Literary Criticism/Archetypal Literary Criticism

Archetypal criticism focuses on the archetypes ( comedy, romance,  tragedy, and  anti-romance) of stories. This school relies on the theories of the psychologist Carl Jung that all stories originate from the collective unconscious. This school of criticism involves the analysis of symbols (even ones unintended by the author) in the literature.

Archetypal criticism was further developed in the twentieth century by Northrop Frye.