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[He: Understanding Masculine Psychology (Perennial Library)] [By: Johnson, Robert A.] [October, 1989]
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November 14, 2025
THE FIRST OF JOHNSON’S ‘TRILOGY’ OF JUNGIAN INTERPRETATIONS
Robert Alex Johnson (1921-2018) was a Jungian analyst. He wrote in the Introduction to this 1989 book (first edition, 1974), “The Grail myth arose in the 12th century, a time when many people feel that our modern age began; ideas, attitudes, and concepts we are living with today had their beginnings in the days when the Grail myth took form… We must remember that a myth is a living entity, and exists within every person… The most rewarding mythological experience you can have is to see how it lives in your own psychological structure.
“The Grail myth speaks of masculine psychology. This is not to say that it is confined to the male, for a woman participates in her own inner masculinity, though it it less dominant for her… Especially as modern women take more part in the masculine world by embracing a profession, the development of masculinity becomes important to her. A woman’s masculinity or a man’s femininity is closer than one realizes. The insights of this myth will be immediate and practical for our present time.” (Pg. Ix-xi)
He tells the mythic story: “the Grail castle… is in serious trouble. The Fisher King, the king of the castle, has been wounded… yet he is incapable of dying… The cattle do not reproduce; the crops won’t grow… there is mourning everywhere---all because the Fisher King is wounded… The whole Grail castle is in serious trouble because the Fisher King is wounded. The myth tells us that years before, early in his adolescence… the Fisher King came to a camp… there was the salmon roasting over the fire, and he took a bit of it to eat… After burning his fingers on it… he put his fingers into his mouth… In so doing he got a bit of the salmon into his mouth. This is the Fisher King wound and gives its name to the ruler of much of our modern psychology. Modern suffering man is the heir to this psychological event which took place culturally some eight hundred years ago…
“Another version of the story has it that the young Fisher King … was out hunting for some experience of his passion. Another knight, a Muslim pagan, had had a vision of the True Cross and was out searching for some expression of this quest. The two came within sight of each other … and [both] went at the other… the pagan knight was killed and the Fisher King received the wound.. which blighted the kingdom for so many years.” (Pg. 1-3)
He states, “the implications of this clash … leaves us the legacy of our sensuous nature killed and our Christian vision terribly wounded. Hardly a modern man escapes this collision in his own life… His passion is killed and his vision is badly wounded… Much is to be learned from the symbol of the wounded Fisher King. The salmon… is one of the many symbols of Christ… His first contact with what will be redemption for him later in his life is a wounding…. Most Western Men are Fisher Kings… Every adolescent received his Fisher King wound. The church speaks of this wounding as … the happy fall which ushers one into the process of redemption. This is …. the graduation from naive consciousness into self-consciousness.” (Pg.[ 3-5)
He explains, “According to tradition, there are potentially three stages of psychological development for a man. The archetypal pattern is that one goes from the unconscious perfection of childhood, to the conscious imperfection of middle life, to conscious perfection of old age. One moves from an innocent wholeness… to a separation and differentiation between the inner and outer worlds with an accompanying sense of life’s duality, and then, at last, to enlightenment---a conscious reconciliation of the inner and outer in harmonious wholeness.” (Pg. 6)
He continues, “Much of modern literature revolves around the lostness and alienation of the hero… the Fisher King wound is the hallmark of modern man. I doubt if there is a woman in the world who has not had to mutely stand by as she watched a man agonize over his Fisher King aspect… The Fisher King is carried about in his litter, groaning, crying in his suffering. There is no respite for him---except when he is fishing. This is to say that the wound, which represents consciousness, is bearable only when the wounded is doing his inner work, proceeding with the task of consciousness which was inadvertently started with the wound in his youth. This close association with fishing will … play a large part in our story.” (Pg. 7-8)
He observes, “The myth is telling us that it is the naive part of a man that will heal him and cure his Fisher King wound. It suggests that if a man is to be cured he must find something in himself about the same age and about the same mentality as he was when he was wounded. It also tells us why the Fisher King cannot heal himself, and why, when he goes fishing, his pain is eased though not cured. For a man to be truly healed he must allow something entirely different from himself to enter into his consciousness and change him.” (Pg. 11-12)
He reports, “The falling out between Jung and Freud occurred over the nature of the unconsciousness. Freud said that the unconscious is the repository of all the inferior elements of the personality… Jung insisted that the unconscious is also … the artesian well from which all creativity springs. Freud would have none of this, so the two parted. That was a frightening experience for Dr. Jung… [But he] knew where to look for the cure of his desperate wound and looked to his inner world… that was the beginning of an outpouring from the collective unconscious from which we have the legacy of Jungian psychology.” (Pg. 14-15)
He continues with the Parsifal myth, “there is in Arthur’s court a damsel who has not smiled nor laughed in six years. The legend … is that [when] the best knight in the world appears, the damsel … will burst into laughter. The instant this damsel sees Parsifal she bursts into laughter and joy… Until the Parsifal part of a man’s nature appears, there is a feminine part of him that has never smiled… if one can awaken the Parsifal in a man, another quality in him immediately becomes happy. When the court sees the doleful maiden laughing they treat Parsifal more seriously and King Arthur knights him.” (Pg. 20)
He explains, “The Red Knight is the shadow side of masculinity, the negative, potentially destructive power. To truly become a man the shadow personality must be struggled with, but it cannot be repressed. The boy… needs the masculine power of his Red Knight to make his way through the nature world.” (Pg. 24)
He asserts, “Man has only two alternatives for relationship to his inner woman: either he rejects her and she turns against [him] in the form of bad moods and undermining seductions, or he accepts her and finds within a companion who walks through life with him giving him warmth and strength. If a man… misconstrues her… he loses his capacity for relation.” (Pg. 34)
He advises, “A woman must also understand that a man is much less in control or aware of things feminine than she is. Many women presume that a man should be as able as she to control the ever-shifting play of light and dark, angel and witch in the feminine element. No man is capable of the same kind of control as she has, and if a woman understands this she can be patient and understanding as the man bungles along some light years behind her in his feminine understanding.” (Pg. 41-42)
He outlines, “There are six basic relationships a man bears to the feminine world: … *His human mother… *His mother complex… This is his regressive capacity which would like to ... be a child again… *His mother archetype…. It is always reliable, nourishing, sustaining. *His fair maiden. This is the feminine component in every man’s psychic structure and is the … inspirer of his life… *His wife or partner… *Sophia. This is the Goddess of Wisdom.” (Pg. 49-50)
He states, “Many men try to make a flesh and blood woman fill the Grail hunger. This is to ask a woman to fulfill a role she can never carry (who can be a living archetype?) and to miss the human miracle she is in fact.” (Pg. 56)
He suggests, “We are apparently in an age where the consciousness of man is advancing from a trinitarian to a quaternarian view… This suggests we are going through an evolution of consciousness from the nice orderly all-masculine concept of reality, the trinitarian view of God, toward a quaternarian view that includes the feminine as well as other elements…” (Pg. 64)
He concludes, “The object of life is not happiness, but to serve God or the Grail. All of the Grail Quests are to serve God. If one understands this and drops his idiotic notion that the meaning of life is personal happiness then one will find that elusive quality immediately at hand. This same motif appears in a contemporary myth, ‘The Fellowship of the Ring’ by J.R.R. Tolkien.” (Pg. 79)
This book will mostly appeal to Jungians (Johnson was also a favorite of the ‘Mythopoetic Men’s Movement’ of a few decades ago). I
Robert Alex Johnson (1921-2018) was a Jungian analyst. He wrote in the Introduction to this 1989 book (first edition, 1974), “The Grail myth arose in the 12th century, a time when many people feel that our modern age began; ideas, attitudes, and concepts we are living with today had their beginnings in the days when the Grail myth took form… We must remember that a myth is a living entity, and exists within every person… The most rewarding mythological experience you can have is to see how it lives in your own psychological structure.
“The Grail myth speaks of masculine psychology. This is not to say that it is confined to the male, for a woman participates in her own inner masculinity, though it it less dominant for her… Especially as modern women take more part in the masculine world by embracing a profession, the development of masculinity becomes important to her. A woman’s masculinity or a man’s femininity is closer than one realizes. The insights of this myth will be immediate and practical for our present time.” (Pg. Ix-xi)
He tells the mythic story: “the Grail castle… is in serious trouble. The Fisher King, the king of the castle, has been wounded… yet he is incapable of dying… The cattle do not reproduce; the crops won’t grow… there is mourning everywhere---all because the Fisher King is wounded… The whole Grail castle is in serious trouble because the Fisher King is wounded. The myth tells us that years before, early in his adolescence… the Fisher King came to a camp… there was the salmon roasting over the fire, and he took a bit of it to eat… After burning his fingers on it… he put his fingers into his mouth… In so doing he got a bit of the salmon into his mouth. This is the Fisher King wound and gives its name to the ruler of much of our modern psychology. Modern suffering man is the heir to this psychological event which took place culturally some eight hundred years ago…
“Another version of the story has it that the young Fisher King … was out hunting for some experience of his passion. Another knight, a Muslim pagan, had had a vision of the True Cross and was out searching for some expression of this quest. The two came within sight of each other … and [both] went at the other… the pagan knight was killed and the Fisher King received the wound.. which blighted the kingdom for so many years.” (Pg. 1-3)
He states, “the implications of this clash … leaves us the legacy of our sensuous nature killed and our Christian vision terribly wounded. Hardly a modern man escapes this collision in his own life… His passion is killed and his vision is badly wounded… Much is to be learned from the symbol of the wounded Fisher King. The salmon… is one of the many symbols of Christ… His first contact with what will be redemption for him later in his life is a wounding…. Most Western Men are Fisher Kings… Every adolescent received his Fisher King wound. The church speaks of this wounding as … the happy fall which ushers one into the process of redemption. This is …. the graduation from naive consciousness into self-consciousness.” (Pg.[ 3-5)
He explains, “According to tradition, there are potentially three stages of psychological development for a man. The archetypal pattern is that one goes from the unconscious perfection of childhood, to the conscious imperfection of middle life, to conscious perfection of old age. One moves from an innocent wholeness… to a separation and differentiation between the inner and outer worlds with an accompanying sense of life’s duality, and then, at last, to enlightenment---a conscious reconciliation of the inner and outer in harmonious wholeness.” (Pg. 6)
He continues, “Much of modern literature revolves around the lostness and alienation of the hero… the Fisher King wound is the hallmark of modern man. I doubt if there is a woman in the world who has not had to mutely stand by as she watched a man agonize over his Fisher King aspect… The Fisher King is carried about in his litter, groaning, crying in his suffering. There is no respite for him---except when he is fishing. This is to say that the wound, which represents consciousness, is bearable only when the wounded is doing his inner work, proceeding with the task of consciousness which was inadvertently started with the wound in his youth. This close association with fishing will … play a large part in our story.” (Pg. 7-8)
He observes, “The myth is telling us that it is the naive part of a man that will heal him and cure his Fisher King wound. It suggests that if a man is to be cured he must find something in himself about the same age and about the same mentality as he was when he was wounded. It also tells us why the Fisher King cannot heal himself, and why, when he goes fishing, his pain is eased though not cured. For a man to be truly healed he must allow something entirely different from himself to enter into his consciousness and change him.” (Pg. 11-12)
He reports, “The falling out between Jung and Freud occurred over the nature of the unconsciousness. Freud said that the unconscious is the repository of all the inferior elements of the personality… Jung insisted that the unconscious is also … the artesian well from which all creativity springs. Freud would have none of this, so the two parted. That was a frightening experience for Dr. Jung… [But he] knew where to look for the cure of his desperate wound and looked to his inner world… that was the beginning of an outpouring from the collective unconscious from which we have the legacy of Jungian psychology.” (Pg. 14-15)
He continues with the Parsifal myth, “there is in Arthur’s court a damsel who has not smiled nor laughed in six years. The legend … is that [when] the best knight in the world appears, the damsel … will burst into laughter. The instant this damsel sees Parsifal she bursts into laughter and joy… Until the Parsifal part of a man’s nature appears, there is a feminine part of him that has never smiled… if one can awaken the Parsifal in a man, another quality in him immediately becomes happy. When the court sees the doleful maiden laughing they treat Parsifal more seriously and King Arthur knights him.” (Pg. 20)
He explains, “The Red Knight is the shadow side of masculinity, the negative, potentially destructive power. To truly become a man the shadow personality must be struggled with, but it cannot be repressed. The boy… needs the masculine power of his Red Knight to make his way through the nature world.” (Pg. 24)
He asserts, “Man has only two alternatives for relationship to his inner woman: either he rejects her and she turns against [him] in the form of bad moods and undermining seductions, or he accepts her and finds within a companion who walks through life with him giving him warmth and strength. If a man… misconstrues her… he loses his capacity for relation.” (Pg. 34)
He advises, “A woman must also understand that a man is much less in control or aware of things feminine than she is. Many women presume that a man should be as able as she to control the ever-shifting play of light and dark, angel and witch in the feminine element. No man is capable of the same kind of control as she has, and if a woman understands this she can be patient and understanding as the man bungles along some light years behind her in his feminine understanding.” (Pg. 41-42)
He outlines, “There are six basic relationships a man bears to the feminine world: … *His human mother… *His mother complex… This is his regressive capacity which would like to ... be a child again… *His mother archetype…. It is always reliable, nourishing, sustaining. *His fair maiden. This is the feminine component in every man’s psychic structure and is the … inspirer of his life… *His wife or partner… *Sophia. This is the Goddess of Wisdom.” (Pg. 49-50)
He states, “Many men try to make a flesh and blood woman fill the Grail hunger. This is to ask a woman to fulfill a role she can never carry (who can be a living archetype?) and to miss the human miracle she is in fact.” (Pg. 56)
He suggests, “We are apparently in an age where the consciousness of man is advancing from a trinitarian to a quaternarian view… This suggests we are going through an evolution of consciousness from the nice orderly all-masculine concept of reality, the trinitarian view of God, toward a quaternarian view that includes the feminine as well as other elements…” (Pg. 64)
He concludes, “The object of life is not happiness, but to serve God or the Grail. All of the Grail Quests are to serve God. If one understands this and drops his idiotic notion that the meaning of life is personal happiness then one will find that elusive quality immediately at hand. This same motif appears in a contemporary myth, ‘The Fellowship of the Ring’ by J.R.R. Tolkien.” (Pg. 79)
This book will mostly appeal to Jungians (Johnson was also a favorite of the ‘Mythopoetic Men’s Movement’ of a few decades ago). I
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