ENGLISH LITERATURE NOTES

ELM 301 – LITERARY CRITICISM AND THEORY – II

Northrop Frye biography and his contribution to literature

Herman Northrop Frye,

Born July 14, 1912, Sherbrooke, Canada

Died on Jan 23 1991, Toronto

Was a Canadian Educator and literary Critic.

wrote much on Canadian literature and culture and became best known as one

of the most important literary theorists of the 20th century.

Frye was educated at the university of Toronto

He studied Theology and Philosophy

He was ordained a minister in the Unite church of Canada in 1936.

He received a scholarship to do postgraduate work at Merton College, Oxford.

He returned to Canada in 1939 and taught at Victoria College, Toronto.

Frye became chairman of the English department there in 1952.

Served as principal (1959–67)

Served as chancellor (1978–91) of the college.

He gave lectures and taught throughout the United States and Great Britain

and around the world.

In 1947 he published Fearful symmetry.

In 1957 he published Anatomy of Criticism.

MYTH, FICTION AND DISPLACEMENT ON NORTHROP FRYE

The purpose of this study was to examine Northrop Frye’s way of looking

literature through his four essays. His approach is designed in the specific

essays;

First, Theory of modes,

Second, Ethical Criticism: Theory of Symbol,

Third, Archetypal Criticism: Theory of Myth,

Fourth, Rhetorical Criticism: Theory of Genres.

The finding showed that every work of art can be categorized as fiction in

Frye’s literary criticism theory. In other word, fiction is an artistic strategy to

tell idea by deceiving a story. Meanwhile, the relation between myth and

literature is established by studying genres and conventions of literature. In

addition, the displacement meant as a technique to make sure that reader of

myth and fiction will get the true message of the story. In

other word the displacement will really occurs when the reader can find the

complete fiction rather than a partial ideology. We hope that the finding will

provide valuable insight to the reader to internalizes the literary traditions of

comedy, romance, tragedy, and satire so thoroughly that they can be brought

to bear concurrently upon whatever text he reads.

Archetypal literary criticism definition:

Archetypal literary criticism is a type of critical theory that interprets a text by

focusing on recurring myths and archetypes.

Achetypes meaning:

In Greek Arche means Beginning and Typos imprint in the narratives symbols

images, and character types in literary works. its an acknowledged form of

literary criticism dating back to 1934. Muad Bodkin a classical scholar

published Archetypal patterns in Poetry.

ELM 302 - MODERN EUROPEAN DRAMA

Biography of Alexander Pushkin author of Eugene Onegin

Alexander Sergeyev ich Pushkin

Born may 26th 1799 Moscow

Died January 29th 1837 saint-Petersburg

Russian poet novelist dramatist short story writer

Greatest poet and founder of modern Russian literature.

He grew up with his sister and a brother with his maternal grandmother

like all aristocratic families in early 19th century questions parents adopted

French culture

His brother and sister and himself learn to talk and read in French

Maternal grandmother told him lot of stories about his ancestors in Russia.

He was a precocious imaginative child He read widely in his father's library and

gave the stimulus from the literary guests who came to the house

In 1817 Pushkin accepted a post in foreign office at Saint Petersburg and he

started writing verses on a program which widely circulated in manuscript and

he took part in the December rising of 1825.it was the unsuccessful

culmination of Russian revolution reform movement in its earliest stage.

For those political poems question was banished from Saint Petersburg in 1822

remote South province.

He was taken ill but still continued to travel and wrote some of his famous

works.His bitterness continued exile in is expressed in letters to friends the

first of a collection of correspondence that became an outstanding and

enduring monument of Russian prose .

During exile he also plunged into the life of a society in amorous intrigue, hard

drinking gaming and violence.

During this time, he fell passionately in love with the wife of a superior who

was the governor general of the province.

Due to this reason he was exiled from there also.

In 1825 he was proved innocent and he returned from exile.

In 1831 Pushkin married Natalya Nikolayev undertook UP Government position

in Saint Petersburg.

His wife enjoyed the social life but it was ill suited for creative work.

He was unhappy both in domestic affairs and official duties. He repeatedly

requested the authorities to accept his resignation and allow him to retire to

the country and devote himself entirely to literature but it was all rejected.

In 1837 Pushkin was wounded while defending his wives honour in a dual

forced on him by influential enemies. He had fallen into debts and faced

scandalous rumours that is why I was having a love affair.

He was attacked by his brother-in-law a French officer who attempted to

seduce Pushkin’s wife Natalia. This 12 took place on 27th January at the Black

river and Pushkin was critically wounded a bullet entered his hip and

penetrated his abdomen two days later on 29th January Pushkin died of

peritonitis. At Pushkin’s wife's request he was put in the coffin in evening dress

not in chamber credit uniform provided by the tsar.

Pushkar had four children from his marriage to Natalia. Maria, Alexander,

Gregory and Natalia.

Some of his works are the

bronze horseman

The stone guest

Mozart and Salieri

the shot (short story)

His use of Russian language is astonishing, its simplicity and profoundness

forms the basis of style for later novelists. Pushkin the creator of Russian

literary language stood as a cornerstone of Russian literature.

BEL -301 BRITISH LITERATURE II

Alexander Pope author of Rape of Lock Biography.

Pope was born on May 21, 1688, in London, England, the son of Alexander

Pope, a London linen merchant, and his second wife, Edith Turner. Pope

attended two Catholic academies before the family moved from London in

1700 to live in the village of Binfield. A new law, prohibiting Catholics from

living within ten miles of the city of London, forced the family to move. The

relocation to Binfield enabled Pope to make enduring friendships with other

Catholic exiles like himself. Pope’s early education was sporadic. He learned to

read and write at home and was taught Latin and Greek by priests. By the age

of twelve, he was already well versed in Greek, Roman, and English literature,

and he diligently emulated the works of his favourite poets. At twelve, Pope

contracted Pott’s disease, a tuberculosis of the spine, from infected milk. The

disease left him with a crooked spine and a severe weakness, which caused

him almost continual headaches for the rest of his life.

Pope’s first published work, “Pastorals,” a group of lyric poems on rural

themes, was published in 1709. Two years later, he published “An Essay on

Criticism,” a treatise on literary theory written in verse couplets. The

impressiveness of this feat caught the attention of English literary society, and

with the publication of the first two cantos of The Rape of the Lock in 1712

(expanded to five cantos in 1714) Pope was regarded as one of the most

prominent poets of the age. He eventually became the first independently

wealthy, full-time writer in English history.

Despite such success, Pope suffered throughout his career from recurring

attacks against him for his Catholicism, his political sympathies, and his literary

criticism, which often raised the anger of the authors he analysed. Some of

these attacks were personal, commenting unfavourably upon his physical

appearance. Much of Pope’s later satirical writings were aimed at those who

had criticized him over the years. Pope’s last years were spent revising the

body of his writings in preparation for a complete, edited edition of his works.

He died on May 30, 1744 of acute asthma and dropsy before the task was

completed.

Rape of the Lock synopsis:

The Rape of the Lock was written by Alexander Pope and first published in

1712, then reworked and published again in 1714. The poem is a mock-epic

that satirizes the upper-class in London at the time. The story focuses on the

central character, Belinda, whose lock of hair is cut off at a social gathering.

Although trivial to most, Belinda is outraged that her lock of hair has been cut

by the Baron. In the Rape of the Lock, Pope uses Belinda and the Baron to

mock two of his acquaintances, Arabella Fermor, and Lord Petre. The poem

follows the events of the night, leading up to Belinda’s “horrific” loss.

Pope wrote The Rape of the Lock in response to a request made his friend John

Caryll, a prominent Roman Catholic of the time. Caryll explained that his friend,

Lord Petre, had cut off a lock of Arabella Fermor’s hair. Ever since the incident,

the families had been feuding. In order to make light of the situation, Pope

wrote The Rape of the Lock. “The stealing of Miss Belle Fermor’s hair, was

taken too seriously, and caused an estrangement between the two families,

though they had lived so long in great friendship before. A common

acquaintance and well-wisher to both, desired me to write a poem to make a

jest of it, and laugh them together again. It was with this view that I wrote the

Rape of the Lock.”

BEL 501- BRITISH LITERATURE ( 1798 – 1914)

Lines Written in Early Spring by William Wordsworth :

Lines Written in Early Spring is a landscape poem that is largely concerned

with nature. ... As the poet sits there and muses on nature, its beauty, and its

seamless existence, his thoughts turn briefly to the misery of man, and to the

miseries that they wrought on each other.

Lines and meanings of stanzas :

I heard a thousand blended notes,

While in a grove I sate reclined,

In that sweet mood when pleasant thoughts

Bring sad thoughts to the mind.

William WordsworthIn summary, Wordsworth sits in a small woodland grove

and listens to the birdsong around him.

To her fair works did Nature link

The human soul that through me ran;

And much it grieved my heart to think

What man has made of man.

But although happy thoughts are prompted by the birdsong, so are more

sombre ones: nature has forged a strong connection between itself and the

soul of mankind, but man has repaid the favour by making a mess of his

relations with his fellow man.

Through primrose tufts, in that green bower,

The periwinkle trailed its wreaths;

And ’tis my faith that every flower

Enjoys the air it breathes.

Wordsworth admires the flowers – the primrose, the blue of the periwinkle,

the greenness of the woodland area in which he sits – and the birds which

‘hopped and played’ around him.

The birds around me hopped and played,

Their thoughts I cannot measure: —

But the least motion which they made

It seemed a thrill of pleasure.

Brief biography of Wiliam wordsworth :

BEL 502 – INDIAN WRITING IN ENGLISH

Swami and Friends : synopsis

Swami and Friends is the first of a trilogy of novels written by R. K. Narayan

(1906–2001), English language novelist from India. The novel, the first book

Narayan wrote, is set in British India in a fictional town called Malgudi. The

second and third books in the trilogy are The Bachelor of Arts and The English

Teacher.

Malgudi Schooldays is a slightly abridged version of Swami and Friends, and

includes two additional stories featuring Swami from Malgudi Days and Under

the Banyan Tree.

Plot Summary

The story revolves around a ten year old school boy named Swaminathan and

his friends. Throughout the novel he is called as Swami. All the events take

place in Malgudi, A fictional town. Swami wakes up a bit late on a Monday

morning. As usual, his father scolds him for not getting up in time and his

grandmother comes to defend him as mostly she does throughout the novel.

His father takes him strictly and scolds him for not completing his homework.

Swami rushes through his homework and then he goes to School. He is

studying in Albert Mission School. He feels bored in the class. He gets a poor

grade in Mathematics. Swami gets involved in some arguments with his class

teacher, Mr. Ebenezar, a Christian ideologist. Mr. Ebenezar criticizes the

practices of Hindu religion, like Idol Worship. Swami and his friends feel

offended. Swami tells about this to his father. Next day, he comes with a letter

from his father to the headmaster complaining against that teacher for not

giving respect to non-christian boys and their religion. The headmaster scolds

Ebenezar and also asked Swami to report to him in the future but not to his

father.

Swami also tells his friends about the letter. Among his friends, there are Mani,

Somu, Sankar and Samuel. Mani is a mighty boy, lazy at times and not so good

at study. Somu is the class monitor. Sankar is very sharp and intelligent in

study. Samuel is nick named as 'The Pea' for his height. Later in the evening,

Swami and Mani sit on the banks of the Sarayu river and they are talking about

Rajam, one of their classmates. Rajam is the son of a wealthy Police

Superintendent. Mani does not like Rajam and he wants to throw him into the

river. Mani sees Rajam as his rival. Swami says that he will always take his side.

But at the same time, Swami wishes him to reconcile with Rajam. In the school,

Mani challenges Rajam for a fight to prove who is better and more powerful.

Swami acts a mediator between the two. They decide to meet for the fight on

the banks of the river. But when the time for the fight comes, Rajam suggests

that they should become friends and Mani agrees. By their reconciliation,

Swami is the one who is the happiest of all. He has great admirations for Rajam

for his good qualities.

(1906–2001). R.K. Narayan was one of the best known and most esteemed

Indians writing in English. He was essentially a storyteller and he did not blaze

new trails in fiction writing, but he tried to convey a sense of the land and the

people he knew so well. He was sometimes compared to the United States

writer William Faulkner, who also drew elaborate stories out of his own

regional experience.

Rasipuram Krishnaswami Ayyar Narayanswami was born in Madras, India, on

Oct. 10, 1906. He was raised by his grandmother. He studied at Maharajah

College in Mysore, which is now the University of Mysore, and graduated from

there in 1930. Narayan worked as a teacher, but he left that profession to

write full-time. He published his first novel, Swami and Friends, in 1935. It told

of a group of boys in the fictional southern Indian town of Malgudi. The town

was the setting for many of Narayan’s subsequent works. His friend Graham

Greene recommended his work to a publisher, and he suggested that the

author shorten his name to R.K. Narayan at the time that Swami and Friends

was published.

Narayan’s works included novels, short-story collections, essays, and

translations of Indian epics. His richly painted novels included The English

Teacher (1945), which explored the pain Narayan experienced after the death

of his young wife; Waiting for the Mahatma (1955); The Guide (1958); The

Man-Eater of Malgudi (1961); Gods, Demons, and Others (1965); The Vendor

of Sweets (1967); A Tiger for Malgudi (1983); Talkative Man (1986); The World

of Nagaraj (1990); and The Grandmother’s Tale (1995). His best-known story

collections included Lawley Road (1956); A Horse and Two Goats and Other

Stories (1970); Under the Banyan Tree and Other Stories (1985); and A

Storyteller’s World (1989). Many of the short stories were originally written for

the Madras newspaper The Hindu. Narayan was praised for his prose versions

of The Ramayana (1972) and The Mahabharata (1978). In 1974 he published

My Days: A Memoir (1974).

Malgudi, the town Narayan invented and explored in his novels, became a part

of Indian literary history. Readers felt as if they knew the town. It had strong

similarities to the Madras of Narayan’s childhood and the Mysore of his later

years. Themes of tradition versus individuality also pervaded Narayan’s work,

along with the kinds of ironies people faced in their daily lives in India. Modern

urban existence often did not seem natural in a life of tradition, but Narayan’s

characters often lived simultaneously in the present and the past. His style was

straightforward and graceful, with a modest humor and a marked elegance.

Narayan did not consider himself to be a devout Hindu, but spirituality was

present in the lives of his characters. The author’s works were translated into

every European language as well as Hebrew. His prose was flavorful and quite

distinct from American or British English. Most Indian writers of his stature

traveled abroad for long periods of time to write, lecture, and teach, but

Narayan did not. On a rare visit to a foreign country, the United States,

Narayan wrote an essay that angered some expatriate Indians living there. “My

America” left the impression that Indian citizens who left India to build a life in

the United States had abandoned the beauty, simplicity, and spirituality of

their homeland.

His awards included the national prize of the Indian literary academy, Sahitya

Akademi, in 1958 for The Guide. In 1964 Narayan received the Padma

Bhushan, a coveted Indian award for distinguished service to literature. He was

a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and an honorary member of the

American Academy of Arts and Letters. Several seats in India’s Parliament were

reserved for those who had achieved distinction in the arts, sciences, or

literature. In 1989 Narayan was named to one of those seats in the Council of

States (Rajya Sabha), the nonelective house of Parliament in India. He died on

May 13, 2001, in Chennai,