The Archetypes of Literature.... Northrop Frye

Northrop Frye, in full Herman Northrop Frye, Canadian educator and critic who wrote much on "Canadian Literature" and culture and became best known as one of the most important literary theorists of the 20th century.

1.What is Archetypal Criticism? What does the Archetypal critic do?

In literary Criticism the term " archetype" denotes recurrent narratives designs, patterns of actions, character- type, themes & images which are identifiable in a wide variety of works of literature, as well as in myths, dreams and even social rituals.
Such recurrent items are held to be the result of elemental & universal forms or patterns in the human psyche, whose effective embodiment in a literary work evokes a profound response from the attentive reader, because he or she shares the psychic archetypes expressed by the author.

2.What is Frye trying to prove by giving an analogy of "Physics to Nature" & "Criticism to Literature"?

Northrop Frye has given a very unique idea of Archetypal Criticism by comparing the human emotions or human Characteristics with the cycle of seasons.

●Each season is aligned with a literary genre:-
1.Comedy with SPRING
2.Romance with SUMMER
3.Tragedy with AUTUMN
4.Satire with WINTER.

◆ Spring :-

The spring season represents the Comedy. As per the genre of comedy is characterized by the birth of the hero, revival & resurrection. Spring also symbolizes the defeat of winter & darkness.

◆ Summer:-

The season of Summer indicates Romance because Summer is the culmination of life in the seasonal celendar, & the romance genre culminates with some short of triumph,usually marriage.

◆ Autumn:-

Autumn season signify the genre of Tragedy. As the autumn is the dying stage of the seasonal calendar that's why the Autumn is parallels to the genre of Tragedy, because the genre of Tragedy is known for the fall on demise of the protagonist.

◆ Winter:-

The season of winter denotes the satire genre because of it's darkness. It's a disillusioned & mocking form of the three other genres. It is notes for its darkness, dissolution, the return of chaos & the defeat of heroic figure.

3. Share your views of Criticism as an organised body of knowledge. mention relation of literature with his & philosophy.

Literature is central division of the Humanities, flanked on one side by History & on the other side by Philosophy.
Here we can say that history and philosophy are twin pillars of literature. History represents what was happened in past.Basically history is about past events & actions. While philosophy is about morality & ethics of life & literature.
Frye has used the word "Centrifugal" which means to go away from literature & find background to understand literature.
    So for the better understanding of literature readers have to refer framework of history & philosophy for the understanding of ethics.

4. Briefly explain inductive method with illustration of Shakespeare's Hamlet's Grave Digger's Scene.

Inductive method is journey which leads from specific to general. As we read some specific literary work & comes to a general conclusion, in this way we extend from specific outcome to general outcome.
    The best example of this method is grave digging scene from Hamlet. It is a specific scene & from that scene we come to some general conclusion.
    In that scene there were two grave diggers & they seemed in quite in harmony with their work. They were talking with one another & singing a song during the time of grave digging. They were also mocking on dead Ophelia & commented that whether she allowed to buried or not. Here we can see that they have no grief for deadly one.

5. Briefly explain deductive method with reference to an analogy to Music, Painting, Rhythm & Pattern. Give example of the outcome of deductive method.

Deductive method is a journey from general to specific.Music & Rhythm both are the form of an art. Music is a form of art which moves in time and Painting also is a form of art which moves in space. Music is rhythm and painting is a pattern. In a music we can understand the rhythm of it while in painting we can understand the pattern of it. Rhythm is a narrative form, while pattern is simultaneous mental grasp of verbal structure and it has meaning and significance. It provides a mental visuals. By listening some of the music we can't get everything, but when we see the visual images (paintings) ...we can get the actual idea of the patterns.

6. Refer to the Indian seasonal grid. If you can, please read small Gujarati, Hindi or English poem from the Archetypal approach & apply Indian seasonal grid in the interpretation.

According to Hindu scriptures, the 6 seasons are:-
1.Spring
2.Summer
3.Monsoon
4.Autumn
5.Pre-Winter
6.Winter

    Here poet talks about the 5 different seasons in this above poem through the student.

Five different seasons are:-
●Spring
●Summer
●Autumn
●Monsoon &
●Winter
In the very beginning of the stanza student talks about Spring season. He wanted to dance & also sing a song by seen the beauty of the spring.
The season of spring indicates the lots of happiness in nature or we can say that it brings a new life for nature as well as human life.
But here we can find a major difference between Western seasonal & Indian seasonal grid. In the Western world Spring symbolizes the defeat of winter & darkness while in the India Spring is symbolizes as the new life of Nature.

Thank-you.