At a glance
- Age
- 83
- Born
- March 26, 1904
- From
- White Plains
- Nationality
- United States
Biography
The idea that stories from every corner of the world share one underlying shape — a departure, an ordeal, a return — is the thing most people encounter first when they come across his name. He called it the monomyth, and he set it out in The Hero with a Thousand Faces, published in 1949. The book argues that the archetypal hero's journey recurs across the mythologies of unrelated cultures, and it remains the work he is best known for.
Before and alongside the writing, he taught. He held a post as a professor of literature at Sarah Lawrence College, working in comparative mythology and comparative religion. That comparative habit — reading one tradition against another rather than treating any single one as the standard — runs through his output, which ranged widely across questions of the human condition rather than staying inside a narrow academic speciality.
He was born in White Plains, New York, on 26 March 1904, and died on 30 October 1987. His work is now stewarded through the Joseph Campbell Foundation.
Before and alongside the writing, he taught. He held a post as a professor of literature at Sarah Lawrence College, working in comparative mythology and comparative religion. That comparative habit — reading one tradition against another rather than treating any single one as the standard — runs through his output, which ranged widely across questions of the human condition rather than staying inside a narrow academic speciality.
He was born in White Plains, New York, on 26 March 1904, and died on 30 October 1987. His work is now stewarded through the Joseph Campbell Foundation.
