Virgils....
Lost are the camp fire storytellers of the hamlet and villages of old. Our pace goes at break neck speed and is mostly isolated. Our sages are Madison avenue, the man in three piece suit in the big office, Shock Jocks in sheep's clothing, and all the other lost souls in our life. Three blind mice and the wife's butcher knife is falling.
Then Movies and TV Shows are thought to be unreal and for entertainment only. No longer do they teach or at least provide some base moral guidance. The characters are all trickster or devil motifs that we idolize. How to be harmful to those around you with great humor is greatly prized. The others are from real T.V. that only show the worst of humanity. Stories of old were not mere Aesop fables that taught you not to be greedy or how to be clever, they were like onions waiting to be stripped layer by layer to gain their prizes that would guide us through the various stages of our lives. The fairy tale, myth, or folk lore was there to guide us through all of life's challenges. Over the million years of human endeavor's and short comings, there is very few challenges or sins that you can come across that some one else has not made it through already a million times. A gifted few over the years had chronicled their challenges into entertaining stories that disguise the real problems so they pluck the string deep within your mind. Only long after you had heard them does their meaning become unveiled when you are ready to hear them and follow their guidance. They side step the shame, blame , guilt cycle. Remember that sin only means to miss ones mark.
Recently there has been some exceptions in the movies. There is 12 Going on to Thirty, Ella Enchanted, and Finding Nemo. Finding Nemo and AI are both the same story, Pinnochio. But in finding Nemo, we hear also about Gepheto's journey that led him into the belly of the whale. Even some B movies like Conan the Destroyer have ancient motives. In that B movie we have the archetypes of the wild wolf in Grace Jones, the Trickster in the thief, Merlin in the oriental wizard, the inner child portrayed by the Princess, the Step Mother by the Sorceress, and the Shadow played by Wilt Chamberlin that guards over the inner child like the Dragon in the cave protecting her chastity. Then Conan is the hero who lets them all go to become the king with the troubled brow, the isolated ego.
In the seventies fairy tales changed to remove the misconception that of good eradicating evil. Once the guy with the white hat kills the guy in black, he dons his opponent's hat. My Lebanese friend's advice on rebel groups, once they taste power they become the same as those they replaced. But in the seventies we had Dr. Seus's Grinch and the Raccoon's Christmas. The first had the bad guy teach himself and the other has the good guys teach the ignorant that returns to teach his father what he has learned. Here they have stumbled on ancient Chinese knowledge concerning fox spirits. In Western catholic exorcisms, the priest taunts and insults the devil's hubris and forces him to flee through conflict. In the Chinese traditions they actually start a dialogue with the spirit. They ask the fox spirit, which is usually the the transgressor, why he is tormenting the person. In one account the Fox spirit replies he does not want to but is forced by a magician that has captured his body and forces him to do so. Here now the cause can be used to remedy the situation. Like antidotes and inoculation, you use the infection or disease to mingle with itself. There was ancient Arabian medicine that cured lacerations caused by sword blades. If you place a powder on a sword that was nicked when it sliced into your skin, your lacerations will heal as the sword heals. The metal shards in your skin is thought to return to the sword and leave your arm. When a squirrel is cornered by a large dog, that is when the squabble is most dangerous. Most animals no matter how big it is will drop the attack when a prey, no matter how small, turns on it. They prefer to attack on the run. The Fairy tales of the seventies was about dialogue not backing one into a corner. Ultimatums in foreign policy can end in drastic disasters. You always give your opponent a back door, a way to save face. Do we even know today the full price of dropping two nuclear bombs on Japan, when they only wanted to save face when they surrendered. Punishment should not be gratuitous, but always teaching how to prevent harm to themselves and the world. If Reincarnation exists, killing your enemy or fault will only rise once again and fall into its natural tendencies. Not if you teach them the error. This is the return. In the seventies it was all about the return.
Throughout the ages we have great guides in these tales of life and their lessons and pitfalls they show us the ways around. Starting in our Hypothalamus, the most primitive brain stems, we have pictorial knowledge and instincts that show symbols of how to live. From seeing mystical greyheaded guides, breast that nurture, and hawks that swoon overhead; the hypothalamus provides us the access to these ancient symbols. From oral traditions to written we first see the Nibengunlied. The first written coming of age story of the hero. From then all the way up to Star Wars, this story has changed to entertain various cultures and times. But today the story is thought of no more than pulp fiction. Or worse something alien, no longer do we know to put ourselves in Luke's shoes. We no longer make his shoes ours. We put these characters on a pedestal above our reach. We emulate to become them without knowing that we are them already by birth, we just have to step out on our own voyage. The Neverending story addresses this problem. Fantasia is drifting into nothing, because no more children are accessing the stories they need to cross the threshold into adulthood. Fantasia is a realm of infinite stories waiting for every youth to enter upon his own adventure. When children avoid following this ancient story line, Fantasia and thus our own world collapses. But Fairy tales are for people of all ages to enter or guide others through.
Some great literary teachers have been Virgil with the Aneiad, Eschenbach and Parzival, Goethe and Mephistopheles, and recently we have Joseph Campbell. Following the ground work of the Grim Brothers, Joseph Campbell caps off the disciple and study of the Hero's Journey. Grim's in their travels translating ancient languages into German had traveled far and wide and kept hearing the same folk tales told over and over in the most distant and remote regions. Why were these story motifs appearing in cultures who have just been connected together just recently. But their stories, each, were ancient? Joseph Campbell started his quest with interest in Native American stories. From here he compiled millions of stories from religions, myths, and folk tales. Time and time again does he connect one motif or archetype to another from Cave Bear cultures to modern literature. Along with him has been more recent additions from the Jungian camp, mostly women. People like Marion Woodman and Carla Pinkola-Estes have analyzed the components of fairy tales that lead out of modern neurosis.
But the greatest guide of these stories is the Holy Spirit, the Collective Unconsciousness, The Great Man, or is called the Million old Man. The voice of the instincts. Like the Greatest American Hero, there is a book, but we lost it. But as he finds out slowly, the book has been within us the whole time. As well as God him or herself. There is no place like home.....
