Setting and Plot Archetypes - Essay Example

Archetypal characters appear repeatedly in legends worldwide. An angel is an archetype of a tragic hero who is trying to overcome the evils of his past. Many literature theories classify archetypes by the roles or purposes the character represents in the story. The classifications are protagonist, antagonist, reason, emotion, sidekick, skeptic, guardian, and antagonist. Caught in the Widow’s Web Caught in the Widow’s web is a story written by Gordon Rice, which can be divided into three structural archetype types.

These archetypal structures are character archetype, plot archetype, and setting archetype. The characters, setting, and plot archetypes that are believed to be the most important to this story have been well used by the author to convey a very complex psychological and philosophical narrative. Archetypes' main purpose is to produce certain psychic forms, their description, and, various means of demonstration. BVCharacter archetypes The character archetypes in this narrative include the hunter, black widow, child, mother, and scavenger.

Given that the story is in first-personArchetypes'n viewpoint, the reader gains access to the narrator's mind. In this case, the heroic hunter is the narrator, who is a hero in his narrative; He embarks on a quest to find black widows in the village and neighborhood. He found them in discarded wheels and tires, house foundations and cellars, automotive shops and tool sheds, and water meters and rock gardens. Other character archetypes are the villains in the town that is revealed in the first paragraph (Kennedy, &, Gioia, 1323) According to Miller, (126), the character archetype is the black widow as she is the object of the hunter’s fury and the heroic hunter seeks and destroys as many villains as possible.

The black widow archetype character is an illusion of something evil and any bad thing that happens in a person’s life is associated with the active malevolent. Black widows always waited in the dark to ambush their victims. A black widow in somebody’s life cannot be reasoned with, just like the heroes cannot reason with their nemesis. Grice also sees the tiny spider as a villain who represents the black widow. The hero hunts them wherever he goes and at the same time, he fears them and realizes that they are too many to hunt, as much as he resolved to hunt them in the whole town.

The Black widow in this narrative is seen as the ultimate villain, yet it is a small and malevolent creature with a high potential for mass destruction. It possesses venom that contains a neurotoxin that produces sweats, vomiting, swelling, convulsions, and several other symptoms. The author also despises widows and sees them as abominations of nature, which is good in the world. Setting Archetypes The setting archetypes in this narrative include the town, the web, and the cosmos or universe.

This narrative is filled with material demonstrating archetypal forms that when pieced together reveal a web of intricacies that can overwhelm even the most analytical eye. The town is the main setting archetype that provides the battling ground between the villain and the hero throughout the story. The town represents the area in which the heroic hunter searches for and destroys the black widow.