Joseph Campbell (1904-1987) was an American writer and scholar who specialized in comparative mythology and religion. When he died he had just completed the PBS documentary Joseph Campbell and the Power of Myth (1988), which was broadcast originally as a series of conversations between Campbell and Bill Moyers. This documentary series was incredibly influential on Jim Carroll at the time he conceived of the idea of The Petting Zoo and throughout his writing of the novel.
Wikipedia has a nice summary of Campbell’s concept of monomyth, which I find to be central in The Petting Zoo. Here’s part of the overview:
As a strong believer in the psychic unity of mankind and its poetic expression through mythology, Campbell made use of the concept to express the idea that the whole of the human race can be seen as engaged in the effort of making the world “transparent to transcendence” by showing that underneath the world of phenomena lies an eternal source which is constantly pouring its energies into this world of time, suffering, and ultimately death. To achieve this task one needs to speak about things that existed before and beyond words, a seemingly impossible task, the solution to which lies in the metaphors found in myths. These metaphors are statements that point beyond themselves into the transcendent. The Hero’s Journey was the story of the man or woman who, through great suffering, reached an experience of the eternal source and returned with gifts powerful enough to set their society free.
I will have to check with with NYPL’s Jim Carroll Archive to verify whether or not Carroll had the companion book for the series, but I am pretty sure he did. I remember reading it, and I am pretty sure the copy I read was his.
Learn more about Joseph Campbell on Wikipedia.
Learn more about the PBS documentary Joseph Campbell and the Power of Myth on Wikipedia and PBS.