Notable class 7 February

Most important critical works in the entire world: Aristotle's "Poetics," Erich Auerbach's "Mimesis: The Representation of Reality in Western Literature," and, of course, our darling Frye's work.

Aristotle & Goldilocks: the Epic is too big, Lyric is too small, but Tragedy is "just right"
(more on Tragedy to come next week with a presentation by the Autumn group)

A statement I don't understand: "Literature is teleologically moving toward perfection."
Teleological: the explanation of phenomena by the purpose they serve rather than by postulated causes
ORIGIN mid 18th cent.(denoting the branch of philosophy that deals with ends or final causes): from modern Latin teleologia, from Greek telos ‘end’ + -logia
I still don't get it.

The way I think about archetypes is that they are like a child's coloring book. (A friend once told me that "Finnegans Wake" is really just a big coloring book) A child readily recognizes the outline for a princess, a hero, a wicked step-mother, but each child chooses different colors for the hair, cape, or dress. In the same way, an archetype provides an outline which each culture "colors" according to its particular context.

Both Freud and his student Jung developed their own particular notions concerning archetypes. For Freud, the archetypes are personal and can be identified through dreams. Dreams are wish fulfillment and/or displacements of trauma. Freud also believed that we can access everything (memories) that has happened.

For Jung, archetypes are a result and expression of a collective unconscious so his archetypes are universal rather than personal.

Joseph Campbell, another archetypes disciple, believes that myths are de-personalized dreams and vice versa. Campbell inspired mythopoiesis. Characteristic of the mythopoetic movement was a tendency to retell fairy tales and engage in their exegesis as a tool for personal insight. Using frequent references to archetypes as drawn from Jungian analytical psychology, the movement focused on issues of gender role, gender identity and wellness for modern men and women. Advocates would often engage in storytelling with music, these acts being seen as a modern extension to a form of "new age shamanism" popularized by Michael Harner at approximately the same time. (courtesy Wikipedia - just for Wayne)

Sue presented on her alternate identity, Black: this is not as a color, but as a repression of death. Thanatos is the primordial representation of death whose twin is Hypnos. He brings pain and grief. Also associated is Hades, a hidden presence whose confrontations on earth are always violent (i.e. the abduction of Persephone). Hillman insists on a move from pseudo negro-psychology to a genuine shadow-psychology to understand this powerful symbolism.

Also presenting were groups on Frye: Archetypal symbolism, Apocalyptic imagery, and Demonic imagery.
Archetypal: communal - how the community understands the symbols
Dianoia: process of thinking, thought, intelligence, understanding
ritual - dream - myth: myth give narrative to ritual and meaning to dream
We examined Wallace Stevens' "The Emperor of Ice-Cream" who is also Thantos.
"The poem is something seen with poem-seeing eyes." This is a loose definition...perhaps too loose for my comfort.
Apocalyptic: "everything is potentially identical with everything else"
This is not about the end of the world, but about revelation: transubstantiation

Question: So we can plug in any literature to these forms...what do we get out of it all? If every character is merely a version of the same archetype, what is the value or purpose of creating new stories? Even if we can identify the fairy tale that is being displaced, why do we still listen, smile and nod to the rhythms of the familiar patterns of three, stock characters, and faery images?

Final presentation was Bree with his Sickness: Hillman argues that a sick animal is not a projection of what we need to heal in ourselves, but an image trying to drag us down into hell/underworld. The soul is going through a putrefaction, not necessarily a negative image because even rotting/mold/rust indicates growth of some sort.
This reminded me of the advice my father gave me one time. He told me that if I ever found myself lost on the prairie that I should look for water with lots of green scum because that would be a sure indication that the water would be good. A deadly pool of water would be that which holds no sign of life, green or otherwise. If the algae like it, it would be good enough for me. I have yet to put this to the test.