An Archetypal Study Of Herzog

Saul Bellow (1915-2005) is a very important American Jewish writer. Historically alert, Saul Bellow expresses his positive attitude of human beings in such a bland, material, encroaching reality in his works. Herzog, one of the best novels of ideas, won Nobel Prize for its author. Herzog, as a typical and important work of Saul Bellow, has won great interest of study. Living a traditional Jewish life when he was young, Saul Bellow was deeply influenced by Judaism and especially The Old Testament. This thesis just attempts to use archetypal theories to probe into the biblical archetypes in Herzog from characters, themes and structures. The biblical archetypes play great roles in this novel. The seemingly fragmentary and casual archetypes form a universal structural relevance which denotes deeper meaning of the author.The introduction gives a survey of the life of Saul Bellow and his literature accomplishment, shows us the importance of this novel Herzog and at last but not least explains the theory of archetypal criticism of Northrop Frye and the feasibility to apply it into this novel. The thesis includes three chapters.Chapter One discusses archetypal characters in Herzog. The name Moses Herzog hints us the relevance between the protagonist and the great Jewish hero. A successful intellectual betrayed by his wife, Herzog is also a modern Samson. Herzog is the combination of two archetypal characters, Moses and Samson. His wife Madeleine serves a complex function in this novel. She was "Delilah" who betrayed her lover and at the same time was "Eve" who fights for knowledge and for her own position in the men-dominated world.Chapter Two analyzes the archetypal themes of Herzog. America was paradise in Jewish Americans' eye. But in Herzog's eyes, modern people became indifferent to each other. As an intellectual Herzog fights a way out for himself as well as for everyone, like Moses who led the Hebrews out of the slavery of the Egyptian Pharaoh.Chapter Three explores the archetypal structures of this novel. Although the structure of Herzog is very complicated in which there are many flashbacks and letter writing, we can find the application of archetypal structures in this novel. The Bible narrative is created by a "U-shaped plot" comedy. The Old Testament and The New Testament form a circular structure. Herzog also depicts the protagonist's experiences and psychological changes in the shape of "U". The narrative structure of this novel is a circle.Saul Bellow illustrates the way of all fleshes by the use of archetypes. Herzog is an everyone in the modern world who sometimes cannot adapt to the brutal reality. This novel shows Bellow's concern about the psychological statement of modern people. Whatever difficulties and disasters his protagonists meet, they will overcome them eventually and attain a positive attitude toward life. This is the optimistic view of Bellow toward modern men.