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Quote by Robert Macfarlane

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Is a River Alive?

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Author

Robert Macfarlane
Robert Macfarlane

Robert Macfarlane is a British writer renowned for his contributions to nature writing. His works delve into the relationship between humans and the natural world, exploring the impact of nature on the human psyche. more

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“What must always be remembered is that myth is a double system; there occurs in it a sort of ubiquity: its point of departure is constituted by the arrival of a meaning. […] the signification of the myth is constituted by a sort of constantly moving turnstile which presents alternately the meaning of the signifier and its form, a language-object and a metalanguage, a purely signifying and a purely imagining consciousness. This alternation is, so to speak, gathered up in the concept, which uses it like an ambiguous signifier, at once intellective and imaginary, arbitrary and natural.”

MythMeaningSignification
Book:Mythologies
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“The signifier of myth presents itself in an ambiguous way: it is at the same time meaning and form, full on one side and empty on the other. […] The meaning will be for the form like an instantaneous reserve of history, a tamed richness, which it is possible to call and dismiss in a sort of rapid alternation: the form must constantly be able to be rooted again in the meaning and to get there what nature it needs for its nutriment; above all, it must be able to hide there. It is this constant game of hide-and-seek between the meaning and the form which defines myth.”

FormMythMeaningSignificationSignifiers
Book:Mythologies
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