Myth Theory and Criticism
Myth criticism designates not so much a critical approach in literary studies as the convergence of several methods and forms of inquiry about the complex relations between literature and myth. So heterogeneous are these inquiries, connecting with so many disciplines and interdisciplinary issues, that it is perhaps best to think of myth criticism as the locus for a series of complex, if powerfully suggestive, questions. Is myth embedded in literature, or are myth and literature somehow coextensive? Is myth (from Greek mythos, "tale, story") inescapably narrative in form? Is all literature susceptible of myth criticism? How self-conscious are literary artists in the use or incorporation of myth? How does myth in, or as, literature evolve historically? Does a single governing myth, a "monomyth," organize disparate mythic narratives and dominate literary form? What tasks, besides a simple cataloging of putative mythic components, fall to the myth critic? And most fundamentally, what does "myth" mean in the context of literary criticism? The divergence in answers to this last question has been so great, recourse to different disciplines (philosophy, anthropology, psychology, folklore) so various, that the question becomes an inevitable terminus a quo for a survey of myth criticism.