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 Arthurian mythology
is at the heart of our
enjoyment of
King Arthur and of all things
Arthurian. It is in the realm of myth that the romance, the mystery and
the wonder lie. It is in myths that we find echoes of ourselves and of
our own lives. It is myths that give life meaning, and events in life an
explanation.
It is in myths that we recognise all the virtues, including courage,
honour, fortitude, endurance, chastity. We are encouraged to set out upon
adventures of our own, and we are reminded that nothing worth having in
life is easy, and that there is virtue in our striving to succeed in our
own quests to overcome all the odds.
But
what can myths mean for us today?
What Are Myths?
Before we can enjoy, explore and understand
Arthurian mythology we need to consider how the word 'myth' is used and,
in my view, often sadly misused by many writers.
The problem is that the word 'myth' is often
used to refer to a story or to something that is thought to be true, but
which in fact, is not true. In this sense, a 'myth' means a lie.
This
line of thought goes back to Plato, who drew the distinction
between 'logos' which meant reason and 'mythos'
which meant story. To Plato, reason led to truth, but
story was inherently unreliable and misleading. As he was reported to
have said in The Republic, Plato wished he could kill all
storytellers and poets. Plato and his descendents of the Enlightenment
are very much responsible for our myth-banished-world of today.
Worse still -from the point of view of someone
who actually believes in such a myth- a lot of writers today use the word
'myth' to mean a story that is thought to be true by credulous people
(who ought to know better), when the story clearly is not true. In this
sense, a 'myth' is a delusion.
There is also a usage in which a 'myth' is seen
as being untrue in that what it describes in the myth did not occur as
an event in history. In this sense, history is seen as being a true
account of the past, and mythology is seen as being a set of stories
about the past which are fun, entertaining, childish and yet ... untrue.
In this sense, 'myth' means a story that is believed by the gullible.
The other problematic usage of ‘myth’ sees a
myth as a story set in the past. This, by implication, seems to suggest
that such a story maybe interesting today, but is no longer relevant and
meaningful.
Of course, everyone is free to use words
however he or she wants to, and I don't want anyone to feel that I am
telling them how they should use words. But I would just like to ask you
to reflect upon how you use the word 'myth' ... and ask yourself what
does this word means to you?
I would like to get rid of the word, and start again. The problem
is that I cannot think of a word to replace ‘myth.’
The word ‘myth’ –like myths themselves- will not go away.
Perhaps, we should all try to come to terms with the word, and find
new meanings for it that speak positively to us today.
To gain a better
understanding of what ‘myth’ means, I want to
suggest that we go back to Carl Gustav Jung, the famous Swiss
psychologist and sometime friend of Sigmund Freud, who wrote extensively
about myths and their meanings to us today.
Jung believed that
everything we say, believe, think and dream is a myth of a sort, in that
it is a creative attempt upon our part (and the part of our unconscious
mind) to make sense of our lives and of our existence. The great eternal
questions remain real and immediate to every person: Who am I? Why am
I here? What’s the meaning of it all? These questions, and questions
like them, bare down upon us, and partly in desperation, we reach out,
consciously and unconsciously, for explanations that make sense of it
all.
So, in this sense, a
myth is any construction of ideas or language which attempts to make
sense of our existence. For Jung, the Creation in the Book of Genesis is
a religious myth; while the account of the Big Bang by, say, Stephen
Hawking, would be a scientific myth. They are both attempts to
understand the eternal questions, and explain them, though obviously
expressed in different forms of language. This explanation of the word
‘myth’ allows us to use the word in a positive way. Perhaps people who
might be drawn to believe in myths can begin to take some comfort, after
all.
If we apply Jung’s
ideas to our own lives, we begin to see that myths need not relate only
to the past, but can be equally alive and relevant in our lives today.
Myths about the past can be understood as stories giving meaning to us
today. Myths set in the present are equally valid, and should be
encouraged, as they allow us to come to terms with whom we are in our
world today. Myths about the future are just as valid as myths about the
past, for we may try to understand our present in terms of both our past
and our future.
The second insight
into myths which I believe we can take successfully from Jung is the
idea that myths are not merely stories about other people, but are
really stories about ourselves. As in fairytales, myths tend to
incorporate
extreme characters with dark, failed lives; or unbelievably good
characters, with incredibly uplifting lives. We read of wondrously
beautiful women, unimaginably strong men, of wise men and of fools, of
graceful ladies and of valiant youths. There seems to be nowhere in
between for ordinary people to go about their everyday lives. So how do
we make sense of it all, and how can we connect to myths today?
Jung said that a myth
works because all the characters are already in us, and that they all
exist in our own personalities. In Jung’s view, we all have an Arthur in
us, and a Morgan le Fay, a
Merlin, a Lancelot, a Galahad, and the whole
cast of characters that make up our world of myths. These characters
Jung called archetypes. These archetypes are shared by all men
and women in their shared experience of living. The human race, Jung
believed, has a collective memory or repository of all its passed
experiences, which is not always apparent to our conscious minds but
which is a well from which everyone can draw water. This well of shared
experiences Jung called the collective unconscious. It is
not the same in everyone, but everyone can draw from it because we
all share in it by virtue of our shared humanity. This explains how we can all relate to mythic
characters through our imaginations. This explains why myths are like
dreams, and why, as Jung would have it, we can unlock the meanings of
our dreams through understanding our mythology; and by understanding our
mythology we can come to understand ourselves.
The third point worth considering is this: if we all share in the Arthurian myth,
in a sense, that makes the Arthurian myth universal, and therefore
universally true. This means that whoever we are, and from whatever
country, class, religion, culture, language or race we come from, we can and do share in
this myth in and through our collective unconscious. Does this mean that myths are universally true? Jung thought
so. Please let me repeat that question again: are myths
universally true? If this is so, then we can claim that myth is the
highest and most perfect form of thought and language; and that through
myths we can come, possibly, to understand universal truths. This is a
claim that is familiar to many religious people, but may be
uncomfortable to others.
If this explains the
true nature of myths, then we need myths, and we should explore
Arthurian myths not so much as stories from the past about the past, but
as stories from the past which are taking place in our lives today, and
from which we can learn who we really are. Myths are a well from which we
can all draw water, and drink.
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