66
PARTISAN REVIEW
form of the myth as "the perpetually recurrent pattern of birth and re–
birth." But this form is so abstracted as to be without any empirical sig–
nificance.
It
is really only a poetic way of saying that "all things change."
It applies to all organic life as well as to art and literature; indeed, by a
little metaphorical stretching, it applies also to solar systems and electrons.
This vast range of application, however, indicates not the "profundity"
of the form but simply its lack of material content. It shows that this form
is by itself useless in solving the
specific
problems of a
specific
field of
phenomena: namely, art and literature. Indeed, Troy's analysis of Mann is
illuminating only because he does
not
make use of this generalized "form
of the myth" but rather of a special concretization of the myth in the
initiation ceremonies and heroic traditions of particular tribal groups.
He could not at all make the same
concrete
analysis of many, in fact most,
other writers, whether past or contemporary.
Even more important: The possibility of making an anthropological
approach to literature does not in the least exclude the possibility and
legitimacy of other approaches. What we call works of literature are
material objects, produced by t-he conscious will of men, enjoyed in various
ways by other men, their conditions of production and enjoyment limited
by social and historical circumstances as well as by the psychological traits
of authors and readers. Thus, as the context changes, works of literature
figure variously, as psychological, anthropological, sociological, economic
phenomena. All that Troy says about Mann may be true; but it is at the
same time quite possible to give a consistent and true analysis of Mann's
work from, say, a psychoanalytic or a sociological point of view. Troy
may not be interested in such analyses, or he may believe that they do
not lead as ably as his type of analysis to a fuller enjoyment of Mann's
work. The latter opinion is a psychological one and can be at least ap–
proximately tested; the former would be an expression of Troy's prefer–
ences. Neither justifies the belief that in anthropology and the myth we
find the magic key to the unknown and the unknowable.
(2)
The objection to the Myth as "our only Absolute," to the idea
that the comprehension of experience, life, history and reality as Myth
is the
only
adequate comprehension, is the objection to all Absolutes,
however worded or disguised. Among proposed Absolutes, however, I
confess I find---the Myth peculiarly dangerous. The Myth, accc;>rding to
Troy's own account, exists only "in the pure realm of the imagination";
it is pure symbol; it is in no way tied to "the world of contemporary
reality," to "the actual."
What this means is that the Myth is a completely
irresponsible
Ab–
solute, a hopelessly subjective Absolute, released from any check or control.
Neither logic nor experiment confounds it. In its pure realm of the imagi–
nation it can go its own sweet way. Chucked overboard is all centuries-
