The Literature of Love: Literary Archetypes Flashcards
Femme Fatale
Origin: Ancient times e.g. The Sirens in Greek mythology
An attractive or seductive woman, especially one who will ultimately cause distress to a man who becomes involved with her.
Cuckold
Origin: Elizabethan Era+
A man whose wife deceives him by having sex with another man.
Tragic Hero
Origins: Ancient Greeks, Roman drama
A character of noble origin and heroic qualities who possesses a fatal flaw which ruins them.
Damsel in Distress
Origin: Medieval Era
A beautiful young woman placed in a dire predicament by a villain or monster and who requires a hero to be rescued. After rescuing her, the hero often obtains her hand in marriage.
Byronic Hero
Origin: Romantic Era
Defined by their rejection of standard social conventions and norms of behaviour, their alienation from larger society, their focus on the self as the centre of existence, and their ability to inspire others to commit acts of good and kindness. Romantic heroes are not idealised heroes, but imperfect and often flawed individuals who, despite their sometimes less than savoury personalities, often behave in a heroic manner.
Example: Heathcliff
Ingenue
Origin: Georgian Era
Typically, the ingénue is beautiful, kind, gentle, sweet, virginal, and often naïve, in mental or emotional danger, or even physical danger, usually a target of the “Heartless Seducer” whom she may have mistaken for the “Hero”.
Knight Errand
Origin: Medieval Era
A figure of medieval chivalric romance literature. The adjective errant (meaning “wandering, roving”) indicates how the knight-errand would wander the land in search of adventures to prove his chivalric virtues, either in knightly duels or in some other pursuit of courtly love.
Shrew
Origin: Middle Ages
An unpleasant, ill-tempered woman characterised by scolding, nagging, and aggression is a comedic stock character in Literature.
Heartless seducer
Origins: Restoration Comedies (17thC)
A man that takes pleasure in wine, women and immoral behaviour.
