Comparing The Hero's Journey In The Hero With A Thousand Faces By Joseph Campbell

Joseph Campbell is the author of The Hero with a Thousand Faces, a novel which outlined the idea of the hero’s journey. His novel identified the common patterns that were found in most myths, fables and spiritual traditions. Campbell expanded on this knowledge by creating a detailed framework that identified the twelve stages of the hero’s journey. His guidelines provided an accurate description of the hero’s journey, as proven in many popular stories and it is clearly presented in the South African movie Tsotsi. Tsotsi is the story of a young gangster who hailed from the slums of South Africa. The movie follows Tsotsi’s journey towards civility after encountering a series of unforeseen events. The steps of the hero’s journey as well as various

In the case of Tsotsi, he realized his mistakes after hearing the story of Miriam’s husband’s death. He understood how the ill-conceived actions of one person can cause a lifetime of grief and hardship for a family. It is because of this story, Tsotsi makes the fateful decision to return the child to his parents. Even though Miriam offered to take the child back knowing that it would allow Tsotsi to escape from his crimes. He kindly declined stating that it was his duty to return the child. Prior to going on his final journey, Tsotsi wears a white dress shirt symbolizing his entry into the real world. In addition, during the stage of resurrection Tsotsi shows his true change in personality and belief. In particular, when he reached the Dube’s home, he told John over the intercom that he would leave the baby safely outside of the gate. Meanwhile, an officer stationed at the house, alerts Captain Smit of the arrival of Tsotsi and he is soon surrounded by authorities at gunpoint. In order to save the child who was in his hands, Tsotsi metaphorically sacrifices himself. He allows the parents take the child from his hands before he put his hands up to be arrested for his crimes. In these two final stages of the journey, Tsotsi demonstrates his true feelings as he had begun to love the child. He understood the pain and the grief the parents were feeling and decided to return the child. Before this journey, Tsotsi would not have paid attention to the child and would have left it to