lover at The Road Back, the new goal of the final movement might be to get revenge. The original objective might be achieved as well, or there might be some overall goal (to learn self-reliance or come to terms with past failures, for example) that continues to be served in all movements as the hero pursues changing superficial goals.

To illustrate this concept I drew the hero's goals in each movement as straight lines, vectors of intention, rather than curves. Straightening out the curves of the circle created sharp, 90-degree turns at the quarter points and revealed the drastic changes that may occur in the hero's objectives. Each straight line represents the hero's aim in that act — to escape the constraints of the ordinary world, to survive in a strange land, to win the boon and escape the strange land, to return home safely with something to share that revives the world.

I was amused to realize I had just drawn a baseball diamond (in reverse.) I've often felt that the layout of game-playing fields produces patterns that overlap with the design of the Hero's Journey. Baseball can be read as another metaphor of life, with the base runner as the hero making his way around the stages of the journey.

Perhaps the best way to explore the endless possibilities of the Hero's Journey is to apply it to a number of films or stories. To that end Michael Wiese Productions has prepared a book and CD-ROM entitled Myth in the Movies. These examine a large number of popular movies through the lens of the Hero's Journey. It's a way to test the idea and see for yourself if it's valid and useful. One can see how it operates in a general way and how it transforms in specific cases. And from the comparison of many examples and from the interesting exceptions, one can find more of the principles, values, and relationships that give the craftsperson command of the form.

At the end of this second edition I have added a few new elements in a section called "Looking Back at the Journey." Here I have used the tools of mythology and the Hero's Journey to analyze some key films, including Titanic, The Lion King, Pulp Fiction, The Full Monty, and the Star Wars saga. I hope these will demonstrate some of the ways that the mythic principles continue to be explored in popular entertainment.

Unlike the stories of heroes, which eventually come to an end, the journey to understand and articulate these ideas is truly endless. Although certain human conditions will never change, new situations are always arising, and the Hero's Journey will adapt to reflect them. New waves will roll out, and so it will go, on and on forever.

I invite you to join me on a Writer's Journey, a mission of discovery to explore and map the elusive borderlands between myth and modern storytelling. We will be guided by a simple idea: All stories consist of a few common structural elements found universally in myths, fairy tales, dreams, and movies. They are known collectively as The Hero's Journey. Understanding these elements and their use in modern writing is the object of our quest. Used wisely, these ancient tools of the storyteller's craft still have tremendous power to heal our people and make the world a better place.

My own Writer's Journey begins with the peculiar power storytelling has always had over me. I got hooked on the fairy tales and Little Golden Books read out loud by my mother and grandmother. I devoured the cartoons and movies pouring out of TV in the 1950s, the thrilling adventures on the drive-in screens, the lurid comic books and mind-stretching science fiction of the day. When I was laid up with a sprained ankle, my father went to the local library and brought back wonder stories of Norse and Celtic mythology that made me forget the pain.

A trail of stories eventually led me to reading for a living as a story analyst for Hollywood studios. Though I evaluated thousands of novels and screenplays, I never got tired of exploring the labyrinth of story with its stunningly repeated patterns,

Christopher Vogkr

bewildering variants, and puzzling questions. Where do stories come from? How do they work? What do they tell us about ourselves? What do they mean? Why do we need them? How can we use them to improve the world?

Above all, how do storytellers manage to make the story mean something? Good stories make you feel you've been through a satisfying, complete experience. You've cried or laughed or both. You finish the story feeling you've learned something about life or about yourself. Perhaps you've picked up a new awareness, a new character or attitude to model your life on. How do storytellers manage to pull that off ? What are the secrets of this ancient trade? What are its rules and design principles?

Over the years I began to notice some common elements in adventure stories and myths, certain intriguingly familiar characters, props, locations, and situations. I became vaguely aware there was a pattern or a template of some sort guiding the design of stories. I had some pieces of the puzzle but the overall plan eluded me.

Then at the USC film school I was fortunate enough to cross paths with the work of the mythologist Joseph Campbell. The encounter with Campbell was, for me and many other people, a life-changing experience. A few days of exploring the labyrinth of his book The Hero with a Thousand Faces produced an electrifying reorganization of my life and thinking. Here, fully explored, was the pattern I had been sensing. Campbell had broken the secret code of story. His work was like a flare suddenly illuminating a deeply shadowed landscape.

I worked with Campbell's idea of the Hero's Journey to understand the phenomenal repeat business of movies such as Star Wars and Close Encounters. People were going back to see these films as if seeking some kind of religious experience. It seemed to me these films drew people in this special way because they reflected the universally satisfying patterns Campbell found in myths. They had something people needed.

The Hero with a Thousand Faces was a lifesaver when I began to work as a story analyst for major movie studios. In my first jobs I was deeply grateful for Campbell's work, which became a reliable set of tools for diagnosing story problems and prescribing solutions. Without the guidance of Campbell and mythology, I would have been lost.

It seemed to me the Hero's Journey was exciting, useful story technology which could help filmmakers and executives eliminate some of the guesswork and expense of developing stories for film. Over the years, I ran into quite a few people who had

been affected by encounters with Joe Campbell. We were like a secret society of true believers, commonly putting our faith in "the power of myth."

Shortly after going to work as a story analyst for the Walt Disney Company, I wrote a seven-page memo called "A Practical Guide to The Hero with a Thousand Faces" in which I described the idea of the Hero's Journey, with examples from classic and current movies. I gave the memo to friends, colleagues, and several Disney executives to test and refine the ideas through their feedback. Gradually I expanded the "Practical Guide" into a longer essay and began teaching the material through a story analysis class at the UCLA Extension Writers' Program.

At writers' conferences around the country I tested the ideas in seminars with screenwriters, romance novelists, children's writers, and all kinds of storytellers. I found many others were exploring the intertwined pathways of myth, story, and psychology.

The Hero's Journey, I discovered, is more than just a description of the hidden patterns of mythology. It is a useful guide to life, especially the writer's life. In the perilous adventure of my own writing, I found the stages of the Hero's Journey showing up just as reliably and usefully as they did in books, myths, and movies. In my personal life, I was thankful to have this map to guide my quest and help me anticipate what was around the next bend.

The usefulness of the Hero's Journey as a guide to life was brought home forcefully when I first prepared to speak publicly about it in a large seminar at UCLA. A couple of weeks before the seminar two articles appeared in the Los Angeles Herald-Examiner, in which a film critic attacked filmmaker George Lucas and his movie Willow. Somehow the critic had got hold of the "Practical Guide" and claimed it had deeply influenced and corrupted Hollywood storytellers. The critic blamed the "Practical Guide" for every flop from Ishtar to Howard the Duck, as well as for the hit Back to the Future. According to him, lazy, illiterate studio executives, eager to find a quick-bucks formula, had seized upon the "Practical Guide" as a cure-all and were busily stuffing it down the throats of writers, stifling their creativity with a technology the executives hadn't bothered to understand.

While flattered that someone thought I had such a sweeping influence on the collective mind of Hollywood, I was also devastated. Here, on the threshold of a new phase of working with these ideas, I was shot down before I even started. Or so it seemed.

Friends who were more seasoned veterans in this war of ideas pointed out that in being challenged I was merely encountering an archetype, one of the familiar characters who people the landscape of the Hero's Journey, namely a Threshold Guardian.

That information instantly gave me my bearings and showed me how to handle the situation. Campbell had described how heroes often encounter these "unfamiliar yet strangely intimate forces, some of which severely threaten" them. The Guardians seem to pop up at the various thresholds of the journey, the narrow and dangerous passages from one stage of life to the next. Campbell showed the many ways in which heroes can deal with Threshold Guardians. Instead of attacking these seemingly hostile powers head-on, journeyers learn to outwit them or join forces with them, absorbing their energy rather than being destroyed by it.

I realized that this Threshold Guardian's apparent attack was potentially a blessing, not a curse. I had thought of challenging the critic to a duel (laptops at twenty paces) but now reconsidered. With a slight change in attitude I could turn his hostility to my benefit. I contacted the critic and invited him to talk over our differences of opinion at the seminar. He accepted and joined a panel discussion which turned into a lively and entertaining debate, illuminating corners of the story world that I had never glimpsed before. The seminar was better and my ideas were stronger for being challenged. Instead of fighting my Threshold Guardian, I had absorbed him into my adventure. What had seemed like a lethal blow had turned into something useful and healthy. The mythological approach had proven its worth in life as well as story.

Around this time I realized the "Practical Guide" and Campbell's ideas did have an influence on Hollywood. I began to get requests from studio story departments for copies of the "Practical Guide". I heard that executives at other studios were giving the pamphlet to writers, directors, and producers as guides to universal, commercial story patterns. Apparently Hollywood was finding the Hero's Journey useful.

Meanwhile Joseph Campbell's ideas exploded into a wider sphere of awareness with the Bill Moyers interview show on PBS, The Power of Myth. The show was a hit, cutting across lines of age, politics, and religion to speak directly to people's spirits. The book version, a transcript of the interviews, was on the New York Times bestseller list for over a year. The Hero with a Thousand Faces, Campbell's venerable warhorse of a textbook, suddenly became a hot bestseller after forty years of slow but steady backlist sales.

The PBS show brought Campbells ideas to millions and illuminated the impact of his work on filmmakers such as George Lucas, John Boorman, Steven Spielberg, and George Miller. Suddenly I found a sharp increase in awareness and acceptance of Campbells ideas in Hollywood. More executives and writers were versed in these concepts and interested in learning how to apply them to moviemaking and screenwriting.

The Hero's Journey model continued to serve me well. It got me through reading and evaluating over ten thousand screenplays for half a dozen studios. It was my atlas, a book of maps for my own writing journeys. It guided me to a new role in the Disney company, as a story consultant for the Feature Animation division at the time The Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast were being conceived. Campbell's ideas were of tremendous value as I researched and developed stories based on fairy tales, mythology, science fiction, comic books, and historical adventure.

Joseph Campbell died in 1987. I met him briefly a couple of times at seminars. He was still a striking man in his eighties, tall, vigorous, eloquent, funny, full of energy and enthusiasm, and utterly charming. Just before his passing, he told me, "Stick with this stuff. It'll take you a long way."

I recently discovered that for some time the "Practical Guide" has been required reading for Disney development executives. Daily requests for it, as well as countless letters and calls from novelists, screenwriters, producers, writers, and actors, indicate that the Hero's Journey ideas are being used and developed more than ever.

And so I come to the writing of this book, the descendant of the "Practical Guide." The book is designed somewhat on the model of the I Ching, with an introductory overview followed by commentaries that expand on the typical stages of the Hero's Journey. Book One, Mapping the Journey, is a quick survey of the territory. Chapter I is a revision of the "Practical Guide" and a concentrated presentation of the twelve-stage Hero's Journey. You might think of this as the map of a journey we are about to take together through the special world of story. Chapter 2 is an introduction to the archetypes, the dramatis personae of myth and story. It describes eight common character types or psychological functions found in all stories.

Book Two, Stages of the Journey, is a more detailed examination of the twelve elements of the Hero's Journey. Each chapter is followed by suggestions for your further exploration, Questioning the Journey. An Epilogue, Looking Back on the Journey, deals with the special adventure of the Writer's Journey and some pitfalls to avoid on the road. It includes Hero's Journey analyses of some influential films including Titanic, Pulp Fiction, The Lion King, The Full Monty, and Star Wars. In one case, The Lion King, I had the opportunity to apply the Hero's Journey ideas as a story consultant during the development process, and saw firsthand how useful these principles can be.

Throughout the book I make reference to movies, both classic and current. You might want to view some of these films to see how the Hero's Journey works in practice. A representative list of films appears in Appendix I.

You might also select a single movie or story of your choice and keep it in mind as you take the Writer's Journey. Get to know the story of your choice by reading or viewing it several times, taking brief notes on what happens in each scene and how it functions in the drama. Running a movie on a VCR is ideal, because you can stop to write down the content of each scene while you grasp its meaning and relation to the rest of the story.

I suggest you go through this process with a story or movie and use it to test out the ideas in this book. See if your story reflects the stages and archetypes of the Hero's Journey. (A sample worksheet for the Hero's Journey can be found in Appendix 3.) Observe how the stages are adapted to meet the needs of the story or the particular culture for which the story was written. Challenge these ideas, test them in practice, adapt them to your needs, and make them yours. Use these concepts to challenge and inspire your own stories.

The Hero's Journey has served storytellers and their listeners since the very first stories were told, and it shows no signs of wearing out. Let's begin the Writer's Journey together to explore these ideas. I hope you find them useful as magic keys to the world of story and the labyrinth of life.

In the long run, one of the most influential books of the 20th century may turn out to be Joseph Campbells The Hero with a Thousand Faces.

The ideas expressed in Campbells book are having a major impact on storytelling. Writers are becoming more aware of the ageless patterns which Campbell identifies, and are enriching their work with them.

Inevitably Hollywood has caught on to the usefulness of Campbell's work. Filmmakers like George Lucas and George Miller acknowledge their debt to Campbell and his influence can be seen in the films of Steven Spielberg, John Boorman, Francis Coppola, and others.

It's little wonder that Hollywood is beginning to embrace the ideas Campbell presents in his books. For the writer, producer, director, or designer his concepts are a welcome tool kit, stocked with sturdy instruments ideal for the craft of storytelling. With these tools you can construct a story to meet almost any situation, a story that will be dramatic, entertaining, and psychologically true. With this equipment you can diagnose the problems of almost any ailing plot line, and make the corrections to bring it to its peak of performance.

These tools have stood the test of time. They are older than the Pyramids, older than Stonehenge, older than the earliest cave paintings.

Joseph Campbell's contribution to the tool kit was to gather the ideas together, recognize them, articulate them, name them, organize them. He exposed for the first time the pattern that lies behind every story ever told.

The Hero with a Thousand Faces is his statement of the most persistent theme in oral tradition and recorded literature: the myth of the hero. In his study of world hero myths Campbell discovered that they are all basically the same story, retold endlessly in infinite variation.

He found that all storytelling, consciously or not, follows the ancient patterns of myth and that all stories, from the crudest jokes to the highest flights of literature, can be understood in terms of the Hero's Journey: the "monomyth" whose principles he lays out in the book.

The pattern of the Hero's Journey is universal, occurring in every culture, in every time. It is as infinitely varied as the human race itself and yet its basic form remains constant. The Hero's Journey is an incredibly tenacious set of elements that springs endlessly from the deepest reaches of the human mind; different in its details for every culture, but fundamentally the same.

Campbell's thinking runs parallel to that of the Swiss psychologist Carl G. Jung, who wrote about the archetypes: constantly repeating characters or energies which occur in the dreams of all people and the myths of all cultures. Jung suggested that these archetypes reflect different aspects of the human mind — that our personalities divide themselves into these characters to play out the drama of our lives. He noticed a strong correspondence between his patients' dream figures and the common archetypes of mythology. He suggested that both were coming from a deeper source, in the collective unconscious of the human race.

The repeating characters of world myth such as the young hero, the wise old man or woman, the shapeshifter, and the shadowy antagonist are the same as the figures who appear repeatedly in our dreams and fantasies. That's why myths and most stories constructed on the mythological model have the ring of psychological truth.

Such stories are accurate models of the workings of the human mind, true maps of the psyche. They are psychologically valid and emotionally realistic even when they portray fantastic, impossible, or unreal events.

This accounts for the universal power of such stories. Stories built on the model of the Hero's Journey have an appeal that can be felt by everyone, because they well up from a universal source in the shared unconscious and reflect universal concerns.

They deal with the childlike universal questions: Who am I? Where did I come from? Where will I go when I die? What is good and what is evil? What must I do about it? What will tomorrow be like? Where did yesterday go? Is there anybody else out there?

The ideas embedded in mythology and identified by Campbell in The Hero with a Thousand Faces can be applied to understanding almost any human problem. They are a great key to life as well as a major instrument for dealing more effectively with a mass audience.

If you want to understand the ideas behind the Hero's Journey, there's no substitute for actually reading Campbell's work. It's an experience that has a way of changing people.

It's also a good idea to read a lot of myths, but reading Campbell's work amounts to the same thing since Campbell is a master storyteller who delights in illustrating his points with examples from the rich storehouse of mythology.

Campbell gives an outline of the Hero's Journey in Chapter IV, "The Keys," of The Hero with a Thousand Faces. I've taken the liberty of amending the outline slightly, trying to reflect some of the common themes in movies with illustrations drawn from contemporary films and a few classics. You can compare the two outlines and terminology by examining Table One.

I'm retelling the hero myth in my own way, and you should feel free to do the same. Every storyteller bends the mythic pattern to his or her own purpose or the needs of a particular culture.

That's why the hero has a thousand faces.

A note about the term "hero": As used here, the word, like "doctor" or "poet," may refer to a woman or a man.

THE HERO'S JOURNEY

At heart, despite its infinite variety, the hero's story is always a journey. A hero leaves her comfortable, ordinary surroundings to venture into a challenging, unfamiliar world. It may be an outward journey to an actual place: a labyrinth, forest or cave, a strange city or country, a new locale that becomes the arena for her conflict with antagonistic, challenging forces.

But there are as many stories that take the hero on an inward journey, one of the mind, the heart, the spirit. In any good story the hero grows and changes, making a journey from one way of being to the next: from despair to hope, weakness to strength, folly to wisdom, love to hate, and back again. It's these emotional journeys that hook an audience and make a story worth watching.

The stages of the Hero's Journey can be traced in all kinds of stories, not just those that feature "heroic" physical action and adventure. The protagonist of every story is the hero of a journey, even if the path leads only into his own mind or into the realm of relationships.

The way stations of the Hero's Journey emerge naturally even when the writer is unaware of them, but some knowledge of this most ancient guide to storytelling is useful in identifying problems and telling better stories. Consider these twelve stages as a map of the Hero's Journey, one of many ways to get from here to there, but one of the most flexible, durable and dependable.

THE STAGES OF THE HERO'S JOURNEY

1. Ordinary World

2. Call to Adventure

3. Refusal of the Call

4. Meeting with the Mentor

5. Crossing the First Threshold

6. Tests, Allies, Enemies

7. Approach to the Inmost Cave

8. Ordeal

9. Reward (Seizing the Sword)

10. The Road Back

11. Resurrection

12. Return with the Elixir

1. The Ordinary World

Most stories take the hero out of the ordinary, mundane world and into a Special World, new and alien. This is the familiar "fish out of water" idea which has spawned countless films and TV shows ("The Fugitive," "The Beverly Hillbillies," Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, The Wizard of Oz, Witness, 48 Hours, Trading Places, Beverly Hills Cop, etc.).

If you're going to show a fish out of his customary element, you first have to show him in that Ordinary World to create a vivid contrast with the strange new world he is about to enter.

In Witness you see both the city policeman and the Amish mother and son in their normal worlds before they are thrust into totally alien environments: the Amish being overwhelmed by the city, and the city cop encountering the 19th-century world of the Amish. You first see Luke Skywalker, hero of Star Wars, being bored to death as a farmboy before he sets out to tackle the universe.

Likewise in The Wizard of Oz, considerable time is spent to establish Dorothy's drab normal life in Kansas before she is blown to the wonderworld of Oz. Here the contrast is heightened by shooting the Kansas scenes in stern black and white while the Oz scenes are shot in vibrant Technicolor.

An Officer and a Gentleman sketches a vivid contrast between the Ordinary World of the hero — that of a tough Navy brat with a drunken, whore-chasing father — and the Special World of the spit-and-polish Navy flight school which the hero enters.

2. The Call to Adventure

The hero is presented with a problem, challenge, or adventure to undertake. Once presented with a Call to Adventure, she can no longer remain indefinitely in the comfort of the Ordinary World.

Perhaps the land is dying, as in the King Arthur stories of the search for the Grail, the only treasure that can heal the wounded land. In Star Wars, the Call to Adventure is Princess Leia's desperate holographic message to wise old Obi Wan Kenobi, who asks Luke to join in the quest. Leia has been snatched by evil Darth Vader, like the Greek springtime goddess Persephone, who was kidnapped to the underworld by Pluto, lord of the dead. Her rescue is vital to restoring the normal balance of the universe.

In many detective stories, the Call to Adventure is the private eye being asked to take on a new case and solve a crime which has upset the order of things. A good detective should right wrongs as well as solve crimes.

In revenge plots, the Call to Adventure is often a wrong which must be set right, an offense against the natural order of things. In The Count of Monte Cristo, Edmond Dantes is unjustly imprisoned and is driven to escape by his desire for revenge. The plot of Beverly Hills Cop is set in motion by the murder of the hero's best friend. In First Blood Rambo is motivated by his unfair treatment at the hands of an intolerant sheriff.

In romantic comedies, the Call to Adventure might be the first encounter with the special but annoying someone the hero or heroine will be pursuing and sparring with.

The Call to Adventure establishes the stakes of the game, and makes clear the hero's goal: to win the treasure or the lover, to get revenge or right a wrong, to achieve a dream, confront a challenge, or change a life.

What's at stake can often be expressed as a question posed by the call. Will E.T. or Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz get home again? Will Luke rescue Princess Leia and defeat Darth Vader? In An Officer and a Gentleman, will the hero be driven out of Navy flight school by his own selfishness and the needling of a fierce Marine drill instructor, or will he earn the right to be called an officer and a gentleman? Boy meets girl, but does boy get girl?

3. Refusal of the Call (The Reluctant Hero)

This one is about fear. Often at this point the hero balks at the threshold of adventure, Refusing the Call or expressing reluctance. After all, she is facing the greatest of all fears, terror of the unknown. The hero has not yet fully committed to the journey and may still be thinking of turning back. Some other influence — a change in circumstances, a further offense against the natural order of things, or the encouragement of a Mentor — is required to get her past this turning point of fear.

In romantic comedies, the hero may express reluctance to get involved (maybe because of the pain of a previous relationship). In a detective story, the private eye may at first turn down the case, only to take it on later against his better judgment.

At this point in Star Wars, Luke refuses Obi Wans Call to Adventure and returns to his aunt and uncle's farmhouse, only to find they have been barbecued by the Emperor's stormtroopers. Suddenly Luke is no longer reluctant and is eager to undertake the quest. The evil of the Empire has become personal to him. He is motivated.

4. Mentor (The Wise Old Man or Woman)

By this time many stories will have introduced a Merlin-like character who is the hero's Mentor. The relationship between hero and Mentor is one of the most common themes in mythology, and one of the richest in its symbolic value. It stands for the bond between parent and child, teacher and student, doctor and patient, god and man.

The Mentor may appear as a wise old wizard (Star Wars), a tough drill sergeant (.An Officer and a Gentleman), or a grizzled old boxing coach (Rocky). In the mythology of "The Mary Tyler Moore Show", it was Lou Grant. In Jaws it's the crusty Robert Shaw character who knows all about sharks.

The function of Mentors is to prepare the hero to face the unknown. They may give advice, guidance or magical equipment. Obi Wan in Star Wars gives Luke his father's light-saber, which he will need in his battles with the dark side of the Force. In The Wizard of Oz, Glinda the Good Witch gives Dorothy guidance and the ruby slippers that will eventually get her home again.

However, the Mentor can only go so far with the hero. Eventually the hero must face the unknown alone. Sometimes the Mentor is required to give the hero a swift kick in the pants to get the adventure going.

5. Crossing the First Threshold

Now the hero finally commits to the adventure and fully enters the Special World of the story for the first time by Crossing the First Threshold. He agrees to face the consequences of dealing with the problem or challenge posed in the Call to Adventure. This is the moment when the story takes off and the adventure really gets going. The balloon goes up, the ship sails, the romance begins, the plane or the spaceship soars off, the wagon train gets rolling.

Movies are often built in three acts, which can be regarded as representing 1) the hero's decision to act, 2) the action itself, and 3) the consequences of the action.

The First Threshold marks the turning point between Acts One and Two. The hero, having overcome fear, has decided to confront the problem and take action. She is now committed to the journey and there's no turning back.

This is the moment when Dorothy sets out on the Yellow Brick Road. The hero of Beverly Hills Cop, Axel Foley, decides to defy his boss's order, leaving his Ordinary World of the Detroit streets to investigate his friend's murder in the Special World of Beverly Hills.

6. Tests, Allies, and Enemies

Once across the First Threshold, the hero naturally encounters new challenges and Tests, makes Allies and Enemies, and begins to learn the rules of the Special World.

Saloons and seedy bars seem to be good places for these transactions. Countless Westerns take the hero to a saloon where his manhood and determination are tested, and where friends and villains are introduced. Bars are also useful to the hero for obtaining information, for learning the new rules that apply to the Special World.

In Casablanca, Rick's Cafe is the den of intrigue in which alliances and enmities are forged, and in which the hero's moral character is constantly tested. In Star Wars, the cantina is the setting for the creation of a major alliance with Han Solo and the making of an important enmity with Jabba the Hutt, which pays off two movies later in Return of the Jedi. Here in the giddy, surreal, violent atmosphere of the cantina swarming with bizarre aliens, Luke also gets a taste of the exciting and dangerous Special World he has just entered.

Scenes like these allow for character development as we watch the hero and his companions react under stress. In the Star Wars cantina, Luke gets to see Han Solo's way of handling a tight situation, and learns that Obi Wan is a warrior wizard of great power.

There are similar sequences in An Officer and a Gentleman at about this point, in which the hero makes allies and enemies and meets his "love interest." Several aspects of the hero's character — aggressiveness and hostility, knowledge of street fighting, attitudes about women — are revealed under pressure in these scenes, and sure enough, one of them takes place in a bar.

Of course not all Tests, Alliances, and Enmities are confronted in bars. In many stories, such as The Wizard of Oz, these are simply encounters on the road. At this stage on the Yellow Brick Road, Dorothy acquires her companions the Scarecrow, Tin Woodsman and Cowardly Lion, and makes enemies such as an orchard full of grumpy talking trees. She passes a number of Tests such as getting Scarecrow off the nail, oiling the Tin Woodsman, and helping the Cowardly Lion deal with his fear.

In Star Wars the Tests continue after the cantina scene. Obi Wan teaches Luke about the Force by making him fight blindfolded. The early laser battles with the Imperial fighters are another Test which Luke successfully passes.

7. Approach to the Inmost Cave

The hero comes at last to the edge of a dangerous place, sometimes deep underground, where the object of the quest is hidden. Often it's the headquarters of the hero's greatest enemy, the most dangerous spot in the Special World, the Inmost Cave. When the hero enters that fearful place he will cross the second major threshold. Heroes often pause at the gate to prepare, plan, and outwit the villain's guards. This is the phase of Approach.

In mythology the Inmost Cave may represent the land of the dead. The hero may have to descend into hell to rescue a loved one (Orpheus), into a cave to fight a dragon and win a treasure (Sigurd in Norse myth), or into a labyrinth to confront a monster (Theseus and the Minotaur).

In the Arthurian stories the Inmost Cave is the Chapel Perilous, the dangerous chamber where the seeker may find the Grail.

In the modern mythology of Star Wars the Approach to the Inmost Cave is Luke Skywalker and company being sucked into the Death Star where they will face Darth Vader and rescue Princess Leia. In The Wizard of Oz it's Dorothy being kidnapped to the Wicked Witch's baleful castle, and her companions slipping in to save her. The title of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom reveals the Inmost Cave of that film.

Approach covers all the preparations for entering the Inmost Cave and confronting death or supreme danger.

8. The Ordeal

Here the fortunes of the hero hit bottom in a direct confrontation with his greatest fear. He faces the possibility of death and is brought to the brink in a battle with a hostile force. The Ordeal is a "black moment" for the audience, as we are held in suspense and tension, not knowing if he will live or die. The hero, like Jonah, is "in the belly of the beast."

In Star Wars it's the harrowing moment in the bowels of the Death Star when Luke, Leia, and company are trapped in the giant trashmasher. Luke is pulled under by the tentacled monster that lives in the sewage and is held down so long that the audience begins to wonder if he's dead. In E. T., the lovable alien momentarily appears to die on the operating table. In The Wizard of Oz Dorothy and her friends are trapped by the Wicked Witch, and it looks like there's no way out. At this point in Beverly Hills Cop Axel Foley is in the clutches of the villain's men with a gun to his head.

In An Officer and a Gentleman, Zack Mayo endures an Ordeal when his Marine drill instructor launches an all-out drive to torment and humiliate him into quitting the program. It's a psychological life-or-death moment, for if he gives in, his chances of becoming an officer and a gentleman will be dead. He survives the Ordeal by refusing to quit, and the Ordeal changes him. The drill sergeant, a foxy Wise Old Man, has forced him to admit his dependency on others, and from this moment on he is more cooperative and less selfish.

In romantic comedies the death faced by the hero may simply be the temporary death of the relationship, as in the second movement of the old standard plot, "Boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl." The hero's chances of connecting with the object of affection look their bleakest.

This is a critical moment in any story, an Ordeal in which the hero must die or appear to die so that she can be born again. It's a major source of the magic of the heroic myth. The experiences of the preceding stages have led us, the audience, to identify with the hero and her fate. What happens to the hero happens to us. We are encouraged to experience the brink-of-death moment with her. Our emotions are temporarily depressed so that they can be revived by the hero's return from death. The result of this revival is a feeling of elation and exhilaration.

The designers of amusement park thrill rides know how to use this principle. Roller coasters make their passengers feel as if they're going to die, and there's a great thrill that comes from brushing up against death and surviving it. You're never more alive than when you're looking death in the face.

This is also the key element in rites of passage or rituals of initiation into fraternities and secret societies. The initiate is forced to taste death in some terrible experience, and then is allowed to experience resurrection as he is reborn as a new member of the group. The hero of every story is an initiate being introduced to the mysteries of life and death.

Every story needs such a life-or-death moment in which the hero or his goals are in mortal jeopardy.

9. Reward (Seizing the Sword)

Having survived death, beaten the dragon, or slain the Minotaur, hero and audience have cause to celebrate. The hero now takes possession of the treasure she has come seeking, her Reward. It might be a special weapon like a magic sword, or a token like the Grail or some elixir which can heal the wounded land.

Sometimes the "sword" is knowledge and experience that leads to greater understanding and a reconciliation with hostile forces.

In Star Wars, Luke rescues Princess Leia and captures the plans of the Death Star, keys to defeating Darth Vader.

Dorothy escapes from the Wicked Witch's castle with the Witch's broomstick and the ruby slippers, keys to getting back home.

At this point the hero may also settle a conflict with a parent. In Return of the Jedi, Luke is reconciled with Darth Vader, who turns out to be his father and not such a bad guy after all.

The hero may also be reconciled with the opposite sex, as in romantic comedies. In many stories the loved one is the treasure the hero has come to win or rescue, and there is often a love scene at this point to celebrate the victory.

From the hero's point of view, members of the opposite sex may appear to be Shapeshifters, an archetype of change. They seem to shift constantly in form or age, reflecting the confusing and constantly changing aspects of the opposite sex. Tales of vampires, werewolves and other shapechangers are symbolic echoes of this shifting quality which men and women see in each other.

The hero's Ordeal may grant a better understanding of the opposite sex, an ability to see beyond the shifting outer appearance, leading to a reconciliation.

The hero may also become more attractive as a result of having survived the Ordeal. He has earned the title of "hero" by having taken the supreme risk on behalf of the community.

10. The Road Back

The hero's not out of the woods yet. We're crossing into Act Three now as the hero begins to deal with the consequences of confronting the dark forces of the Ordeal. If she has not yet managed to reconcile with the parent, the gods, or the hostile forces, they may come raging after her. Some of the best chase scenes spring up at this point, as the hero is pursued on The Road Back by the vengeful forces she has disturbed by Seizing the sword, the elixir, or the treasure.

Thus Luke and Leia are furiously pursued by Darth Vader as they escape the Death Star. The Road Back in E. T. is the moonlight bicycle flight of Elliott and E. T. as they escape from "Keys" (Peter Coyote), who represents repressive governmental authority.

This stage marks the decision to return to the Ordinary World. The hero realizes that the Special World must eventually be left behind, and there are still dangers, temptations, and tests ahead.

11. Resurrection

In ancient times, hunters and warriors had to be purified before they returned to their communities, because they had blood on their hands. The hero who has been to the realm of the dead must be reborn and cleansed in one last Ordeal of death and Resurrection before returning to the Ordinary World of the living.

This is often a second life-and-death moment, almost a replay of the death and rebirth of the Ordeal. Death and darkness get in one last, desperate shot before being finally defeated. It's a kind of final exam for the hero, who must be tested once more to see if he has really learned the lessons of the Ordeal.

The hero is transformed by these moments of death-and-rebirth, and is able to return to ordinary life reborn as a new being with new insights.

The Star Wars films play with this element constantly. The films of the "original trilogy" feature a final battle scene in which Luke is almost killed, appears to be dead for a moment, and then miraculously survives. Each Ordeal wins him new knowledge and command over the Force. He is transformed into a new being by his experience.

Axel Foley in the climactic sequence of Beverly Hills Cop once again faces death at the hands of the villain, but is rescued by the intervention of the Beverly Hills police force. He emerges from the experience with a greater respect for cooperation, and is a more complete human being.

An Officer and a Gentleman offers a more complex series of final ordeals, as the hero faces death in a number of ways. Zack's selfishness dies as he gives up the chance for a personal athletic trophy in favor of helping another cadet over an obstacle. His relationship with his girlfriend seems to be dead, and he must survive the crushing blow of his best friend's suicide. As if that weren't enough, he also endures a final hand-to-hand, life-or-death battle with his drill instructor, but survives it all and is transformed into the gallant "officer and gentleman" of the title.

12. Return with the Elixir

The hero Returns to the Ordinary World, but the journey is meaningless unless she brings back some Elixir, treasure, or lesson from the Special World. The Elixir is a magic potion with the power to heal. It may be a great treasure like the Grail that magically heals the wounded land, or it simply might be knowledge or experience that could be useful to the community someday.

Dorothy returns to Kansas with the knowledge that she is loved, and that "There's no place like home." E.T. returns home with the experience of friendship with humans. Luke Skywalker defeats Darth Vader (for the time being) and restores peace and order to the galaxy.

Zack Mayo wins his commission and leaves the Special World of the training base with a new perspective. In the sparkling new uniform of an officer (with a new attitude to match) he literally sweeps his girlfriend off her feet and carries her away.

Sometimes the Elixir is treasure won on the quest, but it may be love, freedom, wisdom, or the knowledge that the Special World exists and can be survived. Sometimes it's just coming home with a good story to tell.

Unless something is brought back from the Ordeal in the Inmost Cave, the hero is doomed to repeat the adventure. Many comedies use this ending, as a foolish character refuses to learn his lesson and embarks on the same folly that got him in trouble in the first place.

To recap the Hero's Journey:

1. Heroes are introduced in the ORDINARY WORLD, where

2. they receive the CALL TO ADVENTURE.

3. They are RELUCTANT at first or REFUSE THE CALL, but

4. are encouraged by a MENTOR to

5. CROSS THE FIRST THRESHOLD and enter the Special World, where

6. they encounter TESTS, ALLIES, AND ENEMIES.

7. They APPROACH THE INMOST CAVE, crossing a second threshold

8. where they endure the ORDEAL.

9. They take possession of their REWARD and

10. are pursued on THE ROAD BACK to the Ordinary World.

11. They cross the third threshold, experience a RESURRECTION, and are transformed by the experience.

12. They RETURN WITH THE ELIXIR, a boon or treasure to benefit the Ordinary World.

The Hero's Journey is a skeletal framework that should be fleshed out with the details and surprises of the individual story. The structure should not call attention to itself, nor should it be followed too precisely. The order of the stages given here is only one of many possible variations. The stages can be deleted, added to, and drastically shuffled without losing any of their power.

The values of the Hero's Journey are what's important. The images of the basic version — young heroes seeking magic swords from old wizards, maidens risking death to save loved ones, knights riding off to fight evil dragons in deep caves, and so on — are just symbols of universal life experiences. The symbols can be changed infinitely to suit the story at hand and the needs of the society.

The Hero's Journey is easily translated to contemporary dramas, comedies, romances, or action-adventures by substituting modern equivalents for the symbolic

figures and props of the hero's story. The wise old man or woman may be a real shaman or wizard, but may also be any kind of Mentor or teacher, doctor or therapist, "crusty but benign" boss, tough but fair top sergeant, parent, grandparent, or guiding, helping figure.

Modern heroes may not be going into caves and labyrinths to fight mythical beasts, but they do enter a Special World and an Inmost Cave by venturing into space, to the bottom of the sea, into the depths of a modern city, or into their own hearts.

The patterns of myth can be used to tell the simplest comic book story or the most sophisticated drama. The Hero's Journey grows and matures as new experiments are tried within its framework. Changing the traditional sex and relative ages of the archetypes only makes it more interesting, and allows ever more complex webs of understanding to be spun among them. The basic figures can be combined, or each can be divided into several characters to show different aspects of the same idea.

The Hero's Journey is infinitely flexible, capable of endless variation without sacrificing any of its magic, and it will outlive us all.

Now that we've looked over the map, let's meet the characters who populate the landscape of storytelling: the Archetypes.

As soon as you enter the world of fairy tales and myths, you become aware of recurring character types and relationships: questing heroes, heralds who call them to adventure, wise old men and women who give them magical gifts, threshold guardians who seem to block their way, shapeshifting fellow travelers who confuse and dazzle them, shadowy villains who try to destroy them, tricksters who upset the status quo and provide comic relief. In describing these common character types, symbols, and relationships the Swiss psychologist Carl G. Jung employed the term archetypes, meaning ancient patterns of personality that are the shared heritage of the human race.

Jung suggested there may be a collective unconscious, similar to the personal unconscious. Fairy tales and myths are like the dreams of an entire culture, springing from the collective unconscious. The same character types seem to occur on both the personal and the collective scale. The archetypes are amazingly constant throughout all times and cultures, in the dreams and personalities of individuals as well as in the mythic imagination of the entire world. An understanding of these forces is one of the most powerful elements in the modern storyteller's bag of tricks.

The concept of archetypes is an indispensable tool for understanding the purpose or function of characters in a story. If you grasp the function of the archetype which a particular character is expressing, it can help you determine if the character is pulling her full weight in the story. The archetypes are part of the universal language of storytelling, and a command of their energy is as essential to the writer as breathing.

Joseph Campbell spoke of the archetypes as biological: as expressions of the organs of the body, built into the wiring of every human being. The universality of these patterns makes possible the shared experience of storytelling. Storytellers instinctively choose characters and relationships that resonate to the energy of the archetypes, to create dramatic experiences that are recognizable to everyone. Becoming aware of the archetypes can only expand your command of your craft.

ARCHETYPES AS FUNCTIONS

When I first began working with these ideas I thought of an archetype as a fixed role which a character would play exclusively throughout a story. Once I identified a character as a mentor, I expected her to remain a mentor and only a mentor. However, as I worked with fairy tale motifs as a story consultant for Disney Animation, I encountered another way of looking at the archetypes — not as rigid character roles but as functions performed temporarily by characters to achieve certain effects in a story. This observation comes from the work of the Russian fairy tale expert Vladimir Propp, whose book, Morphology of the Folktale, analyzes motifs and recurrent patterns in hundreds of Russian tales.

Looking at the archetypes in this way, as flexible character functions rather than as rigid character types, can liberate your storytelling. It explains how a character in a story can manifest the qualities of more than one archetype. The archetypes can be thought of as masks, worn by the characters temporarily as they are needed to advance the story. A character might enter the story performing the function of a herald, then switch masks to function as a trickster, a mentor, and a shadow.

FACETS OF THE HERO'S PERSONALITY

Another way to look at the classic archetypes is that they are facets of the hero's (or the writer's) personality. The other characters represent possibilities for the hero, for good or ill. A hero sometimes proceeds through the story gathering and incorporating the energy and traits of the other characters. She learns from the other characters, fusing them into a complete human being who has picked up something from everyone she has met along the way.

The archetypes can also be regarded as personified symbols of various human qualities. Like the major arcana cards of the Tarot, they stand for the aspects of a complete human personality. Every good story reflects the total human story, the universal human condition of being born into this world, growing, learning, struggling to become an individual, and dying. Stories can be read as metaphors for the general human situation, with characters who embody universal, archetypal qualities, comprehensible to the group as well as the individual.

THE MOST COMMON AND USEFUL ARCHETYPES

For the storyteller, certain character archetypes are indispensable tools of the trade. You can't tell stories without them. The archetypes that occur most frequently in stories, and that seem to be the most useful for the writer to understand, are:

HERO

MENTOR (Wise Old Man or Woman)

THRESHOLD GUARDIAN

HERALD

SHAPESHIFTER

SHADOW

ALLY

TRICKSTER

There are, of course, many more archetypes; as many as there are human qualities to dramatize in stories. Fairy tales are crowded with archetypal figures: the Wolf, the Hunter, the Good Mother, the Wicked Stepmother, the Fairy Godmother, the Witch, the Prince or Princess, the Greedy Innkeeper, and so forth, who perform highly specialized functions. Jung and others have identified many psychological archetypes, such as the Puer Aeternus or eternal boy, who can be found in myths as the ever-youthful Cupid, in stories as characters such as Peter Pan, and in life as men who never want to grow up.

Particular genres of modern stories have their specialized character types, such as the "Whore with the Heart of Gold" or the "Arrogant West Point Lieutenant" in Westerns, the "Good Cop/Bad Cop" pairing in buddy pictures, or the "Tough but Fair Sergeant" in war movies.

However, these are only variants and refinements of the archetypes discussed in the following chapters. The archetypes we will discuss are the most basic patterns, from which all others are shaped to fit the needs of specific stories and genres.

Two questions are helpful for a writer trying to identify the nature of an archetype: 1) What psychological function or part of the personality does it represent? and 2) What is its dramatic function in a story?

Keep these questions in mind as we look at eight of the basic archetypes, the people or energies we are likely to meet on the Hero's Journey.

The word hero is Greek, from a root that means "to protect and to serve" (incidentally the motto of the Los Angeles Police Department). A Hero is someone who is willing to sacrifice his own needs on behalf of others, like a shepherd who will sacrifice to protect and serve his flock. At the root the idea of Hero is connected with self-sacrifice. (Note that I use the word Hero to describe a central character or protagonist of either sex.)

PSYCHOLOGICAL FUNCTION

In psychological terms, the archetype of the Hero represents what Freud called the ego — that part of the personality that separates from the mother, that considers itself distinct from the rest of the human race. Ultimately, a Hero is one who is able to transcend the bounds and illusions of the ego, but at first, Heroes are all ego: the I, the one, that personal identity which thinks it is separate from the rest of the group. The journey of many Heroes is the story of that separation from the family or tribe, equivalent to a child's sense of separation from the mother.

The Hero archetype represents the ego's search for identity and wholeness. In the process of becoming complete, integrated human beings, we are all Heroes facing internal guardians, monsters, and helpers. In the quest to explore our own minds we find teachers, guides, demons, gods, mates, servants, scapegoats, masters, seducers, betrayers, and allies, as aspects of our personalities and characters in our dreams. All the villains, tricksters, lovers, friends, and foes of the Hero can be found inside ourselves. The psychological task we all face is to integrate these separate parts into one complete, balanced entity. The ego, the Hero thinking she is separate from all these parts of herself, must incorporate them to become the Self.

DRAMATIC FUNCTIONS AUDIENCE IDENTIFICATION

The dramatic purpose of the Hero is to give the audience a window into the story. Each person hearing a tale or watching a play or movie is invited, in the early stages of the story, to identify with the Hero, to merge with him and see the world of the story through his eyes. Storytellers do this by giving their Heroes a combination of qualities, a mix of universal and unique characteristics.

Heroes have qualities that we all can identify with and recognize in ourselves. They are propelled by universal drives that we can all understand: the desire to be loved and understood, to succeed, survive, be free, get revenge, right wrongs, or seek self-expression.

Stories invite us to invest part of our personal identity in the Hero for the duration of the experience. In a sense we become the Hero for a while. We project ourselves into the Hero's psyche, and see the world through her eyes. Heroes need some admirable qualities, so that we want to be like them. We want to experience the self-confidence of Katharine Hepburn, the elegance of Fred Astaire, the wit of Cary Grant, the sexiness of Marilyn Monroe.

Heroes should have universal qualities, emotions, and motivations that everyone has experienced at one time or another: revenge, anger, lust, competition, territoriality, patriotism, idealism, cynicism, or despair. But Heroes must also be unique human beings, rather than stereotypical creatures or tin gods without flaws

or unpredictability. Like any effective work of art they need both universality and originality. Nobody wants to see a movie or read a story about abstract qualities in human form. We want stories about real people. A real character, like a real person, is not just a single trait but a unique combination of many qualities and drives, some of them conflicting. And the more conflicting, the better. A character torn by warring allegiances to love and duty is inherently interesting to an audience. A character who has a unique combination of contradictory impulses, such as trust and suspicion or hope and despair, seems more realistic and human than one who displays only one character trait.

A well-rounded Hero can be determined, uncertain, charming, forgetful, impatient, and strong in body but weak at heart, all at the same time. It's the particular combination of qualities that gives an audience the sense that the Hero is one of a kind, a real person rather than a type.

GROWTH

Another story function of the Hero is learning or growth. In evaluating a script sometimes it's hard to tell who is the main character, or who should be. Often the best answer is: the one who learns or grows the most in the course of the story. Heroes overcome obstacles and achieve goals, but they also gain new knowledge and wisdom. The heart of many stories is the learning that goes on between a Hero and a mentor, or a Hero and a lover, or even between a Hero and a villain. We are all each other's teachers.

ACTION

Another heroic function is acting or doing. The Hero is usually the most active person in the script. His will and desire is what drives most stories forward. A frequent flaw in screenplays is that the Hero is fairly active throughout the story, but at the most critical moment becomes passive and is rescued by the timely arrival of some outside force. At this moment above all, a Hero should be fully active, in control of his own fate. The Hero should perform the decisive action of the story, the action that requires taking the most risk or responsibility.

SACRIFICE

People commonly think of Heroes as strong or brave, but these qualities are secondary to sacrifice — the true mark of a Hero. Sacrifice is the Hero's willingness to give up something of value, perhaps even her own life, on behalf of an ideal or a group. Sacrifice means "making holy." In ancient times people made sacrifices, even of human beings, to acknowledge their debt to the spirit world, the gods, or nature, to appease those mighty forces, and to make holy the processes of daily life. Even death became sanctified, a holy act.

DEALING WITH DEATH

At the heart of every story is a confrontation with death. If the Hero doesn't face actual death, then there is the threat of death or symbolic death in the form of a high-stakes game, love affair, or adventure in which the Hero may succeed (live) or fail (die).

Heroes show us how to deal with death. They may survive it, proving that death is not so tough. They may die (perhaps only symbolically) and be reborn, proving that death can be transcended. They may die a Hero's death, transcending death by offering up their lives willingly for a cause, an ideal, or a group.

True heroism is shown in stories when Heroes offer themselves on the altar of chance, willing to take the risk that their quest for adventure may lead to danger, loss, or death. Like soldiers who know that by enlisting they have agreed to give their lives if their country asks them to, Heroes accept the possibility of sacrifice.

The most effective Heroes are those who experience sacrifice. They may give up a loved one or friend along the way. They may give up some cherished vice or eccentricity as the price of entering into a new way of life. They may return some of their winnings or share what they have gained in the Special World. They may return to their starting point, the tribe or village, and bring back boons, elixirs, food, or knowledge to share with the rest of the group. Great cultural Heroes like Martin Luther King or Gandhi gave their lives in pursuit of their ideals.

HEROISM IN OTHER ARCHETYPES

Sometimes the Hero archetype is not just manifested in the main character, the protagonist who bravely fights the bad guys and wins. The archetype can be manifested in other characters, when they act heroically. An unheroic character can grow to be heroic. The title character of Gunga Din begins as another archetype altogether, a trickster or clown, but by striving to be a Hero, and by sacrificing himself at a crucial moment on behalf of his friends, he earns the right to be called a Hero. In Star Wars, Obi Wan Kenobi clearly manifests the archetype of the mentor through most of the story. However, he acts heroically and temporarily wears the mask of the Hero when he sacrifices himself to allow Luke to escape the Death Star.

It can be very effective to have a villainous or antagonistic character unexpectedly manifest heroic qualities. On the sitcom level, when a character like Danny DeVito's despicable "Taxi" dispatcher Louie suddenly reveals he has a soft heart or has done something noble, the episode wins an Emmy. A gallant villain, heroic in some ways and despicable in others, can be very appealing. Ideally, every well-rounded character should manifest a touch of every archetype, because the archetypes are expressions of the parts that make up a complete personality.

CHARACTER FLAWS

Interesting flaws humanize a character. We can recognize bits of ourselves in a Hero who is challenged to overcome inner doubts, errors in thinking, guilt or trauma from the past, or fear of the future. Weaknesses, imperfections, quirks, and vices immediately make a Hero or any character more real and appealing. It seems the more neurotic characters are, the more the audience likes them and identifies with them.

Flaws also give a character somewhere to go — the so-called "character arc" in which a character develops from condition A to condition Z through a series of steps. Flaws are a starting point of imperfection or incompleteness from which a character can grow. They may be deficiencies in a character. Perhaps a Hero has no romantic partner, and is looking for the "missing piece" to complete her life. This is often symbolized in fairy tales by having the Hero experience a loss or a death in the family. Many fairy tales begin with the death of a parent or the kidnapping of a brother or sister. This subtraction from the family unit sets the nervous energy of the story in motion, not to stop until the balance has been restored by the creation of a new family or the reuniting of the old.

In most modern stories it is the Hero's personality that is being recreated or restored to wholeness. The missing piece may be a critical element of personality such as the ability to love or trust. Heroes may have to overcome some problem such as lack of patience or decisiveness. Audiences love watching Heroes grapple with personality problems and overcome them. Will Edward, the rich but cold-hearted businessman of Pretty Woman, warm up under the influence of the life-loving Vivian and become her Prince Charming? Will Vivian gain some self-respect and escape her life of prostitution? Will Conrad, the guilt-ridden teenager in Ordinary People, regain his lost ability to accept love and intimacy?

VARIETIES OF HERO

Heroes come in many varieties, including willing and unwilling Heroes, group-oriented and loner Heroes, Anti-heroes, tragic Heroes, and catalyst Heroes. Like all the other archetypes, the Hero is a flexible concept that can express many kinds of energy. Heroes may combine with other archetypes to produce hybrids like the Trickster Hero, or they may temporarily wear the mask of another archetype, becoming a Shapeshifter, a Mentor to someone else, or even a Shadow.

Although usually portrayed as a positive figure, the Hero may also express dark or negative sides of the ego. The Hero archetype generally represents the human spirit in positive action, but may also show the consequences of weakness and reluctance to act.

WILLING AND UNWILLING HEROES

It seems Heroes are of two types: 1) willing, active, gung-ho, committed to the adventure, without doubts, always bravely going ahead, self-motivated, or 2) unwilling, full of doubts and hesitations, passive, needing to be motivated or pushed into the adventure by outside forces. Both make equally entertaining stories, although a Hero who is passive throughout may make for an uninvolving dramatic experience. It's usually best for an unwilling Hero to change at some point, to become committed to the adventure after some necessary motivation has been supplied.

ANTI-HEROES

Anti-hero is a slippery term that can cause a lot of confusion. Simply stated, an Anti-hero is not the opposite of a Hero, but a specialized kind of Hero, one who may be an outlaw or a villain from the point of view of society, but with whom the audience is basically in sympathy. We identify with these outsiders because we have all felt like outsiders at one time or another.

Anti-Heroes may be of two types: 1) characters who behave much like conventional Heroes, but are given a strong touch of cynicism or have a wounded quality, like Bogarts characters in The Big Sleep and Casablanca, or 2) tragic Heroes, central figures of a story who may not be likeable or admirable, whose actions we may even deplore, like Macbeth or Scarface or the Joan Crawford of Mommie Dearest.

The wounded Anti-hero may be a heroic knight in tarnished armor, a loner who has rejected society or been rejected by it. These characters may win at the end and may have the audiences full sympathy at all times, but in society's eyes they are outcasts, like Robin Hood, roguish pirate or bandit Heroes, or many of Bogarts characters. They are often honorable men who have withdrawn from society's corruption, perhaps ex-cops or soldiers who became disillusioned and now operate in the shadow of the law as private eyes, smugglers, gamblers, or soldiers of fortune. We love these characters because they are rebels, thumbing their noses at society as we would all like to do. Another archetype of this kind is personified in James Dean in Rebel Without a Cause and East of Eden, or the young Marlon Brando, whose character in The Wild One acted out a new and quite different generation's dissatisfaction with the old. Actors like Mickey Rourke, Matt Dillon, and Sean Penn carry on the tradition today.

The second type of Anti-hero is more like the classical idea of the tragic Hero. These are flawed Heroes who never overcome their inner demons and are brought down and destroyed by them. They may be charming, they may have admirable qualities, but the flaw wins out in the end. Some tragic Anti-heroes are not so admirable, but we watch their downfall with fascination because "there, but for the grace of God, go I." Like the ancient Greeks who watched Oedipus fall, we are purged of our emotions and we learn to avoid the same pitfalls as we watch the destruction of Al Pacino's character in Scarface, Sigourney Weaver as Dian Fossey in Gorillas in the Mist, or Diane Keaton's character in Looking for Mr. Goodbar.

GROUP-ORIENTED HEROES

Another distinction must be made about Heroes with respect to their orientation to society. Like the first storytellers, the earliest humans who went out hunting and gathering on the plains of Africa, most Heroes are group-oriented: They are part of a society at the beginning of the story, and their journey takes them to an unknown land far from home. When we first meet them, they are part of a clan, tribe, village, town, or family. Their story is one of separation from that group (Act One); lone adventure in the wilderness away from the group (Act Two); and usually, eventual reintegration with the group (Act Three).

Group-oriented Heroes often face a choice between returning to the Ordinary World of the first act, or remaining in the Special World of the second act. Heroes who choose to remain in the Special World are rare in Western culture but fairly common in classic Asian and Indian tales.

LONER HEROES

In contrast to the group-oriented Hero is the loner Western Hero such as Shane, Clint Eastwood's Man with No Name, John Wayne s Ethan in The Searchers, or The Lone Ranger. With this Hero type, the stories begin with the Heroes estranged from society. Their natural habitat is the wilderness, their natural state is solitude. Their journey is one of re-entry into the group (Act One); adventure within the group, on the group's normal turf (Act Two); and return to isolation in the wilderness (Act Three). For them the Special World of Act Two is the tribe or village, which they visit briefly but in which they are always uncomfortable. The wonderful shot of John Wayne at the end of The Searchers sums up the energy of this Hero type. Wayne is framed in a cabin doorway as an outsider forever cut off from the joys and comforts of the family. This kind of Hero need not be limited to Westerns. It can be used effectively in dramas or action movies where a loner detective is tempted back into adventure, where a hermit or retired person is called back into society, or where an emotionally isolated person is challenged to re-enter the world of relationships.

As with group-oriented Heroes, the loner Heroes have the final choice of returning to their initial state (solitude), or remaining in the Special World of Act Two. Some Heroes begin as loners and end as group-oriented Heroes who elect to stay with the group.

CATALYST HEROES

A certain class of Hero is an exception to the rule that the Hero is usually the character who undergoes the most change. These are catalyst Heroes, central figures who may act heroically, but who do not change much themselves because their main function is to bring about transformation in others. Like a true catalyst in chemistry, they bring about a change in a system without being changed themselves.

A good example is Eddie Murphy's character Axel Foley from Beverly Hills Cop. His personality is already fully formed and distinctive at the story's beginning. He doesn't have much of a character arc because he has nowhere to go. He doesn't learn or change much in the course of the story, but he does bring about change in his Beverly Hills cop buddies, Taggart and Rosewood. By comparison they have relatively strong character arcs, from being uptight and by-the-book to being hip and streetwise, thanks to Axel's influence. In fact, although Axel is the central figure, the villains main opponent, and the character with the best lines and the most screen time, it could be argued that he is not the true Hero, but the Mentor of the piece, while young Rosewood (Judge Reinhold) is the actual Hero because he learns the most.

Catalyst Heroes are especially useful in continuing stories such as episodic TV shows and sequels. Like The Lone Ranger or Superman, these Heroes undergo few internal changes, but primarily act to help others or guide them in their growth. Of course it's a good idea once in a while to give even these characters some moments of growth and change to help keep them fresh and believable.

THE ROAD OF HEROES

Heroes are symbols of the soul in transformation, and of the journey each person takes through life. The stages of that progression, the natural stages of life and growth, make up the Hero's Journey. The Hero archetype is a rich field for exploration by writers and spiritual seekers. Carol S. Pearson's book Awakening the Heroes Within further breaks down the idea of the Hero into useful archetypes (Innocent, Orphan, Martyr, Wanderer, Warrior, Caregiver, Seeker, Lover, Destroyer, Creator, Ruler, Magician, Sage, and Fool) and graphs the emotional progress of each. It's a good guide to a deeper psychological understanding of the Hero in its many facets. The special avenues traveled by some female heroes are described in The Heroine's Journey: Woman's Quest for Wholeness by Maureen Murdock.

An archetype found frequently in dreams, myths, and stories is the Mentor, usually a positive figure who aids or trains the hero. Campbells name for this force is the Wise Old Man or Wise Old Woman. This archetype is expressed in all those characters who teach and protect heroes and give them gifts. Whether it s God walking with Adam in the Garden of Eden, Merlin guiding King Arthur, the Fairy Godmother helping Cinderella, or a veteran sergeant giving advice to a rookie cop, the relationship between hero and Mentor is one of the richest sources of entertainment in literature and film.

The word "Mentor" comes to us from The Odyssey. A character named Mentor guides the young hero, Telemachus, on his Hero's Journey. In fact it's the goddess Athena who helps Telemachus, by assuming the form of Mentor. (See Chapter 4 in book two for a fuller discussion of Mentor's role.) Mentors often speak in the voice of a god, or are inspired by divine wisdom. Good teachers and Mentors are enthused, in the original sense of the word. "Enthusiasm" is from the Greek en theos, meaning god-inspired, having a god in you, or being in the presence of a god.

PSYCHOLOGICAL FUNCTION

In the anatomy of the human psyche, Mentors represent the Self, the god within us, the aspect of personality that is connected with all things. This higher Self is the wiser, nobler, more godlike part of us. Like Jiminy Cricket in the Disney version of Pinocchio, the Self acts as a conscience to guide us on the road of life when no Blue Fairy or kindly Gepetto is there to protect us and tell us right from wrong.

Mentor figures, whether encountered in dreams, fairy tales, myths, or screenplays, stand for the hero's highest aspirations. They are what the hero may become if she persists on the Road of Heroes. Mentors are often former heroes who have survived life's early trials and are now passing on the gift of their knowledge and wisdom.

The Mentor archetype is closely related to the image of the parent. The fairy godmother in stories such as "Cinderella" can be interpreted as the protecting spirit of the girl's dead mother. Merlin is a surrogate parent to the young King Arthur, whose father is dead. Many heroes seek out Mentors because their own parents are inadequate role models.

DRAMATIC FUNCTIONS TEACHING

Just as learning is an important function of the hero, teaching or training is a key function of the Mentor. Training sergeants, drill instructors, professors, trail bosses, parents, grandparents, crusty old boxing coaches, and all those who teach a hero the ropes, are manifesting this archetype. Of course the teaching can go both ways. Anyone who has taught knows that you learn as much from your students as they do from you.

GIFT-GIVING

Giving gifts is also an important function of this archetype. In Vladimir Propp's analysis of Russian fairy tales, Morphology of the Folktale, he identifies this function as that of a "donor" or provider: one who temporarily aids the hero, usually by giving some gift. It may be a magic weapon, an important key or clue, some magical medicine or food, or a life-saving piece of advice. In fairy tales the donor might be a witch's cat, grateful for a little girl's kindness, who gives her a towel and a comb. Later when the girl is being chased by the witch, the towel turns into a raging river and the comb turns into a forest to block the witch's pursuit.

Examples of these gifts are abundant in movies, from the small-time mobster Puttynose giving James Cagney his first gun in The Public Enemy to Obi Wan Kenobi giving Luke Skywalker his father's light-saber. Nowadays the gift is as likely to be a computer code as the key to a dragon's lair.

GIFTS IN MYTHOLOGY

Gift-giving, the donor function of the Mentor, has an important role in mythology. Many heroes received gifts from their Mentors, the gods. Pandora, whose name means "all-gifted," was showered with presents, including Zeus' vindictive gift of the box which she was not supposed to open. Heroes such as Hercules were given some gifts by their Mentors, but among the Greeks the most gifted of heroes was Perseus.

PERSEUS

The Greek ideal of heroism was expressed in Perseus, the monster-slayer. He has the distinction of being one of the best equipped of heroes, so loaded down with gifts from higher powers that it's a wonder he could walk. In time, with the help of Mentors such as Hermes and Athena, he acquired winged sandals, a magic sword, a helmet of invisibility, a magic sickle, a magic mirror, the head of Medusa that turned all who look upon it to stone, and a magic satchel to stow the head in. As if this were not enough, the movie version of the Perseus tale, Clash of the Titans, gives him the flying horse Pegasus as well.

In most stories, this would be overdoing it a bit. But Perseus is meant to be a paragon of heroes, so it's fitting he should be so well provided for by the gods, his Mentors in the quest.

GIFTS SHOULD BE EARNED

In Propp's dissection of Russian fairy tales, he observes that donor characters give magical presents to heroes, but usually only after the heroes have passed a test of some kind. This is a good rule of thumb: The gift or help of the donor should be earned, by learning, sacrifice, or commitment. Fairy-tale heroes eventually earn the aid of animals or magical creatures by being kind to them in the beginning, sharing food with them, or protecting them from harm.

MENTOR AS INVENTOR

Sometimes the Mentor functions as a scientist or inventor, whose gifts are his devices, designs, or inventions. The great inventor of classical myth is Daedalus, who designed the Labyrinth and other wonders for the rulers of Crete. As the master artisan of the Theseus and the Minotaur story, he had a hand in creating the monster Minotaur and designed the Labyrinth as a cage for it. As a Mentor, Daedalus gave Ariadne the ball of thread that allowed Theseus to get in and out of the Labyrinth alive.

Imprisoned in his own maze as punishment for helping Theseus, Daedalus also invented the famous wax-and-feather wings that allowed him and his son Icarus to escape. As a Mentor to Icarus, he advised his son not to fly too close to the sun. Icarus, who had grown up in the pitch dark of the Labyrinth, was irresistibly attracted to the sun, ignored his father's advice, and fell to his death when the wax melted. The best advice is worthless if you don't take it.

THE HERO'S CONSCIENCE

Some Mentors perform a special function as a conscience for the hero. Characters like Jiminy Cricket in Pinocchio or Walter Brennan's Groot in Red River try to remind an errant hero of an important moral code. However, a hero may rebel against a nagging conscience. Would-be Mentors should remember that in the original Collodi story Pinocchio squashed the cricket to shut him up. The angel on a hero's shoulder can never offer arguments as colorful as those of the devil on the opposite side.

MOTIVATION

Another important function of the Mentor archetype is to motivate the hero, and help her overcome fear. Sometimes the gift alone is sufficient reassurance and motivation. In other cases the Mentor shows the hero something or arranges things to motivate her to take action and commit to the adventure.

In some cases a hero is so unwilling or fearful that he must be pushed into the adventure. A Mentor may need to give a hero a swift kick in the pants in order to get the adventure rolling.

PLANTING

A function of the Mentor archetype is often to plant information or a prop that will become important later. The James Bond films have a mandatory scene in which the weapons master "Q," one of Bond's recurring Mentors, describes the workings of some new briefcase gadget to a bored 007. This information is a plant, meant for the audience to note but forger about until the climactic moment where the gadget becomes a lifesaver. Such constructions help tie the beginning and end of the story together, and show that at some point everything we've learned from our Mentors comes in handy.

SEXUAL INITIATION

In the realm of love, the Mentor's function may be to initiate us into the mysteries of love or sex. In India they speak of the shakti — a sexual initiator, a partner who helps you experience the power of sex as a vehicle of higher consciousness. A shakti is a manifestation of God, a Mentor leading the lover to experience the divine.

Seducers and thieves of innocence teach heroes lessons the hard way. There may be a shadow side to Mentors who lead a hero down a dangerous road of obsessive love or loveless, manipulative sex. There are many ways to learn.

TYPES OF MENTOR

Like heroes, Mentors may be willing or unwilling. Sometimes they teach in spite of themselves. In other cases they teach by their bad example. The downfall of a weakened, tragically flawed Mentor can show the hero pitfalls to avoid. As with heroes, dark or negative sides may be expressed through this archetype.

DARK MENTORS

In certain stories the power of the Mentor archetype can be used to mislead the audience. In thrillers the mask of a Mentor is sometimes a decoy used to lure the hero into danger. Or in an anti-heroic gangster picture such as The Public Enemy or Goodfellas, where every conventional heroic value is inverted, an anti-Mentor appears to guide the anti-hero on the road to crime and destruction.

Another inversion of this archetype's energy is a special kind of Threshold Guardian (an archetype discussed in the next chapter). An example is found in Romancing the Stone, where Joan Wilder's witchy, sharp-tongued agent is to all appearances a Mentor, guiding her career and giving her advice about men. But when Joan is about to cross the threshold to adventure, the agent tries to stop her, warning her of the dangers and casting doubt in her mind. Rather than motivating her like a true Mentor, the agent becomes an obstacle in the hero's path. This is psychologically true to life, for often we must overcome or outgrow the energy of our best teachers in order to move to the next stage of development.

FALLEN MENTORS

Some Mentors are still on a Hero's Journey of their own. They may be experiencing a crisis of faith in their calling. Perhaps they are dealing with the problems of aging and approaching the threshold of death, or have fallen from the hero's road. The hero needs the Mentor to pull himself together one more time, and there's serious doubt that he can do it. Tom Hanks in A League of Their Own plays a former sports hero sidelined by injury and making a poor transition into Mentor-hood. He has fallen far from grace, and the audience is rooting for him to straighten up and honor his task of helping the heroes. Such a Mentor may go through all the stages of a hero's journey, on his own path to redemption.

CONTINUING MENTORS

Mentors are useful for giving assignments and setting stories in motion. For this reason they are often written into the cast of continuing stories. Recurring Mentors include Mr. Waverly on "The Man from U.N.C.L.E.," "M" in the Bond pictures, The Chief on "Get Smart," Will Geer and Ellen Corby as the grandparents on "The Waltons," Alfred in "Batman," James Earl Jones' CIA official in Patriot Games and The Hunt for Red October, etc.

MULTIPLE MENTORS

A hero may be trained by a series of Mentors who teach specific skills. Hercules is surely among the best trained of heroes, mentored by experts on wrestling, archery, horsemanship, weapon-handling, boxing, wisdom, virtue, song, and music. He even took a driver-training course in charioteering from one Mentor. All of us have learned from a series of Mentors, including parents, older brothers and sisters, friends, lovers, teachers, bosses, co-workers, therapists, and other role models.

Multiple Mentors may be needed to express different functions of the archetype. In the James Bond movies, 007 always returns to his home base to confer with his main Wise Old Man or Woman, the spymaster "M" who gives him assignments, advice, and warnings. But the Mentor function of giving gifts to the hero is delegated to "Q," the weapons and gadget master. A certain amount of emotional support as well as advice and critical information is provided by Miss Moneypenny, representing another aspect of the Mentor.

COMIC MENTORS

A special type of Mentor occurs in romantic comedies. This person is often the friend or fellow office worker of the hero, and is usually of the same sex as the hero. She gives the hero some advice about love: go out more to forget the pain of a lost love; pretend to have an affair to make your husband jealous; feign interest in the beloved's hobbies; impress the beloved with gifts, flowers, or flattery; be more aggressive; and so on. The advice often seems to lead the hero into temporary disaster, but it all turns out right in the end. These characters are a feature of romantic comedies, especially those of the 1950s when movies like Pillow Talk and Lover Come Back gave plenty of work for character actors like Thelma Ritter and Tony Randall who could portray this wise-cracking, sarcastic version of a Mentor.

MENTOR AS SHAMAN

Mentor figures in stories are closely related to the idea of the shaman: the healer, the medicine man or woman, of tribal cultures. Just as Mentors guide the hero through the Special World, shamans guide their people through life. They travel to other worlds in dreams and visions and bring back stories to heal their tribes. It's often the function of a Mentor to help the hero seek a guiding vision for a quest to another world.

FLEXIBILITY OF THE MENTOR ARCHETYPE

Like the other archetypes, the Mentor or donor is not a rigid character type, but rather a function, a job which several different characters might perform in the course of a story. A character primarily manifesting one archetype — the hero, the shapeshifter, the trickster, even the villain — may temporarily slip on the mask of the Mentor in order to teach or give something to the hero.

In Russian fairy tales, the wonderful character of the witch Baba Yaga is a Shadow figure who sometimes wears the Mentor mask. On the surface she's a horrible, cannibalistic witch representing the dark side of the forest, its power to devour. But like the forest, she can be appeased and can shower gifts on the traveler. Sometimes if Prince Ivan is kind and complimentary to her, Baba Yaga gives him the magical treasure he needs to rescue the Princess Vasilisa.

Although Campbell called these Mentor figures Wise Old Men or Women, they are sometimes neither wise nor old. The young, in their innocence, are often wise and capable of teaching the old. The most foolish person in a story might be the one we learn the most from. As with the other archetypes, the function of a Mentor is more important than mere physical description. What the character does will often determine what archetype is being manifested at the moment.

Many stories have no specific character who can be identified as a Mentor. There's no white-bearded, wizardly figure who wanders around acting like a Wise Old Man. Nevertheless, almost every story calls on the energy of this archetype at some point.

INNER MENTORS

In some Westerns or film noir stories the hero is an experienced, hardened character who has no need for a Mentor or guide. He has internalized the archetype and it now lives within him as an inner code of behavior. The Mentor may be the unspoken code of the gunfighter, or the secret notions of honor harbored by Sam Spade or Philip Marlowe. A code of ethics may be a disembodied manifestation of the Mentor archetype guiding the hero's actions. It's not uncommon for a hero to make reference to a Mentor who meant something to him earlier in life, even if there's no actual Mentor character in the story. A hero may remember, "My mother/ father/ grandfather/drill sergeant used to say...," and then call to mind the bit of wisdom that will become critical in solving the problem of the story. The energy of the Mentor archetype also may be invested in a prop such as a book or other artifact that guides the hero in the quest.

PLACEMENT OF MENTORS

Although the Hero's Journey often finds the Mentor appearing in Act One, the placement of a Mentor in a story is a practical consideration. A character may be needed at any point who knows the ropes, has the map to the unknown country, or can give the hero key information at the right time. Mentors may show up early in a story, or wait in the wings until needed at a critical moment in Act Two or Act Three.

Mentors provide heroes with motivation, inspiration, guidance, training, and gifts for the journey. Every hero is guided by something, and a story without some acknowledgement of this energy is incomplete. Whether expressed as an actual character or as an internalized code of behavior, the Mentor archetype is a powerful tool at the writer's command.

All heroes encounter obstacles on the road to adventure. At each gateway to a new world there are powerful guardians at the threshold, placed to keep the unworthy from entering. They present a menacing face to the hero, but if properly understood, they can be overcome, bypassed, or even turned into allies. Many heroes (and many writers) encounter Threshold Guardians, and understanding their nature can help determine how to handle them.

Threshold Guardians are usually not the main villains or antagonists in stories. Often they will be lieutenants of the villain, lesser thugs or mercenaries hired to guard access to the chief's headquarters. They may also be neutral figures who are simply part of the landscape of the Special World. In rare cases they may be secret helpers placed in the hero's path to test her willingness and skill.

There is often a symbiotic relationship between a villain and a Threshold Guardian. In nature, a powerful animal such as a bear will sometimes tolerate a smaller animal such as a fox nesting at the entrance of its lair. The fox, with its strong smell and sharp teeth, tends to keep other animals from wandering into the cave while the bear is sleeping. The fox also serves as an early warning system for the bear by making a racket if something tries to enter the cave. In similar fashion, villains of stories often rely on underlings such as doorkeepers, bouncers, bodyguards, sentries, gunslingers, or mercenaries to protect and warn them when a hero approaches the Threshold of the villain's stronghold.

PSYCHOLOGICAL FUNCTION: NEUROSES

These Guardians may represent the ordinary obstacles we all face in the world around us: bad weather, bad luck, prejudice, oppression, or hostile people like the waitress who refuses to grant Jack Nicholson's simple request in Five Easy Pieces. But on a deeper psychological level they stand for our internal demons: the neuroses, emotional scars, vices, dependencies, and self-limitations that hold back our growth and progress. It seems that every time you try to make a major change in your life, these inner demons rise up to their full force, not necessarily to stop you, but to test if you are really determined to accept the challenge of change.

DRAMATIC FUNCTION: TESTING

Testing of the hero is the primary dramatic function of the Threshold Guardian. When heroes confront one of these figures, they must solve a puzzle or pass a test. Like the Sphinx who presents Oedipus with a riddle before he can continue his journey, Threshold Guardians challenge and test heroes on the path.

How to deal with these apparent obstacles? Heroes have a range of options. They can turn around and run, attack the opponent head-on, use craft or deceit to get by, bribe or appease the Guardian, or make an Ally of a presumed enemy. (Heroes are aided by a variety of archetypes known collectively as Allies, which will be discussed in a separate chapter.)

One of the most effective ways of dealing with a Threshold Guardian is to "get into the skin" of the opponent, like a hunter entering into the mind of a stalked animal. The Plains Indians wore buffalo skins to sneak within bow-shot of the bison herd. The hero may get past a Threshold Guardian by entering into its spirit or taking on its appearance. A good example is in Act Two of The Wizard of Oz, when the Tin Woodsman, Cowardly Lion, and Scarecrow come to the Wicked Witch's castle to rescue the kidnapped Dorothy. The situation looks bleak. Dorothy's inside a strong castle defended by a regiment of fierce-looking soldiers who march up and down singing "Oh-Ee-Oh." There's no possible way for the three friends to defeat such a large force.

However, our heroes are ambushed by three sentries and overcome them, taking their uniforms and weapons. Disguised as soldiers, they join the end of a column and march right into the castle. They have turned an attack to their advantage by literally climbing into the skins of their opponents. Instead of uselessly trying to defeat a superior enemy, they have temporarily become the enemy.

It's important for a hero to recognize and acknowledge these figures as Threshold Guardians. In daily life, you have probably encountered resistance when you try to make a positive change in your life. People around you, even those who love you, are often reluctant to see you change. They are used to your neuroses and have found ways to benefit from them. The idea of your changing may threaten them. If they resist you, it's important to realize they are simply functioning as Threshold Guardians, testing you to see if you are really resolved to change.

SIGNALS OF NEW POWER

Successful heroes learn to recognize Threshold Guardians not as threatening enemies, but as useful Allies and early indicators that new power or success is coming. Threshold Guardians who appear to be attacking may in fact be doing the hero a huge favor.

Heroes also learn to recognize resistance as a source of strength. As in bodybuilding, the greater the resistance, the greater the strength. Rather than attacking the power of Threshold Guardians head-on, heroes learn to use it so it doesn't harm them. In fact it makes them stronger. The martial arts teach that an opponent's strength can be used against him. Ideally, Threshold Guardians are not to be defeated but incorporated (literally, taken into the body). Heroes learn the Guardians' tricks, absorb them, and go on. Ultimately, fully evolved heroes feel compassion for their apparent enemies and transcend rather than destroy them.

Heroes must learn to read the signals of their Threshold Guardians. In The Power of Myth, Joseph Campbell illustrated this idea beautifully with an example from Japan. Ferocious-looking demon statues sometimes guard the entrances to Japanese temples. The first thing you notice is one hand held up like that of a policeman gesturing "Stop!" But when you look more closely, you see that the other hand invites

you to enter. The message is: Those who are put off by outward appearances cannot enter the Special World, but those who can see past surface impressions to the inner reality are welcome.

In stories, Threshold Guardians take on a fantastic array of forms. They may be border guards, sentinels, night watchmen, lookouts, bodyguards, bandidos, editors, doormen, bouncers, entrance examiners, or anyone whose function is to temporarily block the way of the hero and test her powers. The energy of the Threshold Guardian may not be embodied as a character, but may be found as a prop, architectural feature, animal, or force of nature that blocks and tests the hero. Learning how to deal with Threshold Guardians is one of the major tests of the Hero's Journey.

Often a new force will appear in Act One to bring a challenge to the hero. This is the energy of the Herald archetype. Like the heralds of medieval chivalry, Herald characters issue challenges and announce the coming of significant change.

The heralds of knighthood were responsible for keeping track of lineages and coats of arms, and had an important role in identifying people and relationships in battle, tournaments, and on great state occasions such as weddings. They were the protocol officers of their day. At the commencement of war a herald might be called upon to recite the causes of the conflict; in effect, to provide the motivation. In Shakespeare's Henry V, the Ambassadors from the Dauphin (crown prince) of France act as Heralds when they bring the young English king an insulting gift of tennis balls, which implies King Henry is fit for nothing but a frivolous game of tennis. The appearance of these Heralds is the spark that sets off a war. Later the character of Mountjoy, the Dauphin's Herald, bears messages between King Henry and his master during the crucial battle of Agincourt.

Typically, in the opening phase of a story, heroes have "gotten by" somehow. They have handled an imbalanced life through a series of defenses or coping mechanisms. Then all at once some new energy enters the story that makes it impossible for the hero to simply get by any longer. A new person, condition, or information shifts the hero's balance, and nothing will ever be the same. A decision must be made, action taken, the conflict faced. A Call to Adventure has been delivered, often by a character who manifests the archetype of the Herald.

Heralds are so necessary in mythology that the Greek god Hermes (Roman Mercury) is devoted to expressing this function. Hermes appears everywhere as the messenger or Herald of the gods, performing some errand or bearing a message from Zeus. At the beginning of The Odyssey Hermes, at Athena's urging, bears a message from Zeus to the nymph Calypso that she must release Odysseus. The appearance of Hermes as Herald gets the story rolling.

PSYCHOLOGICAL FUNCTION: CALL FOR CHANGE

Heralds have the important psychological function of announcing the need for change. Something deep inside us knows when we are ready to change and sends us a messenger. This may be a dream figure, a real person, or a new idea we encounter. In Field of Dreams it's the mysterious Voice that the hero hears saying, "If you build it, they will come." The Call might come from a book we read, or a movie we see. But something inside us has been struck like a bell, and the resulting vibrations spread out through our lives until change is inevitable.

DRAMATIC FUNCTION: MOTIVATION

Heralds provide motivation, offer the hero a challenge, and get the story rolling. They alert the hero (and the audience) that change and adventure are coming.

An example of the Herald archetype as a motivator in movies can be found in Alfred Hitchcock's Notorious. Cary Grant plays a secret agent trying to enlist Ingrid Bergman, the playgirl daughter of a Nazi spy, in a noble cause. He offers her both a challenge and an opportunity: She can overcome her bad reputation and the family shame by dedicating herself to Cary's noble cause. (The cause turns out to be not so noble later on, but that's another story.)

Like most heroes, Bergman's character is fearful of change and reluctant to accept the challenge, but Grant, like a medieval herald, reminds her of the past and gives her motivation to act. He plays her a recording of an argument she had with her father, in which she renounced his spying and declared her loyalty to the United

States. Confronted by the evidence of her own patriotism, she accepts the call to adventure. She is motivated.

The Herald may be a person or a force. The coming of a storm or the first tremors of the earth, as in Hurricane or Earthquake, may be the Herald of adventure. The crash of the stock market or the declaration of war have set many a story in motion.

Often the Herald is simply a means of bringing news to the hero of a new energy that will change the balance. It could be a telegram or a phone call. In High Noon, the Herald is a telegraph clerk who brings Gary Cooper word that his enemies are out of jail and headed for town to kill him. In Romancing the Stone, the Herald for Joan Wilder is a treasure map that arrives in the mail, and a phone call from her sister, who is being held hostage in Colombia.

TYPES OF HERALD

The Herald may be a positive, negative, or neutral figure. In some stories the Herald is the villain or his emissary, perhaps issuing a direct challenge to the hero, or trying to dupe the hero into getting involved. In the thriller Arabesque, the Herald is the private secretary of the villain who tries to lure the hero, a college professor of modest means, into danger with a tempting offer of work. In some cases, a villainous Herald may announce the challenge not to the hero but to the audience. In Star Wars the first appearance of Darth Vader, as he captures Princess Leia, proclaims to the audience that something is out of balance before the hero, Luke Skywalker, has even appeared.

In other stories the Herald is an agent of the forces of good, calling the hero to a positive adventure. The Herald's mask may be worn temporarily by a character who mainly embodies some other archetype. A Mentor frequently acts as a Herald who issues a challenge to the hero. The Herald may be a hero's loved one or Ally, or someone neutral to the hero, such as a Trickster or Threshold Guardian.

The Herald archetype may come into play at almost any point in a story, but is most frequently employed in Act One to help bring the hero into the adventure. Whether it is an inner call, an external development, or a character bringing news of change, the energy of the Herald is needed in almost every story.

People often have trouble grasping the elusive archetype of the Shapeshifter, perhaps because its very nature is to be shifting and unstable. Its appearance and characteristics change as soon as you examine it closely. Nonetheless, the Shapeshifter is a powerful archetype and understanding its ways can be helpful in storytelling and in life.

Heroes frequently encounter figures, often of the opposite sex, whose primary characteristic is that they appear to change constantly from the hero's point of view. Often the hero's love interest or romantic partner will manifest the qualities of a Shapeshifter. We have all experienced relationships in which our partner is fickle, two-faced, or bewilderingly changeable. In Fatal Attraction the hero is confronted with a Shapeshifting woman who changes from a passionate lover to an insane, murderous harpy.

Shapeshifters change appearance or mood, and are difficult for the hero and the audience to pin down. They may mislead the hero or keep her guessing, and their loyalty or sincerity is often in question. An Ally or friend of the same sex as the hero may also act as a Shapeshifter in a buddy comedy or adventure. Wizards, witches, and ogres are traditional Shapeshifters in the world of fairy tales.

PSYCHOLOGICAL FUNCTION

An important psychological purpose of the Shapeshifter archetype is to express the energy of the animus and anima, terms from the psychology of Carl Jung. The animus is Jung's name for the male element in the female unconscious, the bundle of positive and negative images of masculinity in a woman's dreams and fantasies. The anima is the corresponding female element in the male unconscious. In this theory, people have a complete set of both male and female qualities which are necessary for survival and internal balance.

Historically, the female characteristics in men and the male characteristics in women have been sternly repressed by society. Men learn at an early age to show only the macho, unemotional side of themselves. Women are taught by society to play down their masculine qualities. This can lead to emotional and even physical problems. Men are now working to regain some of their suppressed feminine qualities — sensitivity, intuition, and the ability to feel and express emotion. Women sometimes spend their adult lives trying to reclaim the male energies within them which society has discouraged, such as power and assertiveness.

These repressed qualities live within us and are manifested in dreams and fantasies as the animus or anima. They may take the form of dream characters such as opposite-sex teachers, family members, classmates, gods or monsters who allow us to express this unconscious but powerful force within. An encounter with the anima or animus in dreams or fantasy is considered an important step in psychological growth.

PROJECTION

We may also confront the animus and anima in reality. By nature we look for people who match our internal image of the opposite sex. Often we imagine the resemblance and project onto some unsuspecting person our desire to join with the anima or animus. We may fall into relationships in which we have not seen the partner clearly. Instead we have seen the anima or animus, our own internal notion of the ideal partner, projected onto the other person. We often go through relationships trying to force the partner to match our projection. Hitchcock created a powerful expression of this phenomenon in Vertigo. James Stewart forces Kim Novak to change her hair and clothing to match the image of his feminine ideal Carlota, a woman who ironically never existed in the first place.

It's natural for each sex to regard the other as ever-changing, mysterious. Many of us don't understand our own sexuality and psychology very well, let alone that of the opposite sex. Often our main experience of the opposite sex is their changeability and their tendency to shift attitudes, appearances, and emotions for no apparent reason.

Women complain that men are vague, vacillating, and unable to commit. Men complain that women are moody, flighty, fickle, and unpredictable. Anger can turn gentle men into beasts. Women change dramatically during their monthly cycle, shifting with the phases of the moon. During pregnancy they drastically shift shape and mood. At some time most of us have been perceived by others as "two-faced" Shapeshifters.

The animus and anima may be positive or negative figures who may be helpful to the hero or destructive to him. In some stories it's the task of the hero to figure out which side, positive or negative, he is dealing with.

The Shapeshifter archetype is also a catalyst for change, a symbol of the psychological urge to transform. Dealing with a Shapeshifter may cause the hero to change attitudes about the opposite sex or come to terms with the repressed energies that this archetype stirs up.

These projections of our hidden opposite sides, these images and ideas about sexuality and relationships, form the archetype of the Shapeshifter.

DRAMATIC FUNCTION

The Shapeshifter serves the dramatic function of bringing doubt and suspense into a story. When heroes keep asking, "Is he faithful to me? Is she going to betray me? Does he truly love me? Is he an ally or an enemy?" a Shapeshifter is generally present.

Shapeshifters appear with great frequency and variety in the film noir and thriller genres. The Big Sleep, The Maltese Falcon, and Chinatown feature detectives confronting Shapeshifting women whose loyalty and motives are in doubt. In other stories such as Hitchcock's Suspicion or Shadow of a Doubt, a good woman must figure out if a Shapeshifting man is worthy of her trust.

A common type of Shapeshifter is called the femme fatale, the woman as temptress or destroyer. The idea is as old as the Bible, with its stories of Eve in the

Garden of Eden, the scheming Jezebel, and Delilah cutting off Samson's hair to rob him of his strength. The femme fatale finds expression today in stories of cops and detectives betrayed by killer women, such as Sharon Stone's character in Basic Instinct or Kathleen Turner's in Body Heat. Black Widow and Single White Female are interesting variants in which a female hero confronts a deadly, Shapeshifting femme fatale.

The Shapeshifter, like the other archetypes, can be manifested by male or female characters. There are as many hommes fatales in myth, literature, and movies as there are femmes. In Greek mythology, Zeus was a great Shapeshifter, changing forms to cavort with human maidens who usually ended up suffering for it. Looking for Mr. Goodbar is about a woman seeking a perfect lover, but finding instead a Shapeshifting man who brings her death. The film The Stranger depicts a good woman (Loretta Young) who is about to marry a monstrous Shapeshifter, a closet Nazi played by Orson Welles.

The fatale aspect is not always essential to this archetype. Shapeshifters may only dazzle and confuse the hero, rather than try to kill her. Shapeshifting is a natural part of romance. It's common to be blinded by love, unable to see the other person clearly through the many masks they wear. The character played by Michael Douglas in Romancing the Stone appears to be a Shapeshifter to hero Kathleen Turner, who is kept guessing until the last moment about the loyalty of her male counterpart.

Shapeshifting may manifest in changes of appearance. In many films a woman's change of costume or hairstyle indicates that her identity is shifting and her loyalty is in doubt. This archetype may also be expressed through changes in behavior or speech, such as assuming different accents or telling a succession of lies. In the thriller Arabesque, Shapeshifter Sophia Loren tells unwilling hero Gregory Peck a bewildering series of stories about her background, all of which turn out be untrue. Many heroes have to deal with Shapeshifters, male and female, who assume disguises and tell lies to confuse them.

A famous Shapeshifter from The Odyssey is the sea god Proteus, "the Old Man of the Sea." Menelaus, one of the heroes returning from the Trojan War, traps Proteus to force information out of him. Proteus changes into a lion, a snake, a panther, a boar, running water, and a tree in his attempt to escape. But Menelaus and his men hold on tight until Proteus returns to his true form and yields up the answers to their questions. The story teaches that if heroes are patient with Shapeshifters the truth may eventually come out. "Protean," our adjective meaning "readily taking many forms," comes from the story of Proteus.

MASK OF THE SHAPESHIFTER

As with the other archetypes, Shapeshifting is a function or a mask that may be worn by any character in a story. A hero may wear the mask in a romantic situation. Richard Gere, in An Officer and a Gentleman, puts on airs and tells a hat-full of lies to impress Debra Winger. He temporarily acts as a Shapeshifter although he is the hero of the piece.

Sometimes a hero must become a Shapeshifter to escape a trap or get past a Threshold Guardian. In Sister Act, Whoopi Goldberg s character, a Las Vegas lounge singer, disguises herself as a Catholic nun to keep from being killed as a witness to a mob murder.

Villains or their allies may wear the Shapeshifter mask to seduce or confuse a hero. The wicked queen in Snow White assumes the form of an old crone to trick the hero into eating a poisoned apple.

Shapeshifting is also a natural attribute of other archetypes such as Mentors and Tricksters. Merlin, Mentor of the King Arthur stories, frequently changes shape to aid Arthur's cause. The goddess Athena in The Odyssey assumes the appearance of many different humans to help Odysseus and his son.

Shapeshifters can also be found in so-called "buddy movies" in which the story centers on two male or two female characters who share the role of hero. Often one is more conventionally heroic and easier for the audience to identify with. The second character, while of the same sex as the main hero, will often be a Shapeshifter, whose loyalty and true nature are always in question. In the comedy The In~Laws, the "straight" hero, Alan Arkin, is nearly driven crazy by the Shapeshifting of his buddy, Peter Falk, a CIA agent.

The Shapeshifter is one of the most flexible archetypes and serves a protean variety of functions in modern stories. It's found most often in male-female relationships, but it may also be useful in other situations to portray characters whose appearance or behavior changes to meet the needs of the story.

The archetype known as the Shadow represents the energy of the dark side, the unexpressed, unrealized, or rejected aspects of something. Often it's the home of the suppressed monsters of our inner world. Shadows can be all the things we don't like about ourselves, all the dark secrets we can't admit, even to ourselves. The qualities we have renounced and tried to root out still lurk within, operating in the Shadow world of the unconscious. The Shadow can also shelter positive qualities that are in hiding or that we have rejected for some reason.

The negative face of the Shadow in stories is projected onto characters called villains, antagonists, or enemies. Villains and enemies are usually dedicated to the death, destruction, or defeat of the hero. Antagonists may not be quite so hostile — they may be Allies who are after the same goal but who disagree with the hero's tactics. Antagonists and heroes in conflict are like horses in a team pulling in different directions, while villains and heroes in conflict are like trains on a head-on collision course.

PSYCHOLOGICAL FUNCTION

The Shadow can represent the power of repressed feelings. Deep trauma or guilt can fester when exiled to the darkness of the unconscious, and emotions hidden or denied can turn into something monstrous that wants to destroy us. If the Threshold Guardian represents neuroses, then the Shadow archetype stands for psychoses that not only hamper us, but threaten to destroy us. The Shadow may simply be that shady part of ourselves that we are always wrestling with in struggles over bad habits and old fears. This energy can be a powerful internal force with a life of its own and its own set of interests and priorities. It can be a destructive force, especially if not acknowledged, confronted, and brought to light.

Thus in dreams, Shadows may appear as monsters, demons, devils, evil aliens, vampires, or other fearsome enemies. Note that many Shadow figures are also shapeshifters, such as vampires and werewolves.

DRAMATIC FUNCTION

The function of the Shadow in drama is to challenge the hero and give her a worthy opponent in the struggle. Shadows create conflict and bring out the best in a hero by putting her in a life-threatening situation. It's often been said that a story is only as good as its villain, because a strong enemy forces a hero to rise to the challenge.

The challenging energy of the Shadow archetype can be expressed in a single character, but it may also be a mask worn at different times by any of the characters. Heroes themselves can manifest a Shadow side. When the protagonist is crippled by doubts or guilt, acts in self-destructive ways, expresses a death wish, gets carried away with his success, abuses his power, or becomes selfish rather than self-sacrificing, the Shadow has overtaken him.

MASK OF THE SHADOW

The Shadow can combine in powerful ways with other archetypes. Like the other archetypes, the Shadow is a function or mask which can be worn by any character. The primary Mentor of a story may wear the Shadow mask at times. In An Officer and a Gentleman the drill sergeant played by Louis Gossett, Jr. wears the masks of both Mentor and Shadow. He is Richard Gere's Mentor and second father, guiding him through the rigorous Navy training. But in terms of the life-and-death heart of the story, Gossett is also a Shadow who is trying to destroy Gere by driving him out of the program. He tests the young man to the limit to find out if he has what it takes, and almost kills him in the process of bringing out the best in him.

Another strong combination of archetypes is found in the fatal Shapeshifter figures discussed earlier. In some stories, the person who starts out as the hero's love interest shifts shape so far that she becomes the Shadow, bent on the hero's destruction. Femmes fatales are often called "shady ladies." This might represent a struggle between a person's male and female sides, or obsession with the opposite sex turned into a psychotic state of mind. Orson Welles created a classic story on this theme in The Lady from Shanghai, in which Rita Hayworth dazzles Welles' character, shifts shape, and tries to destroy him.

A Shadow may also wear the masks of other archetypes. Anthony Hopkins' "Hannibal the Cannibal" character from The Silence of the Lambs is primarily a Shadow, a projection of the dark side of human nature, but he also functions as a helpful Mentor to Jodie Foster's FBI agent, providing her with information that helps her catch another insane killer.

Shadows may become seductive Shapeshifters to lure the hero into danger. They may function as Tricksters or Heralds, and may even manifest heroic qualities. Villains who fight bravely for their cause or experience a change of heart may even be redeemed and become heroes themselves, like the Beast in Beauty and the Beast.

HUMANIZING THE SHADOW

Shadows need not be totally evil or wicked. In fact, it's better if they are humanized by a touch of goodness, or by some admirable quality. The Disney animated cartoons are memorable for their villains, such as Captain Hook in Peter Pan, the demon in Fantasia, the beautiful but wicked queen from Snow White, the glamorous fairy Maleficent in The Sleeping Beauty, and Cruelle D'Eville in One Hundred and One Dalmatians. They are even more deliciously sinister because of their dashing, powerful, beautiful, or elegant qualities.

Shadows can also be humanized by making them vulnerable. The novelist Graham Greene masterfully makes his villains real, frail people. He often has the hero on the verge of killing a villain, only to discover the poor fellow has a head cold or is reading a letter from his little daughter. Suddenly the villain is not just a fly to be swatted but a real human being with weaknesses and emotions. Killing such a figure becomes a true moral choice rather than a thoughtless reflex.

It's important to remember in designing stories that most Shadow figures do not think of themselves as villains or enemies. From his point of view, a villain is the hero of his own myth, and the audience's hero is his villain. A dangerous type of villain is "the right man," the person so convinced his cause is just that he will stop at nothing to achieve it. Beware the man who believes the end justifies the means. Hitler's sincere belief that he was right, even heroic, allowed him to order the most villainous atrocities to achieve his aims.

A Shadow may be a character or force external to the hero, or it may be a deeply repressed part of the hero. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde vividly depicts the power of the dark side in a good man's personality.

External Shadows must be vanquished or destroyed by the hero. Shadows of the internal kind may be disempowered like vampires, simply by bringing them out of the Shadows and into the light of consciousness. Some Shadows may even be redeemed and turned into positive forces. One of the most impressive Shadow figures in movie history, Darth Vader of the Star Wars series, is revealed in Return of the Jedi to be the hero's father. All his wickedness is finally forgiven, making him a benign, ghostly figure, watching over his son. The Terminator also grows from being a killing machine bent on destroying the heroes in The Terminator to being a protective Mentor to the heroes in Terminator 2: Judgment Day.

Like the other archetypes, Shadows can express positive as well as negative aspects. The Shadow in a person's psyche may be anything that has been suppressed, neglected, or forgotten. The Shadow shelters the healthy, natural feelings we believe we're not supposed to show. But healthy anger or grief, if suppressed in the territory of the Shadow, can turn to harmful energy that strikes out and undermines us in unexpected ways. The Shadow may also be unexplored potential, such as affection, creativity, or psychic ability, that goes unexpressed. "The roads not taken," the possibilities of life that we eliminate by making choices at various stages, may collect in the Shadow, biding their time until brought into the light of consciousness.

The psychological concept of the Shadow archetype is a useful metaphor for understanding villains and antagonists in our stories, as well as for grasping the unexpressed, ignored, or deeply hidden aspects of our heroes.

Heroes on their journeys may need someone to travel with them, an Ally who can serve a variety of necessary functions, such as companion, sparring partner, conscience, or comic relief. It's useful to have someone to send on errands, to carry messages, to scout locations. It's convenient to have someone for the hero to talk to, to bring out human feelings or reveal important questions in the plot. Allies do many mundane tasks but also serve the important function of humanizing the heroes, adding extra dimensions to their personalities, or challenging them to be more open and balanced.

From the dawn of storytelling, heroes have been paired with friendly figures who fight at their sides, advise and warn them, and sometimes challenge them. In one of the first great stories ever recorded, the tale of Gilgamesh, the Babylonian hero-king is linked by the gods with a mighty wild man of the forest, Enkidu, who at first mistrusts and opposes him, but soon wins his respect and becomes his trusted Ally. Hercules had a valuable ally in his charioteer Iolaus, an Olympic champion who cauterized the necks of the Hydra to keep the heads from growing back after Hercules knocked them off with his club.

MULTIPLE ALLIES

Heroes on great epic journeys may acquire whole ship-loads of Allies, building up a team of adventurers, each with his or her different skill. Odysseus has his shipmates and Jason has his Argonauts. In the British Isles, King Arthur, beginning with his foster-brother Sir Kay, attracts a small army of Allies, the Knights of the Round Table. In France, Charlemagne gathers a similar band of Ally knights from all the nations of his empire who become known as his Paladins. Dorothy picks up a series of Allies on her quest, starting with her animal Ally Toto.

GREAT ALLIES IN LITERATURE

Some great stories have been woven from the relationship between a hero and an Ally. Don Quixote and his reluctant squire Sancho Panza form one such pair, representing two extremes of society and very different ways of viewing the world. Shakespeare often employs Allies like Lear's Fool or Prince Hal's riotous companion Falstaff to explore his heroes more deeply, providing the heroes with comic foils or challenging them to look more deeply into their own souls. Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson are another example, where the amazing intellect of Holmes is unfolded for the reader through the admiring eyes of his Ally, Watson, narrator of the tales.

INTRODUCTION TO THE SPECIAL WORLD

Dr. Watson illustrates a useful function for Allies of introducing us to an unfamiliar world. Like Watson, they can ask the questions we would be asking. When the hero is tight-lipped or where it would be awkward and unrealistic for him or her to explain things that are second nature to the hero but very exotic to us, an Ally can do the work of explaining everything as needed. The Ally is sometimes an "audience character," someone who sees the Special World of the story with fresh eyes as we would do if we were there.

Novelist Patrick O'Brian employed this device in his long series of books about the British Navy in the Napoleonic Wars. His hero, Jack Aubrey, is similar to heroes of other seafaring books like C. S. Forester's Horatio Hornblower, but O'Brian's books are distinguished by the introduction of a strong, life-long Ally for the dashing sea captain, in the character of Stephen Maturin, a doctor, naturalist, and secret agent who remains a stranger to the ways of the sea despite decades of sailing with his friend. O'Brian provides much comedy with Stephens lame attempts to understand the jargon of the sailor, but also gives a good reason for the exasperated Jack to explain details of battle and sailing that we, the readers, want to know about.

WESTERN ALLIES: SIDEKICKS

In the rich tradition of Hollywood Western movie serials and TV shows, the Ally is called a "sidekick," a term from early nineteenth-century pickpocket's slang for a side pants pocket. In other words, a sidekick is someone you keep as close to you as your side pocket. Every TV Western hero had to have his Ally, from the Lone Ranger's "faithful Indian companion" Tonto to Wild Bill Hickock's "comical sidekick" Jingles, played by character actor Andy Devine, who also filled the Ally's role in many Western movies going back to Stagecoach. The Cisco Kid had his comic foil Pancho, Zorro had his silent but very useful accomplice Bernardo. Walter Brennan played a gallery of sidekicks, notably supporting John Wayne in Red River. There he goes beyond the usual roles of Ally as provider of comic relief and someone for the hero to talk to. He also serves as a conscience, muttering every time John Wayne's character makes a moral error and rejoicing when Wayne's surrogate son finally stands up to him.

The relationship with the Ally can be quite complex, sometimes becoming dramatic material in its own right. A vast body of story has been written and filmed about self-righteous Western lawman Wyatt Earp and his unruly, alcoholic, sickly, but very dangerous Ally, Doc Holliday. In some versions of the tale, like director John Sturges' thundering Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, the two men are nearly equally matched, and while joining together to fight the external threat of the Clanton gang, they are also two horns of a great debate in American culture, between the rigid moral universe of the Puritans, represented by law-abiding Wyatt Earp, and the wilder rebel side represented by Holliday, a gambler from the old South.

NON-HUMAN ALLIES

Allies need not be human. In some religions of the world, each person is assigned a spirit protector, a lifelong sidekick or Ally. This may be an angel, the guardian angel who is supposed to look out for the person and keep them on the right path, or a minor deity of some kind. The Egyptians taught that Khnemu, the ram-headed builder god, fashioned each person out of clay on his potter's wheel and at the same time made a "ka" or spirit protector in the exact same shape. The ka accompanied each person throughout life and on into the afterlife as long as the person's body was preserved. Its job was to encourage the person to lead a good and useful life.

The Romans also believed that every man had a guardian spirit or Ally, his "genius," and that every woman had a "juno." Originally these were ghosts of the family's distinguished ancestors, but later came to be personal guardian deities. Each person made offerings to the genius or juno on his or her birthday, in return for guidance and protection or a little extra brain power. Not only individuals but also families, households, the Senate, cities, provinces, and entire empires could have such protective supernatural Allies.

The play and movie Harvey show a man who relies on an imaginary friend, a kind of psychic Ally who helps him cope with reality. Woody Allen's character in Play It Again, Sam conjures up the spirit of Humphrey Bogart's movie persona to guide him through the subtleties of love. It's a Wonderful Life depicts a desperate man being helped by an angel Ally.

ANIMAL ALLIES

Animals as Allies are common in the history of storytelling. Goddesses especially are accompanied by animal Allies, like Athena and her companion owl, or Artemis and the deer who is often seen running at her side. The jester of European folktale, Till Eulenspiegel, was always associated with two symbols, an owl and a mirror. His name "Eulenspiegel" means "Owl-Mirror" and suggests that he is wise as an owl and that he holds up a mirror to the hypocrisy of society. The owl became Tills reluctant Ally in the animated film Till Eulenspiegel The heroes of Westerns are often supported by animal Allies like Roy Rogers' elegant steed Trigger and dog Bullet.

ALLIES FROM BEYOND THE GRAVE

Ancient folktales tell of Allies even among the dead. The name for the band "The Grateful Dead" had its origins in a folktale term for the dead who give aid to living people in gratitude for doing something to set their souls at rest, such as paying a debt to give them decent burial. The Helpful Ghost is the title of a romance novel by Sheila Rosalind Allen in which a ghost sorts out romantic matters in an old house.

HELPFUL SERVANTS

Another folktale Ally motif is the "helpful servant," a stock character in tales of romance who helps the hero achieve his or her goal by carrying love letters and messages or providing disguises, hideaways, escape routes, and alibis. D'Artagnans long-suffering valet Planchet is one of the helpful servants in The Three Musketeers and Dudley Moore's butler, played by stately John Gielgud, performs the role in Arthur. Batman's butler Alfred serves many roles and it should be noted that the Ally function can easily overlap with that of the Mentor, as Allies occasionally step up to the higher function of guiding the hero in spiritual or emotional matters.

PSYCHOLOGICAL FUNCTION

The Ally in dreams and fiction might represent the unexpressed or unused parts of the personality that must be brought into action to do their jobs. In stories, Allies remind us of these under-utilized parts and bring to mind actual friends or relationships that may be helpful to us in the journey of our lives. Allies may represent powerful internal forces that can come to our aid in a spiritual crisis.

MODERN ALLIES

Allies thrive in the modern world of storytelling. Allies in fiction suggest alternate paths for problem-solving and help to round out the personalities of heroes, allowing expression of fear, humor, or ignorance that might not be appropriate for the hero. James Bond relies on his loyal Ally Miss Moneypenny and occasionally needs the help of his American Ally, CIA man Felix Leiter. Comic book writers, aiming to expand the appeal of their stories to younger readers, will often add young Allies for their superheroes, like Batman's ward Robin. Simba, the young lion hero of The Lion King, has his comical Allies Timon and Pumbaa. One vision of the future is provided by the Star Wars universe where machines, animals, alien beings, and spirits of the dead all can serve as Allies. Increasingly, computer intelligences and robots will be seen as natural Allies as we move on to new journeys into space and other uncharted realms.

The Trickster archetype embodies the energies of mischief and desire for change. All the characters in stories who are primarily clowns or comical sidekicks express this archetype. The specialized form called the Trickster Hero is the leading figure in many myths and is very popular

in folklore and fairy tales. PSYCHOLOGICAL FUNCTION

Tricksters serve several important psychological functions. They cut big egos down to size, and bring heroes and audiences down to earth. By provoking healthy laughter they help us realize our common bonds, and they point out folly and hypocrisy. Above all, they bring about healthy change and transformation, often by drawing attention to the imbalance or absurdity of a stagnant psychological situation. They are the natural enemies of the status quo. Trickster energy can express itself through impish accidents or slips of the tongue that alert us to the need for change. When we are taking ourselves too seriously, the Trickster part of our personalities may pop up to bring back needed perspective.

DRAMATIC FUNCTION: COMIC RELIEF

In drama, Tricksters serve all these psychological functions, plus the dramatic function of comic relief. Unrelieved tension, suspense, and conflict can be emotionally exhausting, and in even the heaviest drama an audiences interest is revived by moments of laughter. An old rule of drama points out the need for balance: Make 'em cry a lot; let 'em laugh a little.

Tricksters may be servants or Allies working for the hero or Shadow, or they may be independent agents with their own skewed agendas.

The Tricksters of mythology provide many examples of the workings of this archetype. One of the most colorful is Loki, the Norse god of trickery and deceit. A true Trickster, he serves the other gods as legal counselor and advisor, but also plots their destruction, undermining the status quo. He is fiery in nature, and his darting, elusive energy helps heat up the petrified, frozen energy of the gods, moving them to action and change. He also provides much-needed comic relief in the generally dark Norse myths.

Loki is sometimes a comical sidekick character in stories featuring the gods Odin or Thor as heroes. In other stories he is a hero of sorts, a Trickster Hero who survives by his wits against physically stronger gods or giants. At last he turns into a deadly adversary or Shadow, leading the hosts of the dead in a final war against the gods.

TRICKSTER HEROES

Trickster Heroes have bred like rabbits in the folktales and fairy tales of the world. Indeed, some of the most popular Tricksters are rabbit heroes: the Br'er Rabbit of the American South, the Hare of African tales, the many rabbit heroes from Southeast Asia, Persia, India, etc. These stories pit the defenseless but quick-thinking rabbit against much larger and more dangerous enemies: folktale Shadow figures like wolves, hunters, tigers, and bears. Somehow the tiny rabbit always manages to outwit his hungry opponent, who usually suffers painfully from dealing with a Trickster Hero.

The modern version of the rabbit Trickster is of course Bugs Bunny. The Warner Brothers animators made use of folktale plots to pit Bugs against hunters and predators who didn't stand a chance against his quick wits. Other cartoon Tricksters of this type include Warner's Daffy Duck, Speedy Gonzales, the Roadrunner, and Tweety Bird; Walter Lantz's Woody Woodpecker and Chilly Willy the penguin; and

MGM's ubiquitous dog Droopy, who always outwits the befuddled Wolf. Mickey Mouse started as an ideal animal Trickster, although he has matured into a sober master of ceremonies and corporate spokesman.

Native Americans have a particular fondness for Tricksters such as Coyote and Raven. The clown Kachina gods of the Southwest are Tricksters of great power as well as comic ability.

Once in a while its fun to turn the tables and show that Tricksters themselves can be outwitted. Sometimes a Trickster like the Hare will try to take advantage of a weaker, slower animal like Mr. Tortoise. In folktales and fables such as "The Tortoise and the Hare," the slowest outwits the fastest by dogged persistence or by cooperating with others of its kind to outwit the faster animal.

Tricksters like to stir up trouble for its own sake. Joseph Campbell relates a Nigerian story in which the Trickster god Edshu walks down a road in a hat that's red on one side and blue on the other. When people comment, "Who was that going by in a red hat?" they get into fights with people on the other side of the road who insist the hat was blue. The god takes credit for the trouble, saying, "Spreading strife is my greatest joy."

Tricksters are often catalyst characters, who affect the lives of others but are unchanged themselves. Eddie Murphy in Beverly Hills Cop displays Trickster energy as he stirs up the existing system without changing much himself.

The heroes of comedy, from Charlie Chaplin to the Marx Brothers to the cast of "In Living Color," are Tricksters who subvert the status quo and make us laugh at ourselves. Heroes of other genres must often put on the Trickster mask in order to outwit a Shadow or get around a Threshold Guardian.

The archetypes are an infinitely flexible language of character. They offer a way to understand what function a character is performing at a given moment in a story. Awareness of the archetypes can help to free writers from stereotyping, by giving their characters greater psychological verity and depth. The archetypes can be used to make characters who are both unique individuals and universal symbols of the qualities that form a complete human being. They can help make our characters and stories psychologically realistic and true to the ancient wisdom of myths.

Now that we've met the denizens of the story world, let's return to the Road of Heroes for a closer look at the twelve stages and how the archetypes play their parts in the Hero's Journey.

In The Hero with a Thousand Faces, Joseph Campbell describes the beginning of the typical hero's journey. "A hero ventures forth from the world of common day into a region of supernatural wonder..." In this chapter, we'll explore that "world of common day," the Ordinary World, and see how it frames the hero and sets modern-day stories in motion.

The opening of any story, be it myth, fairy tale, screenplay, novel, short story, or comic book, has some special burdens to bear. It must hook the reader or viewer, set the tone of the story, suggest where it's going, and get across a mass of information without slowing the pace. A beginning is, indeed, a delicate time.

A GUIDE TO THE JOURNEY

As a guide through the labyrinth of story, let's imagine ourselves as a tribe of people who live by hunting and gathering, as our ancestors did a hundred thousand years ago, or as people still do in remote parts of the world today. We'll check in with these Seekers at each stage of the hero's journey, and try to put ourselves in their skins.

Look around, sister; brother of the Home Tribe. You can see the people are barely getting by, surviving on a dwindling supply of last season's food. Times are bad and the country all around seems lifeless. The people grow weak before our eyes, but a few of us are filled with restless energy.

Like you. You're uncomfortable, feeling you no longer fit in with this drab, exhausted place. You may not know it, but you're soon to be selected as a hero, to join the select company of the Seekers, those who have always gone out to face the unknown. You'll undertake a journey to restore life and health to the entire Home Tribe, an adventure in which the only sure thing is that you'll be changed. You're uneasy, but there's a thrill running through you. You're poised to break free from this world, ready to enter the world of adventure.

BEFORE THE BEGINNING

Before a story even begins, a storyteller faces creative choices. What's the first thing your audience will experience? The title? The first line of dialogue? The first image? Where in the lives of your characters will the story actually begin? Do you need a prologue or introduction, or should you jump right into the middle of the action? The opening moments are a powerful opportunity to set the tone and create an impression. You can conjure up a mood, an image, or a metaphor that will give the audience a frame of reference to better experience your work. The mythological approach to story boils down to using metaphors or comparisons to get across your feelings about life.

The great German stage and film director Max Reinhardt believed that you can create an atmosphere in a theatre well before an audience sits down or the curtain goes up. A carefully selected title can strike a metaphor that intrigues the audience and attunes them to the coming experience. Good promotion can engage them with images and slogans that are metaphors for the world of your story. By controlling music and lighting as the audience enters the space, and consciously directing such details as the attitudes and costumes of the ushers, a specific mood can be created. The audience can be put in the ideal frame of mind for the experience they will share, prepared for comedy, romance, horror, drama, or whatever effect you wish to create.

Oral storytellers begin their tales with ritualized phrases ("Once upon a time") and personalized gestures to get the attention of the audience. These signals can cue the listeners to the funny, sad, or ironic mood of the story they will hear.

Today many elements go into making those first impressions before the book or the movie ticket is bought; the title, the book cover art, publicity and advertising, posters and trailers, and so forth. The story is cooked down to a few symbols or metaphors that begin to put the audience in the right mood for the journey.

TITLE

A title is an important clue to the nature of the story and the writer's attitude. A good title can become a multi-leveled metaphor for the condition of the hero or his world. The title of The Godfather, for example, suggests that Don Corleone is both god and father to his people. The graphic design of the logo for the novel and movie lays out another metaphor, the hand of a puppeteer working the strings of an unseen marionette. Is Don Corleone the puppeteer, or is he the puppet of a higher force? Are we all puppets of God, or do we have free will? The metaphoric title and imagery allow many interpretations and help to make the story a coherent design.

OPENING IMAGE

The opening image can be a powerful tool to create mood and suggest where the story will go. It can be a visual metaphor that, in a single shot or scene, conjures up the Special World of Act Two and the conflicts and dualities that will be confronted there. It can suggest the theme, alerting the audience to the issues your characters will face. The opening shot of Clint Eastwood's Unforgiven shows a man outside a farmhouse, digging a grave for his wife who has just died. His relationship with his wife and the way she changed him are major themes in the story. The image of a man digging a grave outside his house can be read as an apt metaphor for the plot: The hero leaves home and journeys to the land of death, where he witnesses death, causes death, and almost dies himself. Eastwood the director returns to the same setup at the end of the film, using the image to give a sense of closure as we see the man leave the grave and return to his home.

PROLOGUE

Some stories begin with a prologue section that precedes the main body of the story, perhaps before the introduction of the main characters and their world. The fairy tale of "Rapunzel" begins with a scene before the birth of the hero, and Disney's Beauty and the Beast begins with a prologue illustrated in stained glass, giving the backstory of the Beast's enchantment. Myths take place within a context of mythical history that goes back to the Creation, and events leading up to the entrance of the main character may have to be portrayed first. Shakespeare and the Greeks often gave their plays a prologue, spoken by a narrator or a chorus, to set the tone and give the context of the drama. Shakespeare's Henry V begins with an eloquent passage, intoned by a Chorus character who invites us to use our "imaginary forces" to create the kings, horses, and armies of his story. "Admit me Chorus to this history," he requests, "Who, prologuelike, your humble patience pray/Gently to hear, kindly to judge, our play."

A prologue can serve several useful functions. It may give an essential piece of backstory, cue the audience to what kind of movie or story this is going to be, or start the story with a bang and let the audience settle into their seats. In Close Encounters of the Third Kind, a prologue shows the discovery of a mysterious squadron of World War II airplanes, perfectly preserved in the desert. This precedes the introduction of the hero, Roy Neary, and his world. It serves to intrigue the audience with a host of riddles, and gives a foretaste of the thrills and wonder ahead.

In The Last Boy Scout a prologue shows a pro football player going berserk and shooting his teammates under the pressure of drugs and gambling. The sequence precedes the first appearance of the hero and intrigues or "hooks" the audience. It signals that this is going to be an exciting action story involving life-and-death matters.

This prologue and the one in Close Encounters are a little disorienting. They hint that these movies are going to be about extraordinary events that may strain credibility. In secret societies, an old rule of initiation is: Disorientation leads to suggestibility. That's why initiates are often blindfolded and led around in the dark, so they will be more psychologically open to suggestion from the rituals staged by the group. In storytelling, getting the audience a little off-base and upsetting their normal perceptions can put them into a receptive mood. They begin to suspend their disbelief and enter more readily into a Special World of fantasy.

Some prologues introduce the villain or threat of the story before the hero appears. In Star Wars, the evil Darth Vader is shown kidnapping Princess Leia before the hero, Luke Skywalker, is introduced in his mundane world. Some detective films begin with a murder before the hero is introduced in his office. Such prologues cue the audience that the balance of a society has been disturbed. A chain of events is set in motion, and the forward drive of the story cannot cease until the wrong has been righted and the balance restored.

A prologue is not necessary or desirable in every case. The needs of the story will always dictate the best approach to structure. You may want to begin, as many stories do, by introducing the hero in her normal environment: the "Ordinary World."

THE ORDINARY WORLD

Because so many stories are journeys that take heroes and audiences to Special Worlds, most begin by establishing an Ordinary World as a baseline for comparison. The Special World of the story is only special if we can see it in contrast to a mundane world of everyday affairs from which the hero issues forth. The Ordinary World is the context, home base, and background of the hero.

The Ordinary World in one sense is the place you came from last. In life we pass through a succession of Special Worlds which slowly become ordinary as we get used to them. They evolve from strange, foreign territory to familiar bases from which to launch a drive into the next Special World.

CONTRAST

It's a good idea for writers to make the Ordinary World as different as possible from the Special World, so audience and hero will experience a dramatic change when the threshold is finally crossed. In The Wizard of Oz the Ordinary World is depicted in black and white, to make a stunning contrast with the Technicolor Special World of Oz. In the thriller Dead Again, the Ordinary World of modern day is shot in color to contrast with the nightmarish black-and-white Special World of the 1940s flashbacks. City Slickers contrasts the drab, restrictive environment of the city with the more lively arena of the West where most of the story takes place.

Compared to the Special World, the Ordinary World may seem boring and calm, but the seeds of excitement and challenge can usually be found there. The hero's problems and conflicts are already present in the Ordinary World, waiting to be activated.

FORESHADOWING: A MODEL OF THE SPECIAL WORLD

Writers often use the Ordinary World section to create a small model of the Special World, foreshadowing its battles and moral dilemmas. In The Wizard of Oz, Dorothy clashes with ornery Miss Gulch and is rescued from danger by three farmhands.

These early scenes foretell Dorothy's battles with the Witch and her rescue by the Tin Woodsman, Cowardly Lion, and Scarecrow.

Romancing the Stone begins with a clever foreshadowing technique. The first thing the audience sees is an elaborate fantasy of a noble heroine battling sleazy villains and finally riding off to romance with a comically idealized hero. The scene is a model of the Special World Joan Wilder will encounter in the second act. The fantasy is revealed to be the conclusion of Joan Wilder's romance novel, which she is writing in her cluttered New York apartment. The opening fantasy sequence serves a dual purpose. It tells us a great deal about Joan Wilder and her unrealistic notions of romance, and also predicts the problems and situations she will face in the Special World of Act Two, when she encounters real villains and a less than ideal man. Foreshadowing can help unify a story into a rhythmic or poetic design.

RAISING THE DRAMATIC QUESTION

Another important function of the Ordinary World is to suggest the dramatic question of the story. Every good story poses a series of questions about the hero. Will she achieve the goal, overcome her flaw, learn the lesson she needs to learn? Some questions relate primarily to the action or plot. Will Dorothy get home from Oz? Will E.T. get home to his planet? Will the hero get the gold, win the game, beat the villains?

Other questions are dramatic and have to do with the hero's emotions and personality. Will Patrick Swayze's character in Ghost learn to express love? In Pretty Woman, will the uptight businessman Edward learn from the prostitute Vivian how to relax and enjoy life? The action questions may propel the plot, but the dramatic questions hook the audience and involve them with the emotions of the characters.

INNER AND OUTER PROBLEMS

Every hero needs both an inner and an outer problem. In developing fairy tales for Disney Feature Animation, we often find that writers can give the heroes a good outer problem: Can the princess manage to break an enchantment on her father who has been turned to stone? Can the hero get to the top of a glass mountain and win a princess' hand in marriage? Can Gretel rescue Hansel from the Witch? But sometimes writers neglect to give the characters a compelling inner problem to solve as well.

Characters without inner challenges seem flat and uninvolving, however heroically they may act. They need an inner problem, a personality flaw or a moral dilemma to work out. They need to learn something in the course of the story: how to get along with others, how to trust themselves, how to see beyond outward appearances. Audiences love to see characters learning, growing, and dealing with the inner and outer challenges of life.

MAKING AN ENTRANCE

How the audience first experiences your hero is another important condition you control as a storyteller. What is he doing the first time we see him, when he makes his entrance? What is he wearing, who is around him, and how do they react to him? What is his attitude, emotion, and goal at the moment? Does he enter alone or join a group, or is he already on stage when the story begins? Does he narrate the story, is it told through the eyes of another character, or is it seen from the objective eye of conventional narrative?

Every actor likes to "make an entrance," an important part of building a character's relationship with the audience. Even if a character is written as already on stage when the lights come up, the actor will often make an entrance out of it by how she first impresses an audience with her appearance and behavior. As writers we can give our heroes an entrance by thinking about how the audience first experiences them. What are they doing, saying, feeling? What is their context when we first see them? Are they at peace or in turmoil? Are they at full emotional power or are they holding back for a burst of expression later?

Most important is: What is the character doing at the moment of entrance? The character's first action is a wonderful opportunity to speak volumes about his attitude, emotional state, background, strengths, and problems. The first action should be a model of the hero's characteristic attitude and the future problems or solutions that will result. The first behavior we see should be characteristic. It should define and reveal character, unless your intent is to mislead the audience and conceal the character's true nature.

Tom Sawyer makes a vivid entrance into our imaginations because Samuel Clemens has painted such a character-revealing first look at his Missouri boy hero. The first time we see Tom he is performing a characteristic action, turning the rotten job of whitewashing the fence into a wonderful mind game. Tom is a con artist, but the con is thoroughly enjoyed by his victims. Tom's character is revealed through all his actions, but most clearly and definitively in his entrance, which defines his attitude toward life.

Actors stepping onto a stage and writers introducing a character are also trying to entrance the audience, or produce in them a trance-like state of identification and recognition. One of the magic powers of writing is its ability to lure each member of the audience into projecting a part of their ego into the character on the page, screen, or stage.

As a writer you can build up an atmosphere of anticipation or provide information about an important character by having other characters talk about her before she shows up. But more important and memorable will be her own first action upon entering the story — her entrance.

INTRODUCING THE HERO TO THE AUDIENCE

Another important function of the Ordinary World is to introduce the hero to the audience. Like a social introduction, the Ordinary World establishes a bond between people and points out some common interests so that a dialogue can begin. In some way we should recognize that the hero is like us. In a very real sense, a story invites us to step into the hero's shoes, to see the world through his eyes. As if by magic we project part of our consciousness into the hero. To make this magic work you must establish a strong bond of sympathy or common interest between the hero and the audience.