The Fisher King - Free Essay on the Hero's Journey

In the analysis of The Fisher King, there are various lessons to learn about the hero’s journey and one of the themes is manifest in the case of the King where the King is presented as a little boy and tasked with proving to the society that he can become the king. Hero’s journey is evident in Parry’s telling of the Fisher King story to Jack. Such is the story that shows challenges that Heroes have to go through in becoming the characters they are and ensuring that they fulfill the needs of the population. The challenges in the path to Hero’s journey is evident in the story, and one of them is meeting community expectations as evident where the child is expected to spend the night in the forest as proof. It is factual that such is a dangerous escapade where which exposed the boy to various threats.

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Order now

A hero must also be able to cone t with spiritual forces as evident where the boy in the forest sees a vision of the Holy Grail which is elusive; this proves that heroes need to be prepared to receive divine intervention and know what the spiritual world requires of them. The boy was in a state of radical amazement, and the vanishing of the Grail proved that he was not prepared for the task to receive the blessings of God. Moreover, being a hero requires patience as is apparent in the case where the King got the Grail in the least expected place, in the house of the Fool. The King had been looking for the Grail all his life and found it at last without any challenges. Finally, the hero’s journey requires love and any case of despising should be discouraged; this is because it is the Fool, a person that people despise, that has been having the Grail all the while when the King has been looking for it tirelessly.

In the story, the Grail serve as the source of spiritual guidance and wisdom. This is observable where the boy sees that Grail but becomes elusive because he was not mature enough and had not acquired the wisdom required of him to have the Grail. On the contrary, when the King is old enough, he finds the Grail easily with the fool a case which proves that the Grail is a symbol of wisdom and spiritual guidance. In the story, everyone who has the Grail has the blessing of God to lead the people and is, therefore, a symbol of approval of leadership. There are a lot that the Jack must learn from the story that Parry tells to him and first is that he needs to preserve the challenges that he goes through in his progress of becoming a hero. Secondly, heroes need to have the holistic maturity as evident in the case where the as much as the boy had dared to prove to the community of his courage by staying in the forest at night; he was not spiritually mature.

Finally, Jack needs to learn to be courageous and patient fulfill his role as a hero. In this case, there are various changes that Jack needs to make and the first one is that he needs to respect the elders and spiritual leaders so that he can seek guidance from them. Secondly, Jack needs to respect everyone in the society as all of them have a role to play in the fulfillment of societal roles; This is apparent where the Fool helped the King to find the Holy Grail.