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Kingship as a System of Myth: an Essay in Synthesis

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 July 2024

Masao Yamaguchi
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Thomas Hardy's The Mayor of Casterbridge attracts the attention of ethnologists who are interested by the symbolical analysis of kingship. Although this book does not deal with the theme of kingship as such, it overlaps it on a mythical level. It is a novel about the rise and fall of a man, Henchard, whose initial act is to sell his wife and daughter; in order to commit this act he deviates from the context of the human norm by way of drunkenness. He then enjoys great success as a corn merchant and becomes mayor of the town. Twenty years after this the graph of his destiny starts to fall with the arrival of a young man named Farfrae, who eventually ousts Henchard from his business as well as from his political position, and who goes to the length of taking over not only Henchard's mistress, Lucetta, but also his daughter, Elizabeth-Jane.

Type
Research Article
Information
Diogenes , Volume 20 , Issue 77 , March 1972 , pp. 43 - 70
Copyright
Copyright © 1972 Fédération Internationale des Sociétés de Philosophie / International Federation of Philosophical Societies (FISP)

References

1 A. G. Kimball and A. M. Wettherford, "Mayor of Casterbridge" by Thomas Hardy, New York, 1968. Cf. also D. A. Dike, "A Modern Oedipus" in Essays in Criticism, Vol. II, no. 2.

2 Peter Berger and Thomas Ruckmann, Social Construction of Reality, New York, 1967, p. 96.

3 D. Westermann, The Shilluk People, Lóndon 1912, p. 175.

4 The discussion which follows is based on the study by Godfrey Lienhardt; cf. G. Lienhardt, "The Shilluk," in African Word (edited by D. Forde), London, 1965, pp. 138-163.

5 Luc de Heusch, Essais sur l'inceste royal en Afrique, Brussels, 1956.

6 Cf. Wyndham Lewis, The Lion and the Fox-The Role of the Hero in the Plays of Shakespeare, London, 1927 and 1966, p. 123. The most recent summary of studies of royalty in the ancient world (Egypt, Mesopotamia, Greece and Rome) is to be found in H. S. Versnell, Triumphus, Leiden, 1970, chap. VI, "Gods, Kings and the New Year Festival."

7 P. Berger and Thomas Ruckmann, op. cit., p. 103.

8 Jean-Pierre Vernant, "Ambiguïté et renversement sur la structure énigmatique d'Oedipe-Roi in Échange et Communication II, The Hague, 1970, pp. 1267-1275.

9 M. Douglas, Purity and Danger, Penguin Books, p. 128.

10 Clémence Ramnoux, "Aspect nocturne de la divinité" in Études présocratiques, Paris, 1970, p. 196. See also Ph. Wolff-Windegg, Die Gekrönten, Stuttgart, 1958.

11 The most recent information about this well-known custom appears in W. Bascom, The Yoruba of Southern Nigeria, New York, p. 31.

12 J. Kott, Shakespeare notre contemporain, Paris, 1965, pp. 29-30. On the historical situation, cf. A. Besançon, Le Tsarévitch immolé, Paris, 1967.

13 A. I. Richards (ed.), East African Chiefs, London, 1960, p. 148 cf. Roger Caillois, L'Homme et le Sacré, N. R. F., Paris, p. 147-148.

14 Berger and Ruckmann, Op. cit., p. 103.

15 M. Gluckman, "Succession and Civil War among the Bemba" in Order and Rebellion in Tribal Africa, 1963, p. 87.

16 E. J. Krige, The Realm of a Rain Queen, London, 1945, p. 65.

17 T. O. Beidelmann ("Swazi Royal Ritual" in Africa, Vol. XXVI, no. 7, 1966) discusses the violent, chaotic and demoniacal aspect of the annual ritual of Swazi royalty called Incwala.

18 Ko-ji-ki (Chronicle of ancient things) translated by Mr. and Mrs. Shibata, Paris, 1969, pp. 191-233.

19 Philip Slater, Microcosm — Structural Psychological and Religious Evolution in Groups, New York, 1969, p. 75.

20 P. E. Josselin de Jong, The Dynastic Myth of Negri Sembilan (Malaya), reference text for a lecture given at the Dept. of Ethnology of the University of Paris, Nov. 1970, unpublished.

21 C. Ramnoux, op. cit., p. 276, and La Nuit et les Enfants de la nuit, Paris, 1959, p. 159-160.

22 C. Ramnoux, op. cit., 1970. p. 225.

23 London, 1929 and 1969.

24 Cl. Lévi-Strauss, Les Structures élémentaires de la parenté, The Hague, 1967, Chap. VI "L'Organisation dualiste." M. Eliade, La Nostalgie des origines, Paris 1971, chap. III.

25 J. Herbert, Les Dieux nationaux du Japon, Paris, 1965, pp. 122-131. G. Ouwehand studies the character of Susa-no-o, as the ambivalent trickster, in terms of dualist cosmology, in "Some Notes on the God Susa-no-o" in Monumenta Nipponica Vol. XIV, No. 3/4 1958-59; with regard to the presenta tion of this god as the whimpering infant, cf. Cl. Lévi-Strauss, Du Miel aux cendres-Mythologique II, Paris, 1956, pp. 327-329.

26 M. Matsumoto, Essai sur la mythologie japonnaise, Paris, 1928, p. 46.

27 Cf. W. Willeforde, The Fool and his Scepter, New York, 1969, ch. IX; "The King, the Hero and the Fool," and D. A. Miller, "Royauté et ambiguïté sexuelle," Annales, vol. 26, nos. 3 and 4, May-August 1971.

28 A. M. Hocart, Kings and Councillors, Cairo, 1936.

29 Cf. G. Dumézil, Mitra-Varuna-Essai sur deux représentations indo europeénnes de la souveraineté, Paris, 1948, p. 205-212.

30 M. Bakhtine, La Poétique de Dostoievski, Paris, 1970, p. 174.

31 K. Burke, The Philosophy of Literary Forms, 1957, p. 318.