Thursday, July 11, 2013

The Hero's Journey

As I have worked on my memoir for the last three years, I have struggled with an overarching metaphor to bring cohesiveness to my work. And finally I settled on the Hero's Journey. Thanks to George Lucas, most of us are familiar with the idea of the Hero's Journey. Any really good story follows the Hero's Journey arc. But what of the Heroine? Do women have their own journey? And if so, what is it?
Whenever I've looked into the Heroine's Journey, I find nothing. As best I can tell, any archetypal female journey is more akin to Maiden, Wife, Mother, Crone. Nothing wrong with that. I aspire to Cronehood myself. But it is not the journey that my memoir details. No, my memoir is the Hero's Journey. Call to Action, Death, Trials, Reconciliation with the Father, Ultimate Boon.
Maybe the idea that the genders need separate journeys is outdated now. Women are no longer given one or two options in life. What do you think?

And a shout out to Alice Osborn, who is teaching a course on the Hero's Journey starting this month!

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