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Whence Cometh the Belief...

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Katherine Ashe
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Post by Katherine Ashe » Fri December 3rd, 2010, 12:51 am

My point about Rip van Winkle was that he was pointedly an anti-mythic hero. The enlightened Federal period had a sufficiency of real heroes from the Revolution.
I think the Elvis Presley suggestion is intriguing. He combines qualities of the forever young god of fertility whose death is obscure, and our dazzlement with celebrity per se. He is both Orpheus and our Eurydice. And he is sufficiently widely known, with a national shrine: Graceland for heaven sake.

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Michy
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Post by Michy » Fri December 3rd, 2010, 1:26 am

Graceland as a national shrine? Hmmmm I must confess that when I was there the idea of "national shrine" never crossed my mind for one nanosecond. ;) What did cross my mind was that it was almost pure 1970s camp. I mean, green shag carpeting on the walls! :eek:

Graceland was a nice place to visit once, but is not someplace worth going back to a second time, IMO.

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Michy
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Post by Michy » Fri December 3rd, 2010, 3:28 am

[quote=""Ash""]We are such a young nation in the grand scheme of things that Superman from the 40s is probably going to be the closest.[/quote] And actually, Superman's not too shabby. After all, betcha King Arthur can't leap tall megaliths in a single bound! ;) :D Someone mentioned Captain America -- I'm not familiar with him, but I like it. Has a nice ring to it.

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Katherine Ashe
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Post by Katherine Ashe » Fri December 3rd, 2010, 5:55 am

Hi Michy
I wasn't suggesting that Presley the man should live up to his status as dying god, or reviving king. We might not have thought much of the decor of the original Arthur, assuming, along with Geoffrey Ashe, that there was one.
But "The King" and "Graceland" solely as concepts, coupled with the "sightings" and the passion that grips so many across the world to dress up like him, has something intriguingly archaic and resonant about it.
Marilyn Monroe, in death, seems to have achieved almost mythic status as well. :rolleyes: (By the way, i'm writing on a mac and these icons don't seem to deploy -- I do hope you know I'm :) Ah, they do work!
Last edited by Katherine Ashe on Fri December 3rd, 2010, 6:01 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Ludmilla
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Post by Ludmilla » Fri December 3rd, 2010, 1:59 pm

[quote=""Katherine Ashe""]My point about Rip van Winkle was that he was pointedly an anti-mythic hero. The enlightened Federal period had a sufficiency of real heroes from the Revolution.
I think the Elvis Presley suggestion is intriguing. He combines qualities of the forever young god of fertility whose death is obscure, and our dazzlement with celebrity per se. He is both Orpheus and our Eurydice. And he is sufficiently widely known, with a national shrine: Graceland for heaven sake.[/quote]

Funny how dying relatively young can contribute to mythic status. I'm reminded of a scene on U2's Rattle & Hum DVD where the band tours Graceland. The drummer talks about how much Elvis meant to him. At the end of the footage they show them standing around Elvis's grave and the drummer says he wishes he hadn't gone to the grave site... it made it feel too real. It gave me goosebumps as I watched that scene with their music playing in the background.

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Post by wendy » Fri December 3rd, 2010, 2:17 pm

[QUOTE=Ash;75255]
Hiawatha? Well, I might not be the best person to ask, because we had to memorize that poem in JR hi and I absolutely hated it. Just don't see that character as being the awaited king. . Im thinking maybe of the Ghost Dance cult from the 1800s; one of the leaders from that would fit the bill -


Ash - an interesting suggestion because the ghost dance was a ritualistic worship of Wovoka, a self-appointed Indian Messiah, who was associated with the Sioux Uprising of 1890, which culminated in the battle of Wounded Knee, in South Dakota near the Nebraska border, on December 29, 1890.

Wovoka had been strongly influenced by Christianity and presented himself as another Christ figure. The Sioux believed they would overthrow the white invaders and promised a new golden age for the Native Americans.

All of the above discussion poses an interesting chicken-and-egg question:
Are such later myths based on Christianity OR (as some of us have pointed out) was Christianity just another tale within a long and ancient Messiah tradition? Freud assumed the latter!

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Katherine Ashe
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Post by Katherine Ashe » Fri December 3rd, 2010, 6:40 pm

Along these lines of risen Christs, may I suggest Sharan Newman's The Real History of the End of the World, a stunning little catalogue of risen messiahs and apocalyptic scenarios from Gilgamesh to 2012.
I sited this handy little volume as my "favorite book of the year" on another thread here.
It would seem all of mankind (at least some individuals in any case) are "hard wired" to be looking forward to a returning messiah and the end of the world as we know it. The Christian tradition is one of many. Well, Jesus said "my Father has many mansions." But I do wish mankind would stop fighting over each others' choices. :)

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Post by Margaret » Sat December 4th, 2010, 7:14 am

There were stories about John F. Kennedy, too - if I remember correctly, he was supposedly being kept alive on a respirator in a secret hospital room in the Dallas hospital where he actually died.
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Michy
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Post by Michy » Sat December 4th, 2010, 4:29 pm

[quote=""Margaret""]There were stories about John F. Kennedy, too - if I remember correctly, he was supposedly being kept alive on a respirator in a secret hospital room in the Dallas hospital where he actually died.[/quote] That sounds like something straight from the cover of the National Enquirer. :D

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Post by LoveHistory » Sat December 4th, 2010, 5:55 pm

[quote=""Margaret""]There were stories about John F. Kennedy, too - if I remember correctly, he was supposedly being kept alive on a respirator in a secret hospital room in the Dallas hospital where he actually died.[/quote]

Yeah, but think how old he would be now. Even Ted is gone and he was the baby.

Besides, it is decidedly less dramatic if the person involved has not been dead at any point. And that goes for Elvis too.

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