An Archetypal Reading of the Mythic Representations in Seamus Heaney's Selected Poems

Archetypes reveal the shared roles among universal societies. This archetype may create a shared imaginary which is defined by many stereotypes that have not separated themselves from the traditional, biological, religious and mythical framework. In the same way, archetypal criticism represents that body of many stereotypes including plot structure, symbols, character type, themes that occur in mythology, religion, and stories across cultures and time periods. Heaney poetry has rested on a wide range of mythic patterns and archetypal images, particularly the image of the scapegoat/sacrificial victim and earth goddess. His archetypal images have been identified with the contemporary issues in his country. Therefore, this paper explores the underlying archetypal pattern that Heaney implies in some selected poems. These poems target the mythological heritage of his homeland which he either celebrates or criticized. His poems exhibit the poet's unconscious attachment to the universal archetypes which set social phenomena.

Archetypal Posturing of Soyinka’s Stylistic Modes in the Trials of Brother Jero

Soyinka’s deep immersion in mythology coupled with his stylistic modes in the portraiture of the archetypal trickster hero, as utilized in some of his comic plays, demonstrate a genius whose creative works anchor both the collective universal literary tradition and a domesticated form that defines his uniqueness. Drawing interpretive insights from Frye’s archetypal criticism and the Jungian psychology, this essay examines how Soyinka appropriates the archetypal figure as a monumental image in the play, The Trials of Brother Jero, and how his stylistic choices in the handling of the hero craft a new psycho-social role of picaresque mythology.

An Analysis on the Pursuit of Happiness in The Lord of the Rings

Since The Lord of the Rings was adapted by Peter Jackson into trilogy film in 2001-03, it has astounded its critics and gratified its fans and students. Many critical journals or graduation papers have also talked about this massive novel. After doing a lot of reading concerning these reviews, it’s clear that most of them analyze this work using psychoanalytical criticism; myth and archetypal criticism; cultural studies, and recently ecocriticism. Among these theories, psychoanalytic interpretation mainly focuses on Freud’s key ideas, namely the id; ego; and superego. According to Freud’s theory that: “Psychoanalytic literary criticism is not simply about interpreting a text’s protagonists. It also seeks to relate the text to the mind of its author.”(Berg, 2003, p.84). In this circumstance, this paper will probably dig some new insights by using this theory. The paper will follow the protagonist’s inner mind through employing Freud’s some key ideas, such as repression and projection. Based upon psychoanalytic analysis of the protagonists, this paper tries to argue that the three Hobbits can acquire happiness as long as they deal properly with the relationship between themselves and the society. In other words, common people can also push the wheel of history as long as they code well with themselves and the society.

The "Motherland": An Archetypal and Postcolonial Reading of Ghassan Kanafani's Umm Saad

Working at the intersection of postcolonial and archetypal criticism, this article investigates the role of women in resistance literature by looking at a piece of postcolonial Arabic fiction, Ghassan Kanafani's Umm Saad (1969). Rooted in Arab politics concerning land rights and anti-Zionist struggle, the text offers a related archetypal approach to the depiction of women in politicized literature. Umm Saad allegorizes the struggles of Palestinians to reclaim their land. A poor peasant woman, the titular heroine embodies the intimate connection between Palestinians and their land, acting as a helper to combative men and a primal symbol for attachment to the enduring land. Umm Saad is a personal mother and a trope for a feminized colonized territory, metaphorically representing the Palestinian nation and assuming mythological features enabling her to identify with the Earth Mother to send a message against dispossession. Since she embodies positive mother archetype symbolism (the personal mother and the Earth Mother), she acts as a source of fertility and protection. Expressing a political statement via the mother archetype, Kanafani appeals to a basic human need, i.e. the need to settle down in one’s land, which makes woman an indispensible part of the collective unconscious of any nation. Keywords: Archetypal Criticism; Kanafani; Mother(land); Postcolonial Arabic Fiction; Umm Saad.

An Analysis on The Chrysanthemums based on the Perspective of Archetypal Criticism

The Chrysanthemums is a short story written by John Steinbeck, a modern American writer. The short story reveals the heroine’s inner pain and spiritual pursuit by taking the chrysanthemums as a central image and clue. The paper aims to analyze the short story based on the perspective of archetypal criticism. It mainly includes three parts: the first one is about archetypes of images and characters, the second part is to analyze the archetype of motif, and the third part is about the archetype of narrative structure.

Archetypal Theme of Ambivalent Identity in Le Anne Howe’s Moccasins Don’t Have High Heels and The Red Wars

The current study examines archetypal patterns and themes underlying contemporary Native American initiation fiction. Moccasins Don’t Have High Heels and The Red Wars, both written by Le Anne Howe, are informed by the conventions of initiation fiction. The portrayal of characters with uncertain identities and feelings of alienation and solitude is a recurring theme in both works which are approached from the viewpoint of archetypal criticism. The research claims, questions and aims are stated in the introduction, which also offers an overview of Native American literature, initiation fiction, and archetypal criticism. An archetypal reading of Howe’s stories is presented in the Discussion. Research findings and analysis outcomes are stated in the Conclusion.

Archetypes in Biak folktales: characters, symbols, and concepts

Characters, symbols, concepts, patterns, ideas, images, and many more are similar across the globe. This is because people are similar around the world to put it simply. But to put it in a more sophisticated way, these similarities are there because all human ancestors originated from the same place i. e Africa and later spread all around the globe together with the unconscious patterns of images, ideas, etc. inherited in their genes and universally present in individual psyches. These similarities in characters, symbols, concepts, patterns, and others are called archetypes. Using archetypal criticism, this article will present a number of archetypal characters, archetypal symbols, and archetypal concepts found in the Biak (in Papua) folk stories with discussions of similar characters, symbols, and concepts from around the globe. One very famous example of archetypal character in the Biak stories is Manarmakeri in the Manarmakeri myth with the famous archetypal symbol which found its way to be in the ‘Bintang Kejora’ (the Morning Star) flag of the Papua Freedom Movement called Sampari (also Makmeser), and the archetypal concept of a bountiful era, like Eden, called Koreri still sought for until today.

The Beauty of Evil” – On the Uniqueness of Arson in Literary Works

Fire is of great significance in the process of human civilization, carrying multiple functions such as hunting, sacrifice, cooking, and punishment. Arson, as one of the means of destroying objects, often appears in literary and artistic works. Why arson has become a means of evil favored by creators, and occasionally presents a strong sense of beauty in the text. This article will start with Bertha Mason’s arson in "Jane Eyre", linking classic texts with arson as an important plot, such as "Burn the Warehouse" and "Golden Pavilion", and explore the unique literary meaning of the dialectic of the beauty and evil of arson in combination with archetypal criticism.

ARCHETYPE «SHADOW” IN «STALINKA” BY OLES ULYANENKO

The article deals with Oles Ulyanenko’s first novel «Stalinka» (1994), which presented the appearance of a new extraordinary artist in literature. Today we have a lot of research for this novel and the writer’s works in general, with a radically opposite representation of the artistic component of his works. There are studies, and not only in which the artist is accused of immorality and other «sins», but also those that contain attempts to define the writer as a kind of seer. Such ambiguity and, at the same time, high appreciation of the work of the writer by P. Zahrebelnyi, who initiated the awarding to the novice writer of the unique Small Shevchenko Prize (1997) for the novel «Stalinka», as well as F. Shteinbuk’s monograph «Pid Znakom Savaofa» or «Tam, de …» Ulyanenko» (2020) opened new dimensions for the analysis of the writer’s work. It inspired the author of the publication to comprehend the work of the extraordinary artist from archetypal criticism. The selection of the archetype «shadow» is represented in work in various guises. It is dominant for understanding the characters of the work. The interpretation of the text with the selection of this archetype helps reveal new meanings encoded by the author and gives the work new dimensions in understanding the author’s hyperbole of human sins. The publication argues that the malignant transformation of the individual is the result of external influences associated with the totalitarian reality of Stalin’s time. The general situation in the country has objectified the «shadow” archetype as the collective unconscious in its worst manifestations. Man’s overcoming of his dark nature is presented in the novel through the image of Lord-Yonka, who undergoes a kind of initiation, i.e., a series of dedicated trials, and eventually overcomes the dark part of his soul, becomes ready for another life.