The Joseph Campbell Foundation Mythological RoundTable of Ojai is very pleased to present Richard Buchen, Curator of Joseph Campbell’s book collection and Special Collections Librarian at Pacifica Graduate Institute.Having tended Joseph Campbell’s personal works for 16 years, we are most fortunate to hear from a speaker with such thorough familiarity and knowledge of Campbell’s life and works.
Mr. Buchen will address the unique intellectual journey of this outstanding mythologist and scholar, focusing on those who most deeply influenced him: Sigmund Freud, Carl Jung, and Heinrich Zimmer (to whom Campbell referred as his “Three Gurus”) along with many others, including George Bird Grinnell, Krishnamurti, John Gallishaw, Oswald Spengler, Leo Frobenius, Nikhilanada, Goethe, Schopenhauer and Nietzsche.
To set the tone, and in his own words, Campbell gives the following advice:
"Sit in a room and read—and read and read. And read the right books by the right people. Your mind is brought onto that level, and you have a nice, mild, slow-burning rapture all the time . . . When you find an author that grabs you, read everything he has done. Don’t say, “Oh I want what so-and so did”—and don’t bother at all with the best seller list. Just read what this author has to give you. And then you can go read what he had read. And the world opens up in a way that is consistent with a certain point of view" (The Power of Myth, New York: Doubleday, 1988, p. 99)
The event will be held at the Ojai Foundation, Sunday, June 10th at 5:00 pm. We welcome all who wish to deepen their understanding of myth, culture, and life as seen through the eyes of Joseph Campbell.
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