Objectives – To show how and why society still needs myths and magic in the ages of science and enlightenment. Method – Define the language of myth, and why we read significance into events and objects; Define the function of myths and magic in relation to the human psyche and psychoanalysis; Sources – Barthes’ Mythologies, Rollo May’s The Cry For Myth, Adorno and Horkheimer’s Dialectic Of Enlightenment.
Tag: myth
OBJECTIVES 1. To study the meanings and interpretations of myth, what it means to man 2. To look at the changing attitudes towards inherited truths and traditions from the Middle Ages to the Enlightenment period where superstition and faith were seen as unreason due to the advancement in science. 3. To examine the effect that the Enlightenment had in initiating the existentialist movement and to discover why myth was rejected there also. 4. To study two men, famous for reinventing myth in the postmodern era, both realising that myth is needed to restore coherence in society in order to enhance the experience of mankind. These two men are Car Jung, the psychoanalyst and Richard Wagner the composer. SOURCES Books borrowed from the library of the university of Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, various internet sites, newspaper articles, magazines and CD’s. FIELD OF EXPLORATION I am going to loo at the history of theatre and entertainment trough the ages, drawing on three examples. The first will be a look at Greek tragedy in the time of Euripides where going to watch one of these performances was essentially a ritualistic act. The second example will be Racine and his attempt to please the court of Louis XIV and finally, examples taken from Ionesco, a renowned figure of the theatre of the absurd, which forces the question of whether there is any meaning to existence. CHANGE Throughout the project there will be a strong element of change. I am hoping to illustrate the shift in the beliefs from the colourful myth embracing era of the Middle Ages, through the revolution in thought and discovery of the Enlightenment to the existentialists who believe that man must choose his own way without the aid of universal, objective standards. THE GAP BETWEEN HUMANS AND THINGS My aim here is to show how, through exploring my project territory, man was separated from myth initially and then actively dismissed it as fantasy, later being reunited with it through the fields of psychoanalysis, opera, literature and theatre.