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Life Arts    H4'ed 9/3/24

Young Lynda Carter as Wonder Woman (REVIEW ESSAY)

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Thomas Farrell
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However, I agree with Robert Moore that each archetype of maturity has two bipolar "shadow" forms but only one optimal and positive form. In short, eight archetypes of maturity = sixteen bipolar "shadow" forms.

In the book The Lover Within: Accessing the Lover [Archetype] in the Male Psyche by Robert Moore and Douglas Gillette (William Morrow, 1993b), they discuss the two "shadow" forms of the masculine Lover archetype (see esp. pp. 159-187). One "shadow" form of both the masculine Lover archetype and the feminine Lover archetype is the Impotent Lover. The other "shadow" form is the Addicted Lover.

As the beautiful young Lynda Carter portrays Wonder Woman in the Wonder Woman television series, Wonder Woman/ Diana Prince represents neither "shadow" form of the feminine Lover archetype, but the optimal and positive form of the feminine Lover archetype.

Now, Robert Moore and Douglas Gillette discuss masochistic tendencies and sadistic tendencies as the two bipolar "shadow" forms of the masculine Warrior archetype that all boys and men and all girls and women have in the psyches in their book The Warrior Within: Accessing the Knight [Archetype] in the Male Psyche (William Morrow, 1992a, pp. 121-131 for The Masochist "shadow" form and 132-142 for The Sadist "shadow" form).

BDSM porn videos feature porn actors acting out The Masochist "shadow" form and The Sadist "shadow" form.

In any event, Moore and Gillette say the following about The Masochist "shadow" form of the masculine Warrior archetype: "Impotent men are grieving. They are hurt and in pain. Self-emasculated by their own impotent rage, they have underdeveloped Ego structures and inadequate Ego-archetypal axes. Consequently, they fall under the power of the bipolar archetypal Shadow systems. For the Warrior [archetype], the two poles of the Shadow are the Sadist and the Masochist" (p. 121).

"Often after trauma a psyche fractures into Ego-identified and Shadow-engaged features" (p. 122).

Here are two statements about that "shadow" forms of the Lover archetype from Moore and Gillette's 1993b book:

(1) "Boys must build a wall between themselves and their mothers in order to get the distance they need to experience themselves as fully masculine. . . . The father plays the crucial role at this juncture. . . . Fathers need to nurture their sons in order to show them that while they do have to separate from their mothers in order to achieve a masculine identity, they do not have to forfeit warm and intimate relationships in the process" (p. 162).

(2) "Emotional paralysis comes from the shock and the fear of having had our psychological boundaries invaded, of having been the recipients of emotional abuse, of having been unable to break the 'merger' with the mother. Impotence is its result. If we are raised by a mother who is an 'inconstant love-object,' who alternates offerings of love, nurturing and affirmation with attacks, invasions, and criticisms, we learn to be on alert all the time. We learn to beware of the next 'lightning bolt' which might fall unprovoked out of the sky" (p. 164).

The single most important book that I know of about psychological healing of our deep traumatic wounds from early childhood is the later John Bradshaw's book Healing the Shame That Binds You, expanded and updated second edition (Health Communications, 2005; first ed., 1988).

Now, for girls and women, Lynda Carter's portrayal of Wonder Woman most likely registers on them and their psyches as the optimal positive form of the feminine Warrior archetype in their psyches. In other words, she is like the goddess Athena, the goddess of war, in The Odyssey.

But girls and women most likely are also able to relate positively to the beautiful and charming Diana Prince, with her beautiful eyes and charming smile - and her well-covered-up body.

Wonder Woman's magical powers symbolically represent the optimal and positive form of the feminine Magician archetype that is in the psyches of all girls and women and of all boys and men. However, I suspect that Wonder Woman's optimal and positive form of the feminine Magician archetype in the psyches of all girls and women and on all boys and men does not register much at all in the psyches of girls and women or in the psyches of boys and men. Her magical powers most likely register on my people's psyches as part of the comic-book fantasy associated with Wonder Woman - not as symbolic expressions of the powers associated with the optimal and positive form of the feminine Magician archetype in the psyches of all girls and women and of all boys and men.

As to the optimal and positive form of the Queen archetype that is in the psyches of all girls and women and of all boys and men, Wonder Woman's mother is the Queen. Wonder Woman herself is a princess. And so the Queen archetype is largely in the background in the television series.

In conclusion, check out the DVD version of the Wonder Woman television show (1976-1979) starring the beautiful young Lynda Carter. In her wonderfully revealing Wonder Woman costume, she is wonderful to watch!

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Thomas James Farrell is professor emeritus of writing studies at the University of Minnesota Duluth (UMD). He started teaching at UMD in Fall 1987, and he retired from UMD at the end of May 2009. He was born in 1944. He holds three degrees from Saint Louis University (SLU): B.A. in English, 1966; M.A.(T) in English 1968; Ph.D.in higher education, 1974. On May 16, 1969, the editors of the SLU student newspaper named him Man of the Year, an honor customarily conferred on an administrator or a faculty member, not on a graduate student -- nor on a woman up to that time. He is the proud author of the book (more...)
 

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