Apr 05 2008
Mytho Crit notes
I think this is roughly what I said.
A lot of writers utilize mythopoeia in their work. It can be found in pieces from long ago such as Homer’s The Odyssey and William Blakes’ or Shelley’s poetry, or in more recent pieces such as C.S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia, Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings or, to some, the Star Wars movies.Mythopoeic criticism is a fairly easy concept to grasp. It is the application of archetypes to a piece of literature or art. These archetypes are familiar or long-standing symbols, characters or stories. So these archetypes are either universal and innately known, or subtle but can be traced to other ‘well known’ knowledge – the Bible, myths, legends, etc.. There are different theories in reference to archetypes, which I think is what Mary will be talking about later. Mainly, what archetypes do is appeal to some primal knowledge, and in doing so the piece of writing conveys another meaning than the obvious one, or we can understand it more.
Some are very easily recognizable, such as
The Quest, The Hero, The Wise Old Man, The Damsel in Distress
The Journey, Death and Rebirth, Transformation, The Magic Weapon
There are others that we may understand intrinsically, but do not realize that we know. Examples:
Colors -
red (blood, disorder, passion)
green (fertility, growth, hope, or sometimes negatively as rot/decay (think mould))
black (darkness, evil, death, the unknown)
white (purity, innocence, terror, the blinding truth)
yin-yang
serpent
Some archetypes are strange at first, but once explained, one can understand them. These include:
numbers-
3 – light, unity
4 – life cycle (think seasons)
7 – the perfect order
Mythopoeic criticism can also divide and assign each genre a season according to the emotions related to the genre and the nature of the season.
Spring – Comedy (going from state of unpleasantness to pleasantness, resurrection)
Summer – Romance (achievement, fulfillment – summer is when plants ripen, etc., marriage)
Autumn – Tragedy (season or state of things ‘falls’ into sadness – things begin to die)
Winter – Irony (nightmares come true. Hope dies, times are harder, goals that have been achieved in summer are now not.)
Another theme mythopoeia really concentrates on is cyclic time (so the moving from birth to death, and back again). Also, some critics (Frye) use the GREAT CHAIN OF BEING (deity, human, animal, plant, mineral). This comes into play when looking at Frye’s ‘poles’ of myth.
One pole is demonic/experience, the other is apocalyptic/innocence. This goes with Blake’s Songs of Innocence (look for a poem called The Lamb) and Songs of Experience (look for a poem called The Tyger).
If you need clarification on the poles of myth, ask and I’ll explain.
