ABSTRACT
Few students of mythology today contest B. Malinowski’s assertion that myths “are what they appear to be on the surface, and not symbols of hidden realities.” This chapter explains the method developed by G. Roheim, T. Reik, and D. Bakan and attempt to develop its theoretic consequences for the understanding of myth. The method is a systematic, scientific procedure that is as objective and verifiable as the psychoanalytic method of dream interpretation. Its value is or ought to be self-evident. It is more difficult to explain why the method is effective for myths, but not for legends or folktales. Indeed, the chief obstacle to the acceptance of the method has almost certainly been its consequences for the theory of myth, rather than its procedure. For want of a theory explaining how myths can be understood symbolically, but not allegorically, evidence of myths’ symbolic character has often been distrusted.
