In his major work, The Anatomy of Criticism, he states: 'I mean by an archetype a symbol which connects one poem with another and thereby helps to unify and integrate our . So much I challenge that I may profess He seems to breathe an atmosphere as fateful as that of King Lear, but more confined and oppressive, the darkness not of night but of a close-shut murderous room. Archetypal analysis is an appropriate model for customer heterogeneity whenever the underlying structure is best defined by the extremes. Archetypal Criticism Volume I. BASIC PREMISES OF ARCHETYPAL THEORY: 1. 125-126). Mythological critics compare one work to others with similar story . Northrop Frye, however, further developed this theory in his book Anatomy of Criticism and later in his essay 'The Archetypes in Literature . However, as the play progresses, jealousy clamps down his mind, and his decisions are colored with jealousy that Desdemona is betraying him, leading him to kill her and take his own life. During the play Iago manipulates Othello because Lieutenant Cassio was promoted ahead of him, and also because he suspects that Othello has had an affair with his wife. By trying to hide the fact that Othello had murdered her, Desdemona has chosen to put the honor of their love above honesty. Frye's thesis in "The Archetypes of Literature" remains largely unchanged in Anatomy of Criticism. Desdemona senses a change in Othello and she has a feeling that she will die soon due to the hands of Othello. Kibin. Othello assumes that Emilia is helping Desdemona in her infidelity. According to Aristotle, a tragic protagonist is a nobleman or person from high status, who contributes to his own demise and illustrates a flaw or weakness in judgment. A tragic hero has many characteristics, 3 of them being that they must have an error in judgement, they must have a reversal of fortune, and they must recognize that the reversal of fortune was brought about by their own actions. The tragic protagonist must make a fall from a high state of being to a low state or death. OTHELLO: Iago critics. Othello is a Moorish (African) general in the Venetian army and an eloquent storyteller who is respected, but often treated as an outsider. His imagination is excited to intense activity, but it is the activity of concentration rather than dilation. Issues of genre, period, and language were ignored or subjected to gross generalization as Jung searched for universals in texts as disparate as the fourth-century Shepherd of Hermas, the Divine Comedy, Francesco Colonnas Hypnerotomachia Poliphili (1499), E. T. A. Hoffmans tales, Pierre Benoits LAtlantide (1919-20), and Henry Wadsworth Longfellows Hiawatha, as well as works by Carl Spitteler and William Blake. For Frye, as William K. Wimsatt and Cleanth Brooks put it, archetype, borrowed from Jung, means a primordial image, a part of the collective unconscious, the psychic residue of numberless experiences of the same kind, and thus part of the inherited response-pattern of the race (Literary Criticism 709). "An Archetype Criticism of Othello, a Play by William Shakespeare." Othello also matches Aristotle's ideas of tragic hero because our Othello realizes the error of his ways, causing us to feel sympathy for him. And the 1980s saw a new, suggestive, and controversial direction in archetypal studies of literature: the feminist. James Hillman, Archetypal Psychology: A Brief Account (1983), Re-Visioning Psychology (1975); C. G. Jung, Collected Works (ed. Considered according to this definition, the concept becomes a useful tool for literary analysis that explores the synthesis of the universal and the particular, seeks to define the parameters of social construction of gender, and attempts to construct theories of language, of the imaginal, and of meaning that take gender into account. Othello A Christian Moor who has earned a high reputation as a general in the Venetian army and has recently married Desdemona, daughter of the Venetian senator Brabantio. For Cassirer, reason alone cannot lead to truth, but mythical thinking which focuses on immediate experience is essential. Othello Zootopia Act 1 The wall Othello is referring to are the Walls of Nicosia which surround the capital city Nicosia in Cyprus. Even when Desdemona was found after Othello strangles her, she still believed that her death was not the fault of Othello. . Kibin, 2023, www.kibin.com/essay-examples/an-archetype-criticism-of-othello-a-play-by-william-shakespeare-yJF4zltX. Jung was also more preoccupied with dreams and fantasies, because he saw them as exclusively (purely) products of the unconscious, in contrast to literature, which he oddly believed, citing Joyces Ulysses as an example, was created in the full light of consciousness (15:123). This juxtaposition between Othello's transparency and Iago's duality identifies him as a sympathetic character despite his actions. Moreover, Shakespeare, by deliberately clouding the issue of Iagos motive, finds ever more sinister threats in such a characters apparently bottomless and unmerited hatred and capacity for evil. Each literary theory will examine the text through different lenses, resulting in different interpretations. FREE Archetype Essay Essay - Example Essays This recurring idea of an evil witch is extremely common and archetypal. : 2022625 : archetypal criticism in othello Toril Moi, trans. Othello, a play that was written in 1604 by William Shakespeare, is an example of a type of story called a tragedy. Throughout the course of the work, Othello proves himself to be very easily misled, despite his heroic status. Such characters can be found in works of fiction, long or short, and in more poetic works. Unlike the other Shakespeare tragedies, which follow the common ideas for Shakespearean tragedy, Othello includes some of the ideas from classical tragedies. http://www.kibin.com/essay-examples/an-archetype-criticism-of-othello-a-play-by-william-shakespeare-yJF4zltX, ("An Archetype Criticism of Othello, a Play by William Shakespeare. However, for Othello this is not the case. Desdemona and Othello, therefore, face the usual challenges of the lovers in a Shakespearean comedy who must contend with the forces of authority, custom, and circumstances allied against their union. The Women of Othello There are only three female characters in Othello, and each plays a critical role in Shakespeare's artfully crafted plot of jealousy and retribution. Bibliography O, damn her, damn her! R. F. C. Hull, 2 vois., 1973-75). It has been mentioned earlier that pattern in literature refers to recurrent images, forms and words. Some of these include the downfall from high position Othello goes from being the general, to being convicted of being a murderer. Archetypal criticism gets its impetus from psychologist Carl Jung, who postulated that humankind has a "collective unconscious," a kind of universal psyche, which is manifested in dreams and myths and which harbors themes . Othello is decisive, confident, and secure in his identity, duty, and place in the world. Unfortunately, this got the ball rolling for Othellos inevitable downfall. She stayed loyal to her lover throughout the entire play and in the end it did her no good. A archethpes symbol or myth leads to the establishment of a general truth. "Othello", by William Shakespeare, is a story of jealousy's potential to manipulate thoughts and eventually lead to ultimate demise. Farewell / Commend me to my kind lord. And concomitantly, on which of these levels was the reader affected? QAFQAZ UNIVERSITY SPRING, 2013. They're not intended to be submitted as your own work, so we don't waste time removing every error. Misled by the handkerchief, his love token to Desdemona, that Iago has planted in Cassios room and by a partially overheard conversation between Iago and Cassio, Othello, by the end of act 3, forsakes his wife and engages himself in a perverse version of the marriage ceremony of act 2 to Iago. "Who can control his fate?" Ralph Manheim, 1974); Morris Philipson, Outline of a Jungian Aesthetic (1963, reprint, 1991); Annis Pratt et al., Archetypal Patterns in Womens Fiction (1981); Jos van Meurs and John Kidd, Jungian Literary Criticism, 1920-1980: An Annotated Critical Bibliography of Works in English (with a Selection of Titles after 1980) (1988); William K. Wimsatt, Jr., and Cleanth Brooks, Literary Criticism: A Short History (1957). Carl Jungs Contribution to Psychoanalytic Theory. (V.2.320-322) Giving up is hardly Othello's style, but this is how a noble and true man should react when he has mistakenly killed his wife. When he realizes the grave mistake he had made by taking an honest Desdemona's life he can no longer live with himself. Home Drama Criticism Analysis of William Shakespeares Othello, By NASRULLAH MAMBROL on July 25, 2020 ( 0 ). By the end of the play, he has brought down his world around him with the relentless force that made him a great general turned inward, destroying both what he loved best in another and in himself. Emilia comes into the couples bedroom after Othello smothers Desdemona, but hears Desdemona cry out. Act 3, one of the wonders of the stage, anatomizes Othellos psychic descent from perfect contentment in his new wife to complete loathing, from a worldview in which everything is as it appears to one in which nothing is as it seems. Not only does she try to protect Othellos reputation by blaming herself, Desdemona tells Emilia to remind Othello about her showing that she stills respects Othello. The concept of the archetype is a venerable philosophical principle that came into new prominence and usage in the twentieth century with the development of archetypal literary criticism . To protect the anonymity of contributors, we've removed their names and personal information from the essays. Even though Othello had a reputation as a hero, he ends up being one of the most gullible characters in the play when he completely falls into the evil trap that Iago set for him. Their discourse is conducted in poetic language; that is, their notions of soul-making come from the Romantics, especially William Blake and John Keats. Othello is characterized by his plainspoken read analysis of Othello Iago Othello's disloyal standard-bearer and the villain of the play. Iago will direct the remainder of the play, constructing Othellos down-fall out of the flimsiest evidence and playing on the strengths and weaknesses of Othellos nature and the doubts that erode Othellos faith in Desdemona. Othello is generally regarded as Shakespeares greatest stage play, the closest he would ever come to conforming to the constrained rules of Aristotelian tragedy. As mine own face. Jung and the Humanities: Toward a Hermeneutics of Culture. After confronting Desdemona of her crimes he decides to carry out his overall plan to end his trues loves life. William Shakespeare, born in the year 1564, is often considered to be one of the greatest, if not the greatest, writer in the English language. Othello: Damn her, lewd minx! An archetype criticism of othello, a play by william shakespeare. Frye's work helped displace New Criticism as the major mode of analyzing literary texts . Posted on . From the theorists, dissertations, articles, and books, often traditionally academic in orientation, appeared; the productions of the practitioners are chronicled and critiqued in van Meurss bibliography. Given this background, it is not surprising to find in a 1976 essay entitled Jungian Psychology in Criticism: Theoretical Problems the statement that no purely Jungian criticism of literature has yet appeared (Baird 22). Kibin, 2023. http://www.kibin.com/essay-examples/an-archetype-criticism-of-othello-a-play-by-william-shakespeare-yJF4zltX. Desdemonas true morals is her absolute devotion to her husband. Beat a Venetian and tradud the state, To wronged Othellos service. The character of Iago is so conducted, that he is from the first scene to the last hated and despised. In the essay Frye critically analyses literature against the backdrop of rituals and myths. If we carefully examine the third scene in the third act, we can see how Othello fits into Aristotle's definition of tragic hero. Archetypes Archetypal criticism focuses on patterns in a literary work that commonly occur in other literary works. The critic is at the center of interpretive activity, and the critic functions as teacher, interpreter, priest, seer. Innocent characters also suffer, like Desdemona. But Wheelwright, for example, barely mentions Jung (The Burning Fountain, 1954), and he, Fergusson, and others often owe more to Sigmund Freud, Ernest Jones, Oedipus Rex, and the Oedipus complex than to anything taken from Jung. Iago leads Othello to suspect that love and devotion are shams disguising the basest of animalistic instincts. Twere now to be most happy, for I fear Othellos motivation in the play appears to be his love and concern for his wife Desdemona, which ironically, ends up being his downfall in the end. The formerly self-sufficient Othello has now staked his life to his faith in Desdemona and their union, and she has done the same. Othello, likewise, has tradud the state and has changed from noble and valiant Othello to a beast, with the passion that ennobled him shown as corrosive and demeaning. Othello as a character of noble blood seems to conform to all these. Often in our society people are labelled as, or fit into a, certain character mould and their behaviour and actions remain consistent. The moment he showed violence towards Desdemona, the audience lost interest in comforting Othello. If Hamlet is a tragedy about youth, and Lear concerns old age, Othello is a family or domestic tragedy of a middle-aged man in which the fate of kingdoms and the cosmos that hangs in the balance in Hamlet and Lear contracts to the private world of a marriages destruction. Of one that loved not wisely but too well, He suffers barbs and preconceived notions, yet Othello is esteemed and wins the love of the daughter of a nobleman. Archetypal theory then took shape principally in the multidisciplinary journal refounded by Hillman in 1970 in Zurich, Spring: An Annual of Archetypal Psychology and Jungian Thought. Mythological literary critics look for archetypes, characters and/or symbols with traits that are seen throughout literature regardless of time or place. Commend me to my kind lord. Their union is opposed by Desdemonas father, Brabantio, and by a rival for Desdemona, Roderigo, who in the plays opening scenes are both provoked against Othello by Iago. 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O my souls joy, Indeed, the psychological resonances of the drama, along with its provocative racial and gender themes, have caused Othello, perhaps more than any other of Shakespeares plays, to reverberate the loudest with current audiences and commentators. 1: 4), but he distinguishes his concept and use of the term from that of philosophical idealism as being more empirical and less metaphysical, though most of his empirical data were dreams. Within these three days let me hear thee say But heres my husband; Archetypal criticism proceeds from the initial assumption that every work of literature can be categorized and fitted into a large framework that encompasses all literature. To you, preferring you before her father, Further, myth critics, aligned with writers in comparative anthropology and philosophy, are said to include Frazer, Jessie Weston, Leslie Fiedler, Ernst Cassirer, Claude Lvi-Strauss, Richard Chase, Joseph Campbell, Philip Wheelwright, and Francis Fergusson. He interprets literature in the light of various rituals and myths. Human emotions have a lot of power over how we react to situations in life, the trick is learning how to not let them take over. 2. Iago reviews Othellos performance as a lover by stating, O, you are well tuned now, / But Ill set down the pegs that make this music. Iago will now orchestrate discord and disharmony based on a life philosophy totally opposed to the ennobling and selfless concept of love demonstrated by the newlyweds. In Shakespeare's, An outburst that othello has in a crowd of his peers causes people to start to question their noble leader. Archetypal Literary Criticism. Wow! Archetypal criticism is a type of literary criticismexamining the presence of archetypal characters within a piece of literature. . He offers throughout the play multiple justifi cations for his intrigue: He has been passed over in favor of Cassio; he suspects the Moor and Cassio with his wife, Emilia; he is envious of Cassios open nature; and he is desirous of Desdemona himself. Cinthios version of Iago is conventionally driven by jealousy of a superior and lust for his wife. In The Tragedy of Othello, Shakespeare details the story of a celebrated military hero who falls victim to the machinations of a conniving villain who goes by the name of Iago. But the great literary text for Jungs life and work was Johann Wolfgang von Goethes Faust, not because of its literary qualities but because he sensed that the drama expressed his own personal myth (Letters 1:309-10). : In this quote, Othello is stating that his wife's supposed infidelity has ruined his name and turned it "black" and dirty like his own face, showing that a woman's fidelity was linked to a man's honor. to view the complete essay. I do perceive here a divided duty: Shakespeare often focuses his plays on human nature as well as fate, which Othellos fate ended in the tragic ending due to his reversal of fortune once the claims against Desdemona begin. 2. Examples of Archetype in Shakespearean Works. (And nope, we don't source our examples from our editing service! Thus archetype is recognized as the tendency to form and reform images in relation to certain kinds of repeated experience, which may vary in individual cultures, authors, and readers (Lauter and Rupprecht 13-14). While adding to the tone of the story it also adds to the characters overall personality from the reader's perspective. And will upon the instant put thee tot. Othello, being a hero, enjoys a good reputation and has notable qualities. The critical annotations are astute and, given their brevity, surprisingly thorough and suggestive. Due to the Moor, my lord. Because of that, it has generated a lot of literary criticism in the 400 years since it was written and first . The men of the play manipulate her image of a naive lover to being a strumpet! (V.ii.94). OTHELLO: My name, that was as fresh. "In Sidney's view, tragedy provokes "the affects of admiration and commiseration" and so demonstrates "the uncertainty of this world". Eliot, Samuel Taylor) characterize themselves as realists, pragmatic, practical, eschewing the supporters of the so-called weaker Othello, who conversely tend to describe themselves as somehow morally elevated, more empathetic. At the center of the plays intrigue is Shakespeares most sinister and formidable conceptions of evil in Iago, whose motives and the wellspring of his villainy continue to haunt audiences and critics alike. Nor set down aught in malice. Evil is displayed before him, not indeed with the profusion found in King Lear, but forming, as it were, the soul of a single character, and united with an intellectual superiority so great that he watches its advance fascinated and appalled. He is a character of high stature that is destroyed by his surroundings, his own actions, and his fate. The concept of the archetype is a venerable philosophical principle that came into new prominence and usage in the twentieth century with the development of archetypal literary criticism through the theories of psychologist C. G. Jung and literary theorist Northrop Frye. Archetypal criticism is a product of both cultural anthropology and psychoanalysis which are academic fields that might seem to be far from the concept of archetypal criticism. The tragedy of Othello is not a fault of a single person, but is rather the consequence of a wide range of feelings, judgments, misjudgments, and attempts for personal justification revealed by the characters. In the beginning of the play, Othello is seen as content with his new bride: For know, Iago, But that I love the gentle Desdemona (1.2.24-25). An archetype is recurrent. Hillman also discovers archetypal precursors in Neoplatonism, Heraclitus, Plotinus, Proclus, Marsilio Ficino, and Giambattista Vico. The direction of Othello criticism will also be affected as literary criticism's longstanding commitment to cultural historicism comes under pressure from those who argue that explorations of context often come at the expense of literature's formal properties and affective registers, and as developments in the digital humanities enable fresh