Mad Men and the Power of Storytelling
Storytelling is the most ancient form of both entertainment and history. The oral tradition has handed down fables for generations that stand in for history, tell the story of peoples, and create the archetypes of heroes. In his book, The Hero With a Thousand Faces , Joseph Campbell described how across all cultures in the world there was a version of the “Hero’s Journey.” An underdog must undertake a great task, through completion of this journey find self discovery, and return home as the hero of one’s people. The television series Mad Men follows the epic self-destruction of a 1960’s advertising executive. The seven-season show is tragic, and while the main character Don Draper is deeply flawed, he is also a brilliant advertising creative. My favorite scene in the series is a pitch Don makes for a Kodak slide machine, featuring a wheel of slides. He begins the pitch by describing that most advertising relies on the fact that a product is new, that people are driven to have the n...
