ARCHETYPAL or MYTH CRITICISM

1. ARCHETYPAL or MYTH CRITICISM patterns that transcend time and geography

2. “Whether we listen with aloof amusement to the dreamlike mumbo jumbo of some red-eyed witch doctor of the Congo, or read with cultivated rapture thin translations from the sonnets of the mystic Lao-tse; now and again crack the hard nutshell of an argument of Aquinas, or catch suddenly the shining meaning of a bizarre Eskimo fairy tale, it will be always the one, shape-shifting yet marvelously constant story that we find.” (3) Joseph Campbell Hero With a Thousand Faces

3. “We all travel, if not in space in time. And since the first strolling teller-of-tales enthralled his audience at the first campfire, we have all loved travelers and travelers’ tales. From Gilgamesh through Odysseus to Bilbo Baggins and Frodo, the epic journey and its hero continue to capture our imagination.” Rodney Standen The Changing Face of the Hero

4. Archetypal critics account for a universality in literature by pointing to recurring patterns and images that appear so deeply embedded in the human mind and culture that they strike a responsive chord in everyone.

5. Archetypal Criticism • also called Myth Criticism • has roots in anthropological and psychological studies • Late 19th and early 20th centuries

6. Sir James Frazer • Cambridge anthropologist • examined primitive rituals that indicated similar patterns of behavior and belief among diverse and widely separated cultures

7. Frazer... • The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion (1922) - 12 volumes • explanation of motives behind customs • Italian people of the shores of Lake Nemi • rule of kingly succession was to pluck the bough from a sacred tree and then kill the old king in individual combat • found this custom was similar or connection of other customs in other peoples

8. Gilbert Murray • “Hamlet and Orestes” in The Classic Tradition in Poetry • found similarities in Shakespeare’s Hamlet and the Greek Orestes • both are sons of kings killed by younger kinsmen who then marry the dead king’s wife • both are driven by supernatural forces to avenge their father’s death • both end not only by slaying the new king but also by being responsible for their mother’s death

9. Murray... • explores connection in the mythic patterns underlying the Greek Orestes saga and the Scandinavian Hamlet story. • behind both is the “world-wide ritual story of what we may call the Golden-Bough Kings” (Murray 228) • pattern identified by Frazer in which life is renewed through the slaying of an old monarch and succession by a new one.

10. Carl Jung • psychologist • student of Freud • The Basic Writing of C.G. Jung • first gave prominence to the term archetype

11. Carl Jung • Collective Unconscious • Shared by all humans • an unconscious “which does not derive from personal experience and is not a personal acquisition but is inborn” (Jung 289)

12. Carl Jung • Archetypes • contents of the collective unconscious • defined as primordial or “universal images that have existed since the remotest times” (Jung 288) • formed during the earliest stages of human development

13. Carl Jung • Although the theory may seem almost mystic, Jung found no other way to account for the appearance of nearly identical images and patterns in the mind of individuals from wholly different cultures and backgrounds.

14. Jung... • Jung notes instances which suggest that • water is a symbol of the unconscious and the action of descending to the water is a symbol of the frightening experience of confronting the depths of one’s unconscious. • dreams of Protestant clergymen • legends of African tribes

15. Jung... • Jung’s account of a patient who in 1906 related visions containing odd symbolic configurations. • later he encountered similar symbols in a Greek papyrus first deciphered in 1910

16. Jung • Theory of Individuation • A psychological “growing up” • A process of learning of one’s own individuality • A process of self-recognition which is essential to becoming a well-balanced person • Neuroses are result of person’s failure to confront and accept archetypal components of the unconscious

17. Jung… • Inherited components of the psyche • Principles Archetypes • Animus • Anima • Shadow

18. ANIMUS • Physical man • Represents physical, brute strength of man and his animal instincts • Can be the “masculine” designation of the female psyche

19. ANIMA • The “soul image” • The spiritual life-force • The “living thing in man, that which lives of itself and causes life…” “…the archetype of life itself” (Jung, Archetypes 26) • Feminine designation in the male psyche • Associated with feelings, passions, instinctive, unconscious aspect of the psyche

20. SHADOW • The darker side of our unconscious self • Inferior, less pleasing aspect of the personality • Represents “the dangerous aspect of the unrecognized dark half of the personality” (Jung, Two Essays 94) • Needs to be suppressed • When projected, this archetype becomes • The villain • The devil

21. The theory of archetypes would explain not only such instances as these but also the similarity of myths and rituals found by Frazer, for archetypes are universal patterns from which myths derive.

22. Joseph Campbell • Monomyth pattern

23. Maud Bodkin • Archetypal Patterns in Poetry (1934) • among first literary studies in the Jungian tradition • application of psychological knowledge to works of literature

24. Bodkin... • Rime of the Ancient Mariner • rebirth archetype • “night journey under the sea” • going down to the water (into depths of one’s own being) [death] precedes a “rebirth” into greater wisdom and self-knowledge • Jonah - biblical parallel

25. Northrop Frye • Anatomy of Criticism: Four Essays (1957) • Relies solely upon literature to draw the archetypal patterns. • Calls the theory of collective unconscious an “unnecessary hypothesis in literary criticism” (Frye 112)

26. Frye... • Shifts definition of archetype from psychological to the literary • Archetype is “a symbol, usually an image, which recurs often enough in literature to be recognized as an element of one’s literary experience as a whole” (Frye 365)

27. Frye... • four types of literature (narrative patterns) • mythos • Unifying myth • analogous to seasons of year • to the story of the birth, death, and rebirth of the mythic hero

28. Frye... • Mythos of SUMMER: Romance • analogous to the birth and youthful adventures of the mythic hero • suggests innocence and triumph • narrative of wish-fulfillment with good character triumphing over bad • Sir Gawain and the Green Knight • Robin Hood • old-fashioned cowboy movies

29. Frye... • Mythos of AUTUMN: Tragedy • major movement toward the death or defeat of the hero • Oedipus • King Lear

30. Frye... • Mythos of WINTER: Irony or Satire • hero now absent • society is left without effective leadership or sense of norms/values • Swift’s A Modest Proposal • social norms are turned upside down for artistic purposes • Conrad’s Heart of Darkness • Kafka • Camus • sense of hopelessness and bondage

31. Frye... • Mythos of SPRING: Comedy • rebirth of hero • renewal of life in which those elements of society who would block the hero are overcome • hero and heroine take their rightful place • order is restored • Shakespearian comedies

32. Frye... • Every work of literature has its place within this scheme or myth. • Every piece of literature adds to the myth.

33. Leslie Fiedler • Begins examination with literary works themselves, rather than with universal patterns • Concerned with defining unique cultural patterns within literature • An End to Innocence: Essays on Culture and Politics (1955) • Love and Death in the American Novel (1962)

34. Fiedler... • Uses insights of archetypal criticism to isolate patterns within literature of a given culture or author. • An End to Innocence • sees a single, though controversial, archetype: • “the mutual love of a white man and a colored…the boy’s homoerotic crush, the love of the black…” (Fiedler 146)

35. Fiedler... • Argues that where in European novels we would expect to find heterosexual passion, we discover same-sex relationship • James Fenimore Cooper • Natty Bumppo and Chingachgook (Leatherstocking novels – TheLast of the Mohicans, The Deerslayer, etc.) • Herman Melville • Ishmael and Queequeg (Moby Dick) • Mark Twain • Huck and Jim (Adventures of Huckleberry Finn)

36. Fiedler... • American pattern that may be limited historically • Is a pattern that repeats itself • Seems widely shared at a level beneath consciousness • Is for Fiedler, “a symbol, persistent, obsessive, in short, an archetype” (Fiedler 146)

37. Bibliography Bodkin, Maud. Archetypal Patterns in Poetry, London: Oxford UP, 1934. Campbell, Joseph. The Hero With a Thousand Faces. New York: Pantheon, 1949. Fiedler, Leslie. An End to Innocence: Essays on Culture and Politics. Boston: Beacon, 1955. --------. Love and Death in the American Novel. Cleveland: World, 1962.

38. Bibliography Frazer, Sir James George. The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion. 1922. New York: McMillan, 1940. Frye, Northrop. Anatomy of Criticism: Four Essays. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1957. Guerin, Wilfred L. et. al. A Handbook of Critical Approaches to Literature. 4th ed. New York: Oxford UP, 1999. Jung, Carl Gustav. The Basic Writings of C.G. Jung. Ed. Violet Staub De Laszlo. New York: Modern, 1959.

39. Bibliography Murray, Gilbert. The Classical Tradition in Poetry. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1927. Standen, Rodney. The Changing Face of the Hero. Wheaton, IL: Theosophical Publishing House, 1987.