The Hero's Journey

byLabman

79.2K followers

10 years ago

In the 1980's a writer named Joseph Campbell identified a series of traits that are common throughout the most powerful stories. He calls this the Hero's Journey.

In the development of his postulate, he actually analyzed the "New" Star Wars film that had recently come out. (This was the early '80s, it was Episode IV) the original version of his memo was called "The Hero with 1000 Faces" and was delivered to Disney executives shortly before the "Lion King" was produced. This resulted in Mr. Campbell being an integral part of the script work done for that movie.

It has been applied throughout history. Look at the voyages of Sinbad, or even finding Nemo. If you're into science fiction or fantasy, you will find that most plot lines follow this layout.

So what is it?

1. The hero is introduced in an ordinary world.

2. The call to adventure

3. The refusal of the call

4. The hero meets a mentor

5. Crossing the threshold

6. Tests, allies, enemies

7. Approach to the innermost cave

8. The ordeal

9. Seizing the sword

10. The road back

11. The resurrection

12. Return with the elixir.

You'll find that many movies, of course, the lion King, but even finding Nemo and national treasure follow this process. It can be purely for entertainment purposes but, what if you were to implement something of this sort in your blog.

This is an idea I've been kicking around for a while. If you been paying attention, you know that one of the best ways to gain your readers trust is by telling stories. Now everyone may not have of 50,000 word book in them. But I bet that you may have 50 1,000 word posts. Sounds like the same length as a book. Perhaps creating some rendition of a hero's journey might give your website or blog a new lease on life.

Just a thought.

If you're off to the new Star Wars movie, you can watch it with a new perspective.