This is my presentation on Symbolism in Northrop Frye...

1. Topic: Symbolism in Archetypal
criticism of Northrop Frye
Paper Name: Literary theory and
criticism
Paper No.: 7
Name: Bhatt Urvi
Roll No: 32
Std: M.A.
Sem: 2
Submitted to: Department of English
Maharaja Krishnakumarsinhji Bhavnagar
University

2. Introduction
• Herman Northrop
Frye (1912-1991)
was Canadian
literary critic.
• Literary Theorist
• Most influence of
the 20th century

3. What is Archetypal
criticism?
• “Archetypal criticism looks in literature
for patterns and traces them through
works of classical antiquity into modern
texts, and interprets those reverberations
as symbols or manifestations of universal
human conflicts and desires.”
• Archetypal symbols
• Narratives or characters types

4. Human
• Wish fulfillment
• Being community
centered
Comic
Human
• Isolation
• The Fallen
Hero
Tragic
Human

5. Animal
Comic
genre
Tragic
genre
Docile and
pastoral
Predictors
and
hunters

6. vegetation
• The comedic is pastoral but also
represented by garden, park, rose and
lotuses.
• The tragic is of a wild forest

7. Mineral
• Cities, Temples are represents comic
mineral
• Tragic mineral realm is noted for being
a desert

8. Water
• Symbol of life
• Cleansing and rebirth
comic River
Tragic Flood

9. The Hero
• The courageous figure,
the one who’s always
running in and saving the
day .

10. The Outcast
• He or she has been cast out of society
or has left it on a voluntary basis.
• Figure can oftentimes also be
considered as a Christ figure.

11. Sun
• Rising Sun: Birth and Creation
• Setting sun: Death

12. Numbers
The Holy Trinity

13. stage of life: childhood, teenage,
middle age and old age
The completion of a
cycle, perfect order,
perfect number, religious
symbol.

14. Seasons
Seasons
Spring,
Rebirth,
comedy
Summer,
Life,
Romance
Fall,
Death ,
Tragedy,
Winter,
Death,
Irony

15. Other symbols
• The Task
• The Quest
• The Loss of Innocence
• Colors
• Serpent
• Wise old man
• Garden
• Tree
• Desert
• Creation
• The great fish