Northrop Frye and the Book as Metaphor and Material Artefact

Few strains of literary study seem further from Northrop Frye’s critical project than the history of the book. In light of this distance, this essay is inspired by two primary objectives. The first is to cast light on Frye’s treatment of the book as a material artefact, a theme that has received relatively little attention. The second is to draw attention to the important role of the material book as metaphor in Frye’s writings, and consider its implications for the practice of book history. Working against prevailing stereotypes of both Frye’s visionary humanism and book history, this essay attempts to bridge the two by considering how books as physical artefacts participate in the work of the imagination. I argue that Frye’s attentiveness to the socially symbolic power of the book, and his various explorations of the metaphorical possibilities of this artefact, provide powerful instances of how cultural meanings of media of inscription signify alongside their verbal contents.