Archetypal Visions of Impossible Love and Aborted Apocalypse In Fight Club
This book uses archetypal criticism to probe Chuck Palahniuk’s novel Fight Club and the literary phenomena of abortacalypse (aborted + apocalypse). The ultimate question of Fight Club is not the degree to which its archetypal imagery is divine or demonic, as Northrop Frye contends apocalyptic works to be; instead, the ultimate question of Fight Club is the degree to which the work moves from collective experience (myth), to individual experience (narrative), and back again to a collective lesson. By setting this novel at the familiar mythic edge of human civilization, at the apocalypse, the author allows himself the sort of character analysis that can only occur there: a full reckoning with self and sin. Yet, that this apocalypse is aborted maintains utter plausibility (an important criterion for Frye) by mirroring the experience of contemporary life. Fight Club’s mythic content loops back to the collective experience of time immemorial; the narrative tells the story of a specific psychotic man, while its narrative anti-climax exposes the collective experience of contemporary life. Palahniuk tells us that, for all the relief it would bring, we are powerless to prevent the apocalypse and possess love. First, I will discuss the ideas of a polemic critic, Northrop Frye. Frye’s “Theory of Archetypal Meaning” provides an important, systematic method with which to probe how myth functions to organize literature; however, Frye’s method is riddled with a cultural/religious bias that damages the validity of his results. His model cannot handle sincere, abortacalyptic texts like Fight Club. After exploring this bias, I will dramatically transform Frye’s “Theory of Archetypal Meaning” to create a model of archetypal meaning that accurately probe the themes of Fight Club. I will then explore the two main lines of this new model: the Individual and Collective Worlds. Finally, I will use this model to note insights into contemporary, post-modern life that the novel draws.
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Archetypal Visions of Impossible Love and Aborted Apocalypse In Fight Club
This book uses archetypal criticism to probe Chuck Palahniuk’s novel Fight Club and the literary phenomena of abortacalypse (aborted + apocalypse). The ultimate question of Fight Club is not the degree to which its archetypal imagery is divine or demonic, as Northrop Frye contends apocalyptic works to be; instead, the ultimate question of Fight Club is the degree to which the work moves from collective experience (myth), to individual experience (narrative), and back again to a collective lesson. By setting this novel at the familiar mythic edge of human civilization, at the apocalypse, the author allows himself the sort of character analysis that can only occur there: a full reckoning with self and sin. Yet, that this apocalypse is aborted maintains utter plausibility (an important criterion for Frye) by mirroring the experience of contemporary life. Fight Club’s mythic content loops back to the collective experience of time immemorial; the narrative tells the story of a specific psychotic man, while its narrative anti-climax exposes the collective experience of contemporary life. Palahniuk tells us that, for all the relief it would bring, we are powerless to prevent the apocalypse and possess love. First, I will discuss the ideas of a polemic critic, Northrop Frye. Frye’s “Theory of Archetypal Meaning” provides an important, systematic method with which to probe how myth functions to organize literature; however, Frye’s method is riddled with a cultural/religious bias that damages the validity of his results. His model cannot handle sincere, abortacalyptic texts like Fight Club. After exploring this bias, I will dramatically transform Frye’s “Theory of Archetypal Meaning” to create a model of archetypal meaning that accurately probe the themes of Fight Club. I will then explore the two main lines of this new model: the Individual and Collective Worlds. Finally, I will use this model to note insights into contemporary, post-modern life that the novel draws.
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Archetypal Visions of Impossible Love and Aborted Apocalypse In Fight Club
Archetypal Visions of Impossible Love and Aborted Apocalypse In Fight Club
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Product Details
| BN ID: | 2940012002495 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Ryan Schoon |
| Publication date: | 12/19/2010 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| File size: | 160 KB |
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