The respondents implied that they read not to find out what happened but
what happens, not what took place but what always takes place, and their literary
selections seemed to be part of a complete world of probabilities, of which every
mythopoeic work forms part. I t was apparent that for the readers their reading was
not simply the comprehension of one story after another but rather a process
involving an intertextual continuum that literally constituted an existentially
elsewhere-place in their lives. The writers also acknowledged the same process of
intertextuality in their texts, the implications of which are discussed in Chapter 5.
This seems to indicate also the presence of a symbiotic relationship between
mythopoeic-reader and mythopoeic writer; all ostensibly functioning as independent
psyches but as soon as they read or wrote in mythopoeic mode, a collective mind or
Mind-at-Large was activated. I n fact, all of the readers stated that they read,
frequently, even if unwittingly, in quest of a mind, of experiences and of places
more original than their own; the shamans stated this emphatically.
The writers’ responses clearly confirmed the phenomenon of the de-centred
self, the obliterating of the egoic persona. I n particular, David Malouf described the
writing process as one in which he falls into a state where his mind becomes open,
emptied of egoic ideas and receptive to new ideas, sometimes even ones that are
contrary to those he holds in a conscious state. Thomas Keneally said that when he
writes it is ... the universal and unified mind which is brought into play ... and that
he strives to attain ... that state of un-self reflecting grace, the opposite to
egocentrism, and that he believed ... that all the equipment we need to be everyone
else is laid down in that noosphere ... and that writers ... bring this stuff into play all
the time, because they are involved in crossing over the categories, because they
contain all the archetypes in themselves. I n other words, he becomes a de-centred
self and accesses new identities in Mind-at-Large or the collective psyche. I n the
case of Colleen McCullough, her responses demonstrate a sharp demarcation in
mentation from egoic consciousness to that of a peak experience or a state of
animistic-like consciousness in her perception of the depth and beauty of the
Connecticut countryside; a demarcation that reveals the involvement of Mind-at-
Large.
Overall, the responses revealed the operation of a process of reverie that is
implicated in the act of mythopoeic writing and reading. That reverie produces a
de-centred self in the writer and reader, one that also precipitates a relationship
between them and the various characters and places that populate or figure in
ron
(Ron)
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