be changed in his society and what conserved. The operative word here is “know.”
“Universities and the Deluge of Cant” (1972), Northrop Frye’s Writings on Education (2001), CW, 7.
It is essential for the teacher of literature, at every level, to remember that in a modern democracy a citizen participates in society mainly through his imagination.
“Elementary Teaching and Elemental Scholarship” (1963), Northrop Frye’s Writings on Education (2001), CW, 7.
Civilization
But for better or worse, our civilization, if it survives at all, will be one in which criticism and literature, that is, the theory and practice of literature itself, will be two parts of one thing.
“Literary Criticism” (1963), “The Critical Path” and Other Writings on Critical Theory, 1963–1975 (2009), CW, 27.
Civilization is not merely an imitation of nature, but the process of making a total human form out of nature, and it is impelled by the force that we have just called desire.
“Second Essay: Ethical Criticism: Theory of Symbols” (1957), Anatomy of Criticism: Four Essays (2006), CW, 22.
In the civilized state of humanity we love those who are close to us: for those farther away we feel the tolerance and good will which express love at a distance. In the pure state of nature we feel only possessive about those close to us, and hostile and mistrustful of those further away. The latter do all sorts of vaguely irritating things, like speaking different languages, eating different foods, and holding different beliefs.
The Double Vision (1991), Northrop Frye on Religion (2000), CW, 4.
The totality of imaginative power, of which the matrix is art, is what we ordinarily call culture or civilization.
“Part One: The Argument,” Fearful Symmetry: A Study of William Blake (1947, 2004), CW, 14.
The oldest civilization in the modern world is the American one, which was established in its present form in 1776.
“The Church and Modern Culture” (1950), Northrop Frye on Modern Culture (2003), CW, 11.
Clarity
No darkness can comprehend any light; no ignorance or indifference can ever see any claritas in literature itself or in the criticism that attempts to convey it, just as no saint in ordinary life wears a visible gold plate around his head.
“Criticism, Visible and Invisible” (1964), using claritas as a synonym for clarity or intensity, “The Critical Path” and Other Writings on Critical Theory, 1963–1975 (2009), CW, 27.
Classes
The social energy which maintains the class structure produces perverted culture in its three chief forms: mere upper-class culture, or ostentation, mere middle-class culture, or vulgarity, and mere lower-class culture, or squalor.
“Tentative Conclusion” (1957), Anatomy of Criticism: Four Essays (2006), CW, 22.
But it would be wrong to forget that the average American does not think of the rich and poor as separate classes, but as lucky and unlucky branches of an undifferentiated society he does not even think of as middle-class.
“The Present Condition of the World” (1943), Northrop Frye on Literature and Society, 1936–1989: Unpublished Papers (2002), CW, 10.
We have already got to the point where the phrase “leisure class” makes no sense. Perhaps our grandchildren will be living in a world in which the phrase “working class” makes even less sense.
“The Teacher’s Source of Authority” (1978), Northrop Frye’s Writings on Education (2001), CW, 7.
Classic, Literary
The word “classic” as applied to a work of literature means primarily a work that refuses to go away, that remains confronting us until we do something about it, which means also doing something about ourselves.
“The Double Mirror” (1981), Northrop Frye on Religion (2000), CW, 4.
Masterpiece and classic don’t mean inherent formal qualities but a locus of social acceptance. Perhaps they emerge when acceptance becomes recognition, a vision of form irradiating it.
Entry, Notebook 54-8 (late 1972–77), 13, Northrop Frye’s Notebooks on Romance (2004), CW, 15.
The classic, what’s worth studying, is what has already established itself in experience, and won’t go away.
“Critical Views” (1980s), 17, Northrop Frye’s Fiction and Miscellaneous Writings (2007), CW, 25.
If I were to be asked what my definition of a classic was, I would say it was a work that won’t go away. It just stands in front of you until you deal with it. It’s the angel that every Jacob has to wrestle with.
“Canadian Energies: Dialogues on Creativity” (1980), Interviews with Northrop Frye (2008), CW, 24.
What we call classics are works of literature that show an ability to communicate with other ages over the widest barriers of time, space, and language.
“The Expanding World of Metaphor” (1984), “The Secular Scripture” and Other Writings on Critical Theory, 1976–1991 (2006), CW, 18.
The original writer is the person who returns to origins. The man who produces the imperishable classic is not a man with a new story but a man who tells one of the world’s great stories again and tells it better.
“Music in My Life” (1985), Interviews with Northrop Frye (2008), CW, 24.
What we call a “classic” in literature is often a literary work so complex that understanding the “structure” becomes an indefinite and tentative sequence of responses.
“The Mythical Approach to Creation” (1985), Northrop Frye on Religion (2000), CW, 4.
Literature revolves around certain classics or models because it is really revolving around certain structural principles which those classics embody.
“The Developing Imagination” (1962), Northrop Frye’s Writings on Education (2001), CW, 7.
This coincides with a feeling we have all had: that the study of mediocre works of art remains a random and peripheral form of critical experience, whereas the profound masterpiece draws us to a point at which we seem to see an enormous number of converging patterns of significance.
“Polemical Introduction” (1957), Anatomy of Criticism: Four Essays (2006), CW, 22.
Classics, Greek & Roman
… Classical mythology became purely poetic after its oracles had ceased.
“Third Essay: Archetypal Criticism: Theory of Myths” (1957), Anatomy of Criticism: Four Essays (2006), CW, 22.
The first thing to be laid on top of a Biblical training, in my opinion, is Classical mythology, which gives us the same kind of imaginative framework, of a more fragmentary kind. Here again there are all sorts of incidental or secondary
