Monomyth In Siddhartha

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Although not necessarily as literal as Dorothy’s trademarked yellow brick road, essentially all literature uses as its framework a certain path, or, as defined by Joseph Campbell, a 17-step monomyth. One notable example of the use of this path resides within the classic novel Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse; however, the monomyth is not reserved solely for fictional creations as many biographies, memoirs, and even personal lives, such as those of Elie Wiesel and J.K. Rowling, exhibit parallels between themselves and a majority of the 17 steps. The pieces of this path are endlessly varying and can be interpreted uniquely; for, while all exploring the same monomyth, Wiesel and Siddhartha both find an overwhelming presence of motivational love, but,…show more content…
Every step in the monomyth can be accurately assigned to a specific moment in Elie Wiesel’s perilous journey described in his memoir Night; however, the step titled “Meeting with the Goddess”, in which a character is enveloped in love, a love that shows extraordinary power throughout the course of the story, correlates in one of the most unique and powerful ways. A romantic love does not, in fact, influence Wiesel; instead, he is overcome with devotion for his father. From the very beginning, the moment the father and son are separated from the rest of their family, Wiesel thinks only of his father. While first entering the concentration camp and feeling the chaos and confusion around him, witnessing unnecessary murder, and seeing families torn apart, he narrates, “My hand tightened its grip on my father. All I could think of was not to lose him” (Wiesel 30). From this moment on, Wiesel trusts his father beyond all else. This indefatigable faith and commitment…show more content…
The British author J.K. Rowling exemplifies this through her own road of trials. Before her internationally praised Harry Potter novels became famous, adversity made itself quickly abundant in her life, starting with the death of her mother. She describes the devastation of this tragic unforeseen loss as “a paving slab pressing down upon my chest, a literal pain in my heart…” (“jkrowling.com”). Alone and isolated, Rowling raised her daughter Jessica on meager unemployment benefits while also trying to fight off the resounding depression that had struck. A spark of hope finally arrived when Rowling started to write her first book on the back of a napkin, the first book in what would soon become a groundbreaking heptalogy of young adult novels; however, the sense of joy did not last long, for the failure of her marriage quickly hampered her prosperity. Nevertheless, she fought on. Despite this adversity, she did not lose hope; after being rejected by 12 different publishers, she still did not give up, thus finally earning the worshipped franchise worth approximately $24 billion, a franchise created on the back of a

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