Dreaming the Myth Onward: Comic Books as Contemporary Mythologies

Abstract

As Joseph Campbell noted, our mythologies are in tatters, as fragmented as the global collective consciousness we now reside in. The new “mythogenic zone” of myth-making is not a geographical location, as of old, when communities could tell stories in relative isolation, but within the creatives: the artists, filmmakers, dancers, writers….and comic book creators? This chapter argues this to be the case, noting current examples of how authors of comics draw upon mythic material from their own diverse cultural backgrounds to weave tales of fantasy and magic relevant for our time. A second point is that a valid “loreway,” a network of storied performances rich with transformative ideas, has more allure today than any project to reconstitute yesterday’s fragmented myths.