Northrop Frye
World-Leading Literary Theorist

Internationally renowned literary critic, celebrated Canadian author, and inspirational teacher to thousands, Northrop Frye spent most of his highly productive academic career at Victoria College, University of Toronto. Born at Sherbrooke, Quebec, in 1912, raised in Moncton, New Brunswick, in an evangelical Methodist environment, Frye, a student at Victoria College in the early 1930s, joined the staff of its English department in 1939 following two years of graduate work at Merton College, Oxford. Much later, in 1978, Frye was named Chancellor of Victoria. Although his links to Victoria stayed close virtually to his death in 1991, he was anything but local in his work and interests. Indeed, his influential scholarship earned him global accolades and a worldwide reputation verging on reverence. This led to numerous honours, ties with and lecture tours to many centres of learning in other lands. Overall, his scholarship includes some 25 books of profoundly critical analysis of English literature that focuses primarily on symbolism and on the Bible as the very foundation for Western world literature.

His first key work, Fearful Symmetry (1947), studied the deliberate symbolic patterns used in the prophetic poems of William Blake, religious romantic and visionary artist of England’s late eighteenth century. Next — in point of significance — came Anatomy of Criticism (1957) wherein Frye set forth a whole universe of verbal symbolism shared by all of Western literature. He sought, in fact, to provide a unified pattern for literary studies beyond the merely personal outbursts of the would-be great. For that effort he gained worldwide supporters and some opposition. Yet he went on further with his Great Code (1982) which analyzed the writings and rhetoric of the classic English Bible. This was followed by his last major work, a second grand biblical study, Words with Power, published in 1990. Frye made literary criticism a discipline itself. This had global impact. Those students, both undergraduate and graduate who attempted to follow his footsteps, were affectionately called “small Fryes.” 

One of the 20th century’s most esteemed and respected inter-preters of western literature, Northrop Frye, mythologist and cultural intellect, generated a global following that today is reflected in the world’s great institutions of higher learning [The Toronto Star].
He also produced Northrop Frye on Shakespeare in 1986, edited the Canadian Forum in younger years (1948-52), and wrote about the Canadian identity with sensitive, compelling penetration of Canada’s character and image. He was, besides, a stimulating member of Massey College, a renowned graduate and research institution of the University of Toronto. But first and foremost, Frye was a brilliant teacher. In social conversation he might often have seemed withdrawn, though always he was both kind and sensitive. In lecture performances he was totally committed, glowing, and inspiring while his smaller, advanced seminars were no less a challenging experience of wit and insight. Consequently, he drew students from across the country, from the United States, and from around the world. From England to Australia and back to Canada he left an indelible mark. Just as there are courses offered on Milton or Keats or Shakespeare, there are today educational institutes offering courses on Frye.

Genius and a warm heart can sometimes go together. They clearly co-existed in this very special, Canadian intellectual.