Popular Culture Review Vol. 10, No. 2, August 1999 | Page 107
Archetypal Metaphor and
The Shadow Radio Drama
All the most powerful ideas in history go back to archetypes.
Carl Jung (45-6)
All cultures appear to share beliefs in archetypal heroes that model the
ideal virtues of humanity in general and of the culture in particular. Indeed, Northrop
Frye believed that the heroic quest was the central archetype of narrative literature
(16-18). Ray Browne stated it this way:
Heroes serve as models and leaders of people and nations because
they reflect the projection of the consensus of the dreams, fanta
sies, self-evaluations and needs of individuals and of society it
self Heroes like a lens concentrate the power of people, of a na
tion and serve as the muscle for the movement and development
of a people, which they epitomize. (91)
Though all eras have had heroes, the advent of mass communication tech
nology has perhaps made the heroic archetype more pervasive than ever. Roger R.
Rollin observed that mass communication has accelerated the production of myth
in general and heroic myth in particular (30-31).
Heroes frequently employ a common set of archetypal metaphors in the
construction of their heroic narratives. Some of the most common archetypes that
occur in heroic myth are the hero’s birth and rebirth, the conflict of good (repre
sented by the hero) and evil, the hero’s use of magic or other superhuman abilities,
the heroic quest, and the consummation or triumph of the hero.
If, as Rollins suggests, it is true that archetypal heroes become even more
prevalent in a mass communication culture, it should be informative to examine
the heroes of America’s first broadcasting mass medium: radio. This study will
explore how archetypal metaphor figures in constructing the myth of the greatest
of the radio heroes.
Archetypal Metaphor and The S h adow Radio Drama
When the continuing dramatic series developed on radio in the early 1930s, heroic
drama quickly became one of its most popular forms (MacDonald 29,42). Heroic
drama came in a number of variations—adventure, detective, mystery, sciencefiction, western—^but all had one thing in common: a strong heroic character (or
characters) battling the forces of evil. In other words, radio heroes were arche
typal heroes, as J. Fred MacDonald wrote: “Radio heroes, like most champions in