Character & Image
Archetype
An archetype is a primal, universal image, motif, or scheme that recurs in the myths, folklore, and literature of different peoples and epochs. The concept was introduced into psychology by Carl Gustav Jung as a 'primordial image' of the collective unconscious — an inherited structure of the psyche that manifests in dreams, religion, and art (the archetypes of the Mother, the Shadow, the Anima, the Wise Old Man, the Self). In literary studies, the theory of archetypes was developed by Northrop Frye ('Anatomy of Criticism'), who linked them to recurring mythological schemes and 'modes.' Archetypal images include the World Tree, the Road, the Flood, Death-and-Rebirth, and the initiation of the hero. Archetypal analysis reveals the deep, unconscious structures of the artistic image. The archetype (a psychological-mythological concept) must be distinguished from the identically named textological term for a work's original text. Archetypal images appear vividly in Lesia Ukrainka's 'The Forest Song.'
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Meaning, origins and distinction — side by side.
Distinction
Two sources of an image, polar in nature. The archetype is a PRIMAL, universal, impersonal scheme from the collective unconscious (Jung), an inherited proto-image (the Mother, the Shadow, the Hero) that structures the work from within the psyche. The prototype, conversely, is a REAL concrete person, historical or contemporary to the author, whose life became material for a character. The archetype is universal and invisible; the prototype, singular and documentary. One comes from the depths of the psyche; the other, from a real biography.
