It is said Tolkein’s work was a conscious effort on his part to create a Myth for England. I wonder aloud, what would a myth of America be? By myth I do not mean what are the untruths that perpetuate our society, but what, when we find ourselves in a dream-like state, devoid of the rational, do we see when we see America? What are the unconscious archetypes that populate this land? What are the mytho-poetics of America? Where is our Leviathan, who is our Achilles, what is our Jungian shadow?
If I was to write such a myth what would it look like? Would one simply send Johnny Appleseed on a long journey across America, would the thing itself take place in America? Or would it be metaphors, would some Gnome represent the cowboy, would the vast waste be Middle America, would zombies be pop-culture?
The images that come to my mind are as follows:
Founding Fathers
The American Dream
2.5 Kids
Manifest Destiny
Cowboys and Indians
Immigration vs. Melting Pot
America saved Europe in the two world wars
The anonymous man
The Civil War
Democracy
Militias
Libertarians
The Statue of Liberty
Oblivious to rest of world
Inclusively
Lincoln
Hippie Communes
Evangelical Christianity
And that’s enough fodder for now. What do you guys think?
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