MYTHOLOGY &

ARCHETYPE CRITICISM
Literary Criticism

 Aulia Annisyatur Rachmi

 Lusi
 Rima Nadayanti Sabi’is
 Widy Handayani
Outline
Outline >>>

 Definition of Mythological and Archetypal Criticism

 Three Different Facets of Mythological and
Archetypal Criticism
 Brief Historical of Archetypal Criticism
 Major Archetypal Critics
i. Frazer
ii. Jung
iii. Frye
Definition of Mythological and Archetypal
Criticism
Mythological criticism

Literary criticism that

Has references to famous
mythological stories in
works of literature

These references in
Myths are symbolic of
people’s hopes fears,
values, and other
philosophical ideas
ARCHETYPAL CRITICISM

literary criticism that focusing

on recurring myths and
archetypes (from the Greek
archē, "beginning," and typos,
"imprint") in the narrative,
symbols, images, and character
types in literary work

Examples of archetypes are

images (such as water, sun,
certain colors or numbers,
circles, the serpent, garden,
tree, desert) “the hero,” "the
earth mother", "the soul mate,"
"the trickster," motifs or
pattern, and genres.
 ARCHETYPAL CRITICISM

Archetypal literary criticism is a

type of critical theory that
interprets a text by focusing on
recurring myths and archetypes.

Origins are rooted in 2

academic disciplines :
It was popular in the 1940s and
1. Social anthropology
1950s with the work of Canadian
2. Psychoanalysis
literary critic Northrop Frye.
 MAJOR ARCHETYPAL CRITICS
1. Frazer
The Golden Bough (1890 – 1915), written
by the Scottish anthropologist Sir James George
Frazer, was the first influential text dealing with
cultural mythologies.

Death-rebirth
myth.

Present in almost all ultural The myth symbolized by

mythologies, and is acted out in terms the death (i.e. Final hervest) and
of growing seasons and vegetation. rebirth (i.e. Spring) of the god of
vegetation.
iii. Frye Part of

The Archetypes of
Anatomy of Criticism
Literature

New Criticism x
Anatomy of
Criticism Օ Structuralism
and Semiotics
iii. Frye (Continued…)

“Play an essential role in refashioning the

material universe into an alternative
verbal universe that is humanly intelligible
and viable, because it is adapted to
essential human needs and concerns"
(Abrams 224-225).
The function and effect of archetypes
based on Frye
iii. Frye (Continued…)
Framework

• Comedy; Spring.
Comedy • Romance; Summer.

• Tragedy; Autumn.
Tragic • Satire; Winter.
 iii. Frye (Continued…)
Tragic; isolation,
tyranny, and the
fallen hero Human

Water Animal Tragic; predatory

Comedy; represented and hunters (wolves)
by rivers. Five different
spheres

Tragic; desert, ruins, Mineral Vegetation

or "of sinister geometrical
images" (Frye 1456)
iii. Frye (Continued…)

Schema in "The Archetypes

of Literature" is simplistic,
makes room for exceptions
by noting that there are
neutral archetypes.
Neutral

Island

Circe Prosper
o