Lit Theory - Fry - "The Archetypes of Literature"

Northrop Frye

1.     “The Archetypes of Literature”

a.     There is the learning of a subject and there is the subject to its application.

                                               i.     One studies Physics.  However, they are learning physics to apply to nature. 

                                             ii.     People do not learn literature.

                                            iii.     Knowledge of literature is gained through the application of criticism to literary texts.

1.     There is the study of criticism.

2.     There is the application to literature in which better understanding of literature unfolds.

                                            iv.     The study of criticism can be a science.

1.     Not necessarily an exacting science, but a body of knowledge that can organized and taught.

                                             v.     Literature encompasses history and philosophy.

1.     History is needed for events and also becomes the background for interpretation.

2.     Philosophy is needed for ideas.

3.     Criticism is to art as philosophy is to wisdom and history is to action.

                                            vi.     The field of criticism is clogged with useless information.

1.     The first step is to recognize and remove useless criticism.

a.     This is to mean to rid criticism that does not add to a systematic structure of knowledge.

b.     Political and religious rhetoric fits in this category.

c.     Whatever dithers or vacillates or reacts is merely leisure conversation.

2.     The next step deals with an absolute structural approach.

a.     It becomes a series of analyses based on the mere existence of literary structure without explaining how the structures developed.

3.     A new approach needs to be developed that considers both the rhetoric and structural approach.

a.     The first postulate is a belief that we can make order out of the chaos of criticism.

b.     The approach will entail a fusion of rhetoric and science.

                                          vii.     Art is born, not made and the work separates itself from the poet upon birth.  It is the difference between form and having a formal cause of creation.

1.     Remnants of the author exist which the critic might explore.

2.     The author has their own private mythology and usages of symbols that reside in their unconscious.

                                         viii.     Genres are not addressed through history or philosophy, but emerge through literary history.

1.     Genres emerge throughout history that suggests there might be archetypes of genres and of images.

2.     To study a genre we need a social historian, a literary philosopher and a student of the history of ideas.

                                            ix.     The arts.

1.     Rhythm – arts that move in time.

2.     Pattern – arts that move in spatial.

3.     Words are linear like rhythm, and form concepts like pattern.

a.     The authors meaning is the integrity of the complete form.

4.     Myth is the informing power that gives archetypal significant to rhythm and pattern.

a.     Myth constructs a narrative around a figure that is part sun, part fertility, partly god and partly human.

5.     The cycles.

a.     The Dawn (Spring) – Archetypes of birth, revival, creation, defeat of darkness, and romance.

b.     The Zenith (Summer) – Archetypes of marriage, entering into paradise, and comedy.

c.     The Sunset (Fall) – Archetypes of the dying god, violent death, isolation and tragedy.

d.     The Darkness (Winter) – Archetypes of floods, return to chaos, and the defeat of the hero.

6.     The quest myth is fundamental.

a.     The critic will form opinions based on this cycle, but will also infuse and use science in their analysis.

7.     Central pattern of the comic and tragic vision.

a.     The Human world.

                                                                                                     i.     Comic – The human world is a community, or a hero who represents the wish-fulfillment of the reader.  Archetypes include friends, communion, and love.

                                                                                                   ii.     Tragic – Human world is tyranny or anarchy, an isolated man, the betrayed hero.

b.     The Animal world.

                                                                                                     i.     Comic – world is domesticated.  Archetype of pastoral visions.

                                                                                                   ii.     Tragic – Animals are seen as beasts, wolves, serpents.

c.     The Vegetable world.

                                                                                                     i.     Comic – Gardens, groves, parks, tree of life.

                                                                                                   ii.     Tragic – Sinister forest, tree of death.

d.     The Mineral world.

                                                                                                     i.     Comic – World is a city, or a building, or temple.  Archetype of geometrical images, starlight dome.

                                                                                                   ii.     Tragic – Deserts, rocks and ruins, or sinister geometrical images.

e.     The Unformed world.

                                                                                                     i.     Comic – World is a river, the four humors or blood, phlegm, choler and black bile.

                                                                                                   ii.     Tragic – World becomes the sea, floods, sea monsters.

8.     End notes.

a.     The tables are over simplified.

b.     This is just an idea for an approach to literary understanding.

            Works Cited

Fry, Northrop. “The Archetypes of Literature.”  The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism.  Ed. Vincent B. Leitch et al.  2^nd ed. New York: W.W.Norton & Co., 2010. 1301-1316. Print.