Jung's Feminine Heroic in Tumultuous Times, with reference to The Sacred Well Murders, a lecture with Susan Rowland

Jung portrays individuation as beginning with the death of the hero. Not for the first time, his insight is prescient for our troubled twenty-first century in which notions of the heroic masculine warrior have been tested to destruction, even on occasion becoming vehicles for the shadow. By contrast, Jung provides a feminine that is marginalized, often forced into the shadow, pluralized, and hospitable to other cultures and/or forms of consciousness. Taking inspiration from Jung’s feminine, it is possible to discover less ego-centric, less dogmatic, less euro-centric, and more collective modes of individuation. Arguably, these are better fitted to intervene in the crises of our times.

To explore new kinds of heroism, my Jungian arts-based research has transitioned into writing murder mysteries because the genre is a link to pre-patriarchal individuation myths, such as those of the Holy Grail and the Well Maidens of Logres. In particular, I will demonstrate my…