Northrop Frye’s Notebooks for Anatomy of Critcism

Northrop Frye’s Anatomy of Criticism (1957) is widely regarded as a masterpiece of literary theory. The product of years of reading and reflection, the book’s value extends far beyond its impact on criticism as a whole; ultimately, it must be viewed as a synoptic defense of liberal learning by one of the twentieth century’s most distinguished critics. In this, the twenty-third volume of the Collected Works, editor Robert D. Denham presents the notebooks to the Anatomy, blue-prints, as it were, for Frye’s comprehensive account of literary conventions. Composed from the late 1940s to 1956, the notebooks document the struggle Frye underwent to provide a structure for his work. This involved incorporating previously published essays and developing new material that would maintain the continuity of his argument. This fully annotated volume contains seventeen holograph notebooks, each illuminating some aspect of the grand structure that eventually emerged. Altogether, the notebooks offer an intimate picture of Frye’s working process and a renewed appreciation for his magisterial accomplishment.