Joseph Campbell (1904-1987) wrote classics including The Hero with a Thousand Faces, the four-volume The Masks of God, and Myths to Live By. His televised interview with Bill Moyers introduced his views to millions. Campbell's interest in mythology was sparked by his love of reading about American Indians and visits to New York City's American Museum of Natural History.
No one in our century -- not Freud, not Thomas Mann, not L vi-Strauss -- has so brought the mythical sense of the world and its eternal figures back into our everyday consciousness. -- James Hillman Campbell has become the rarest of intellectuals in American life: a serious thinker who has been embraced by the popular culture. -- Newsweek