Structuralism and Literary Criticism

Hello Readers,
This blog is a part of my academic  activity which is given on this blog.

In literary theory, Structuralism is an approach to analysing the narrative material by examining the underlying invariant structure .There are many Structuralist critics like Ferdinand Saussure, Gerard Genette , Roland Barthes, Claude Levi-Strauss etc. Structuralist critics found basic common structure in every work. As all the human beings  have a same structure from inside, similarly literature has basic structure and it is same everywhere whether it movies, TV serials or advertisement etc.

Here I would like to refer to Northrop Frye: The Archetypes of Literature

" Frye identified common pattern in every work of art. So he talks about the totality of literature. According to him all are connected somewhere. And when we do criticism from this perspective, It is Archetypal criticism.

And Archetypal critics finds this sort of recurring pattern in literature. Narrative technique, Hero, structure are same everywhere."

I am trying to see three structures as a structuralist critic:-
1.) Revenge
2.) Detective
3.) Quest


Many movies or literature have the same structure of Revenge tragedy.

For example:-

1.) ‘Eega’ or ‘Makkhi’ (2012) directed by S.S Rajamouli and J.V.V.Sathyanarayana

Nani loves Bindu but is killed by a jealous Sudeep, who lusts after Bindu. Nani is reincarnated as a fly and decides to avenge his death. He teams up with Bindu to make Sudeep's life a living hell.

2.)‘Agneepath’( 2012 ) Indian action drama film directed by Karan Malhotra.

Vijay wants to take revenge of his father’s murder. His father was a teacher and a very good man. For taking this revenge, he stands against the system and gets himself involved in the goon’s world. He tries several tricks to reach Kancha and finally drags him to death but unfortunately loses his newly wedded wife and his own life in the end.

 3.)‘Kahaani’(2012) directed by Sujoy Ghosh.

 Vidya Bagchi is  the widow of Arup Basu, an IB officer and Damji's colleague, who was killed in the poison-gas attack. She comes Kolkata to avenge his death and at the end she is successful in taking her revenge.

 4.)‘Ek Hasina thi’(2004) directed by Shriram Raghvan

Sarika  falls for  Karan a charming and mysterious businessman. The whirlwind romance turns sour when she is framed for his underworld crimes.  Later she is finally out of prison and  ready for sweet revenge.

 5.)‘Baazigar’(1993) directed by Abbas-Mustan.

Ajay is frustrated from his father’s death and decides to take revenge. That is why he plans to make love with the daughters of his father’s murderer, thereby first killing the younger daughter, Seema and then marrying the elder one, Priya. After the marriage, he takes over the entire business of his enemy. But he really falls in love with Priya who later comes to know of all his plans. He is able to take his revenge but he himself dies in the end.

The above movies are some examples having the same structure of Revenge only the presentation of the director differs. There are many Bollywood movies have the same structure like ‘Haider’, ‘Zanjeer’, ‘Ghajini’, ‘Karz’ etc.

Many T.V series also have the same structure of detective series. For example:- ‘CID’ and ‘Crime Patrol’.  Structure is same for example murder occurs, detection and murderer found by detective. This structure is same in every episode they just do changes in representing the events. Same structure is also found in many Movies also like ‘Drishyam’.

In many literary texts also we find the similar structure.

For Example:

‘Doctor Faustus’ by Christopher Marlowe and ‘Frankenstein’ by Marry Shelley. In both the text  we see that the central character is in Quest of knowledge which ultimately leads them to their downfall. Same structure is also found in the  Greek mythology of , ‘Icarus’.




















From the above examples we can see that whether it is revenge, detective or Quest  the structure is basic and same everywhere only the presentation differs. we find common pattern in every piece of literature.