The Myth of the Birth of the Hero: A Psychological Exploration of MythJHU Press, 2015 M11 1 - 200 pages First published in German in 1909, Otto Rank's original The Myth of the Birth of the Hero offered psychoanalytical interpretations of mythological stories as a means of understanding the human psyche. Like his mentor Sigmund Freud, Rank compared the myths of such figures as Oedipus, Moses, and Sargon with common dreams, seeing in both a symbolic fulfillment of repressed desire. In a new edition published thirteen years after the original, Rank doubled the size of his seminal work, incorporating new discoveries in psychoanalysis, mythology, and ethnology. This expanded and updated edition has been eloquently translated by Gregory C. Richter and E. James Lieberman and includes an introductory essay by Robert A. Segal as well as Otto Rank's 1914 essay "The Play in Hamlet." |
From inside the book
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... (Rank 1914,10).8 Rank's work is much fuller and sprightlier than Abraham's, and the second, till now untranslated, 1922 edition of the work is richer still. Rank considers far more myths than Abraham, and studies them in far more detail ...
... Rank, following Freud, heroism deals with what Jungians call the “first half of life.” The first half—birth, childhood ... Rank's goes from the hero's birth to his attainment of a “career”: The hero is the child of most distinguished ...
... Rank's heroic pattern, which by Slochower's superficial rendition ends cheerfully with the hero's triumphant return to the community, to his own, which ends with only a temporary modus vivendi (see Slochower 1970a, 25; 1970b, 153). Yet ...
... Rank's will can master and direct the drives. Where Freud's ego strives only to mediate, Rank's will strives creatively to forge an independent person. By the will Rank means not a Nietzschean or Adlerian will to power but a will to ...
... Rank's examples recount, parents save their children from drowning. In the second edition Rank asks rhetorically whether, after “the overwhelming evidence for this birth symbolism, doubts remain about its application to the hero myth ...
Contents
vii | |
Translators Introduction | xxxix |
Preface to the First Edition | xlv |
Preface to the Second Edition | xlvii |
1 Introduction | 1 |
2 The Cycle of Myths | 9 |
3 The Interpretation of the Myths | 47 |
Toward an Analysis and Dynamic Understanding of the Work | 93 |
Notes | 105 |
References | 129 |
Index | 143 |
Other editions - View all
The Myth of the Birth of the Hero: A Psychological Exploration of Myth Otto Rank Limited preview - 2004 |
The Myth of the Birth of the Hero: A Psychological Exploration of Myth Otto Rank Limited preview - 2015 |
The Myth of the Birth of the Hero: A Psychological Exploration of Myth Otto Rank Limited preview - 2004 |