1980s NEWS
INTERVIEW SEGAL, OZICK, NOLD, AND NOEL
Robert Lipsyte:
nerve first the series, then Gil, then Guillain Moyers, then the reaction, why are people so exercise? Why are they so excited by this?
Robert Segal 6:39
I think and I'm not saying this as either a defender or recruiter of critic of Campbell. I think Campbell indeed touches a nerve. Obviously, his sales, his sales attest to that the popularity the show attest to that. Campbell is and I'm not saying this, either to criticize him or endorse him, which I trust we'll get to Campbell is romantic. And Campbell appeals to the latent or overt romanticism of lots of persons Campbell is a romantic in saying that all myths have the same message or people or one and what is the meaning? That that that that that myths have and that all people have, that they are in fact one. I think Campbell appeals to what people would like to think the nature of the world is like, I'm by no means saying it is but that's what I think Campbell's
Robert Lipsyte 7:22
Cynthia, what's what's so bad about that?
Cynthia Ozick 7:24
Well, there's nothing bad about it and my my heart is holy with it. I'm a writer of fiction I've written about a rabbi who populates with a Dryad, a figurehead who comes off a ship and copulates to rather disastrously with a with a lawyer I'm I'm for the nature deities. I'm for poetry, Campbell says again and again, it is metaphor, it's poetry. I'm for poetry. But he also says, myths are a way to live, you live by them. You don't live by polytheism and you don't live by the imminent deity. And you certainly don't live by saying the creator is in me.
Robert Lipsyte 8:02
You say that the Creator is there
Cynthia Ozick 8:05
The creator and the creator and and the creators creation are divided. There is a distinction. There's a firmament between them and once you break the firmament, you become you become a polytheist and and what makes what makes Campbell's so angry at Judaism, nevermind about the Jews, what he's what makes him so angry at Judaism, and the daughter religions Catholicism, and and Islam is the fact that they stick to their guns is monotheists.
Robert Lipsyte 8:36
Madeline, how do you feel about that? Is that Is that an accurate portrayal of
Madeline Nold 8:40
um, yes and no. I wouldn't call Campbell a polytheist. I would say the Campbell went behind the myths. He always said the myths were doorways and mysteries to the truth which cannot be described, that you cannot put in categories, although in the West, we put them in distinct categories I in now. And in the east, it's imminent. And even beyond all of that there's something that you cannot describe as either it's all and you know it inside you sense it. And that's where the follow your own bliss may be related to deep religion in a religion. You know, inside you have an experience. You have a sense it's indescribable, ineffable, full of awe and rapture.
Robert Lipsyte 9:17
Yeah. Do you think that's Daniel, you think that's why people?
Daniel Noel 9:21
Yes, I think that's one of many ways one could characterize this appeal and counter appeal, as it were from Brendan Gill. Campbell had appeal to the to the hope that we have to make connections, Glasnost as part of that right now. We want to reach across all boundaries and old divisions. We've seen this whole earth icon since the late 60s. And people very much want to believe in this universal oneness. I think there are problems with it. But the appeal is very powerful. And I don't rule out the possibility of a viable polytheism either, but I think his main appeal was to a minism to a oneness that may not have been theistic. So it Isn't monotheistic, but it moved us beyond our narrow enclosures toward connecting links between cultures between peoples and gets to the point of a kind of homogenized oneness, which then raises other questions.
Robert Lipsyte 10:14
Let's try to be specific for a moment. The phrase that keeps reappearing in all these discussions about Campbell is follow your bliss. So let's follow his line of thought on that.