Jung’s epic poem is a spiritual journey in the tradition of Dante’s Commedia And Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick. Jung knew both of these epics well and in many instances uses them as templates for his own journey.
But to understand epic, one should know how it fits into a universe of genres that include: Lyric, Tragedy, Comedy and Epic, which Aristotle described in his Poetics and which literary theorist, Dr. Louise Cowan, developed further in 65 years of teaching. I call these territories “genretypes,” for as archetypes they represent the cosmos of the soul situated in a mandala, with each having three moments, or occasions of insight. The power of epic is that it contains all the other genres within it. The lecture will explore these genretypes as they together offer a “complete cosmos that makes up the whole of man’s image of himself,” as Cowan has written. Her diagram will aid us in reflecting on these mytho-poetic moments.
Presenter Biography
Dennis Patrick Slattery, Ph.D. has been teaching for 45 years, the last 24 at Pacifica Graduate Institute in the Mythological Studies Program as well as others. He is the author, co-author, editor or co-editor of 27 volumes, including 6 volumes of poetry and one co-authored novel. He has also published more than 200 articles in books, magazines, journals and on-line sources. He also paints in acrylics and has completed 12 paintings, most of which are 16x20. His most recent publications include Our Daily Breach: Exploring Your Personal Myth in Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick and Pilgrimaging Beyond Belief: A Monastic Memoir. He has finished a book on Homer’s Odyssey as well as a co-edited volume on the Letters of Joseph Campbell, both for 2018 publication.