Annotations 8-11

Vogler, Christopher. “The Reward”, “The Road Back”
The Writers Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers. 3rd Edition. Studio City, CA
Michael Wiese Productions, 2007. 175-194

Summary
This is the part of the journey that the Hero has been striving for the whole time. The reward can take many forms but all types serve to better the Hero’s understanding. There are many cases where the hero achieves an epiphany, the hero develops new perceptions after his great achievement. Vogler describes how the hero, while on his journey, the hero has multiple close encounters with death. As long as these moments do not kill the hero, he is able to learn from them and think differently so that he does not end up in a deadly situation again. Prevailing over these near death experiences causes a “self realization” within the Hero. At times the reward can be a distortion, something that seems real but is either a dream or another obstacle the hero can’t recognize. With time this task is completed, the hero will get the reward, it’s part of the story. Vogler chose to examine “The Wizard of Oz” and apply it to these two stages of the journey. The road back is not always an easy journey for the Hero, Vogler states there can be obstacles even here to make sure the hero isn’t the same person he was before. The challenges that are experienced on the road back do not faze the hero. Whatever he learns from the reward enables the hero to overcome the challenge without blinking an eye.

Reaction
These two stages of the journey serve as the hero’s first taste of victory. He may be overwhelmed by the past ordeal but the reward serves as a boost for the hero to make it out of danger and back into the ordinary world. I think the road back along with a large portion of the stages and archetypes aren’t necessary to the story. They do add to the excitement and plot but can be left out.

Questions
1. Where, if noticed, is the Ally’s help not needed?
2. What stage, if any, does the Hero begin to learn for himself?
3. Is there a case where the reward is only achieved after the road back, once the hero is home?

Vogler, Christopher. “Resurrection”, “Return with the Elixir”
The Writers Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers. 3rd Edition. Studio City, CA
Michael Wiese Productions, 2007. 197-228

Summary
The resurrection is a continuation of the reward. Here the hero may have another epiphany/self discovery. It is considered the climax in the story, the resurrection deals with death and rebirth.The Hero is maturing and learning from the whole ordeal. The lessons learned will be a part of the hero’s life from now on. The return with the elixir is when the hero tells of his story and returns home, he will be praised and remembered. Both of these stages, “Resurrection & “Return with the Elixir” are part of the hero’s journey back to the ordinary world. He goes home to what he knows, what is familiar, to spread the word and educate others. What happens in the return with the elixir holds true to earlier characteristics from other stages of the journey. The death and rebirth is constantly brought up again and again.

Reaction
This reading was very useful for my understanding of the final stages of the Hero’s Journey. I was unaware of the final stages that were discussed, I’m glad I have a more in depth understanding of the journey itself. Because these two stages deal with the hero’s return to the ordinary world they are typically happy and heartwarming. This makes me happy and warms my heart as well.

Questions
1. Have there been any cases where the hero skips stages of the journey and manages to return to the ordinary world with the reward earlier than expected?
2. Can the hero fail in these final stages that are part of the ordinary world?
3. Can the lesson learned ever be a bad one that turns the hero into a worse person than before?

Vogler, Christopher. “Looking back on the journey”
The Writers Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers. 3rd Edition. Studio City, CA
Michael Wiese Productions, 2007. 231-290

Summary
In this lengthy reading Vogler gives us an Overview of the hero’s journey and relates it to a handful of movies where he goes into more detail assigning all the archetypes to characters from the film and shows how the stages of the journey can be interpreted and used to benefit the story. The movies he chooses are very different from one another which help Vogler get his point across about how applicable the hero’s journey is to film and stories. Vogler states that you do not need to follow the text step by step; the arrangement of stages can be altered. In some cases you can neglect whole parts of the journey, the story does not depend on them; “It’s possible to write good stories that don’t exhibit every feature of the Hero’s Journey”. Vogler states that the “measure of a stories success is its lasting popularity and effect on the audience”. That statement is true considering people will not like a story if a writer can’t keep the reader’s attention.
Vogler then examines the four movies, Pulp Fiction, The Lion King, Titanic, and The Full Monty. Pulp Fiction proves Voglers point about the arrangement of the stages and how it’s not necessary to tell the story the actual way it happened. Titanic was able to keep the viewer’s attention through all of the inner stories the of the individual character’s. As a viewer we saw many examples of the Hero’s Journey in all the characters.

Reaction
The length of the epilogue is due to the rather huge analysis of the four movies, Vogler’s focus is easy to pick up on in the epilogue, the movie references prove his point, and thanks to this reading it’ll be hard not to analyze and interpret movies with regard to this text.

Questions
1. After being told that the Hero’s Journey is noticeable in every story, think long and hard about a movie that has no evident Journey. Does the movie suffer from this absence?
2. What conclusions are you beginning to make about this book from “Looking Back on the Journey”?
3. Are you satisfied with Voglers’ Reflection?

Vogler, Christopher.“The Writer’s Journey” “Stories are alive”
The Writers Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers. 3rd Edition. Studio City, CA
Michael Wiese Productions, 2007. 293-312

Summary
This reading was very convincing and effective as a final chapter to the text; it connected the Hero’s Journey to the way you should write. Vogler called it the Writers Journey, and said it “is one in the same” with the Hero’s Journey. Vogler’s idea was easy to comprehend and stood out to me as the main point of the text. After all, the title of the book is “The Writer’s Journey”. Vogler also broke down elements of stories, in particular sentences, to get his point across about the importance of words. He considered stories to be alive which I thought was a broad statement although I was able to see his point. It was a little too much for me.
In the first chapter, Vogler compares writing to magic. He explained how we as writers are shapeshifters who alter writing to say what we want. He also compared us to shamans to prove his point. Vogler also states how applicable the Hero’s Journey is to writing.

Reaction
This is where the connection was made between the Hero’s Jouney and Voglers’ purpose in writing. The comparison makes the individual people who are reading this book feel like their own little hero’s. Vogler is able to put the power in our hands when he sets us off on the Writer’s Journey. Vogler, in doing so, acts as our mentor. This is a very effective tool that Vogler uses, he does exactly what he tell us to do when writing, he carries us through the book, like babies.

Questions
1. Do you think stories are alive? In the realm of how Vogler described sentences?
2. Do you feel more confident as a writer?
3. Has Vogler taught his lesson, or do you think there is still some other purpose to his writing?